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What kind of man is Billy Pilgrim in "Slaughterhouse-Five"? Why does Kurt Vonnegut choose to make a man like Pilgrim the protagonist of his novel?

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The protagonist of Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse-Five", Billy Pilgrim, is a quintessential anti-hero because he is an unequivocal vehicle for anti-war sentiment, yet lacks any admirable or heroic qualities. An optometry student before getting drafted in the military in World War II, Billy is nerdy and awkward. While many of his peers display the bravado and assertiveness expected of a soldier, Billy is ridiculed for his physical and mental fragility; he has frequent mental meltdowns and is consistently passive in the way he experiences everything. A case in point: he and his fellow POWs survive one of the deadliest massacres, the firebombing of Dresden, by hiding in a meat-locker. The irony that he survives the war without contributing any dashing or heroic effort underscores the futility of war and the arbitrary, senseless loss of life. 
Vonnegut's decision to characterize Billy as a pathetic weakling is essential to deconstructing the generic archetype of the hyper-masculine soldier. Vonnegut wants to make a larger point about the depravity and inhumanity of war in spite of its frequent glorification in literature and history. The best way to achieve that is through a sensitive character like Billy, whose military experiences leave him mentally scarred, begging the question: is surviving war more desirable than dying? Through Billy's PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and deluded belief that he has been abducted by aliens, Vonnegut indicates that war has taken a huge toll on Billy's mental well-being. Thus, Vonnegut successfully uses Billy as a tool to critique the destructiveness and pointlessness of war.

Answer

Billy Pilgrim is exactly the sort of character that Kurt Vonnegut would make his protagonist, especially in Slaughterhouse-Five. The author is known for his anti-war sentiments that underline most of his writing, which leads him to counter-act almost everything about the average war novel. He uses a lot of autobiographical material. For example, Vonnegut personally lived through the firebombing of Dresden—which Billy Pilgrim also survives—that marked the most traumatic experience of his life. For that reason, Vonnegut uses the character of Billy Pilgrim to illustrate his philosophy about war, death, and reality.
Broadly speaking, most war novels can be categorized as one of the following two: those that were written by people who have actually been in a war and those that were written by people who clearly haven't. Vonnegut belongs in the former. There is nothing glorious about war in his vision. There is no poetic justice, and most importantly, the soldiers don't follow a dramatic character arc where they start off being scared little boys and grow into heroes. Vonnegut's soldiers grow into traumatized adults with more or less severe PTSD. That is the case for Billy Pilgrim. He does not want to go to war. Nothing in war calls to him, and that never changes. He doesn't get used to it, and he doesn't develop a taste for it. Billy doesn't even get to a level of coping or dealing with the aftermath of it all. He survives only because fate has determined he will not die in the war. The only reason Billy comes out of it with any sanity is that he "becomes unstuck in time."
Billy Pilgrim is meant to be a caricature, almost: the absolute opposite of a macho war hero. After all, most people who are sent to war find means to manage, some better than others, but Billy really is a hopeless cause where the war is concerned. Rather than being a portrayal of a person unsuited for combat, Billy is a symbol of the entire world being dragged into the horrors of war. He is absolutely adrift, entirely passive, and more an observer of his own life than the person actually living it. He is, in a way, every person during times of war: helpless to stop it, just sailing along and going through the motions, waiting for it to end.

Slaughterhouse-Five Questions and Answers
by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

What kind of man is Billy Pilgrim in "Slaughterhouse-Five"? Why does Kurt Vonnegut choose to make a man like Pilgrim the protagonist of his novel?

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