Chapter Seven: A Quatrain to End All Quatrains!

A quatrain is a poem consisting of four lines, or four lines of a poem that can be considered a unit. The quatrain in chapter seven occurs when a group of optometrists called the Four-eyed Bastards sing for Billy Pilgrim's father-in-law. They sing the following:

"Me and Mike, ve vork in mine.
Holy shit, ve have good time.
Vunce a veek ve get our pay.
Holy shit, no vork next day."

Chapter Six: Death is Everywhere

"If you protest, if you think that death is a terrible thing, then you have not understood a word I've said." -Billy Pilgrim

Death is an unavoidable force in all living creatures. That is an irrevocable fact. Some creatures die prematurely, and some die after living full lives. Some creatures die peacefully, and some die in horrific agony. Although death is so common, we have yet to fully understand death. Slaughterhouse Five is full of death references, and it famously says "So it goes." I started thinking about how casual that phrase is. Its almost like Vonnegut is nonchalant discussing the very dark subject of death.  I believe it is because our culture is filled references of death. Think about all the times someone has talked about a person who died, watched a TV show that depicted death, or listened to a song about violence and murder.  Let's take a look through various aspects of our culture to see death in its various forms:

Music:

"And Weep" and the cover contain quite a bit of violence and murder.

"This Song Plays Suicide" is about suicide (duh). The cover implies cannibalism.

Movies:
                                                             The Crazies

Other:
Obituaries in newspapers
TV shows (both comical and dramatic)
Video games
Books
Art
Crime and Punishment (death penalty)
...and so on.






I think you get the idea. I believe that Vonnegut is so casual when he mentions death because people are so used to the constant exposure, so death lost its impact. We are used to a force we can't understand; therefore, Vonnegut drives this point home. So it goes.

Chapter Six: Allusion

In chapter six, Billy is awoken by "animal magnetism" and discovers two small lumps in the lining of his overcoat. He is told to "...be content with knowing that they could work miracles for him, provided he did not insist on learning their nature."


This reminds me of a biblical story Vonnegut mentioned in chapter one: the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. While Lot and his wife were fleeing, Lot's wife is overcome with the irresistible temptation to look back. She knew it would immobilize her, but she could not resist and paid the consequences.

Billy knows that he has been instructed not to investigate the mysterious lumps, but his curiosity is piqued. He has to try his absolute hardest to curb his desire to find out in order to avoid any negative ramifications that may occur.

Chapter Five: The Future!

We've all wished to know the future. In chapter five, Billy tells his wife Valencia that she looks fine as she is, although she apparently is hideous. But Billy knows that his marriage is comfortable based on his time travel adventure. This made me think about how easy my life decisions would be if I could see the outcomes before they ever happened. Think about how assured we could be in our decisions if the Tralfamadorian principle of time actually existed!

Chapter Five: Dramatic Irony

Chapter 5 has an excellent example of dramatic irony. A German guard in the Dresden prisoner of war camp knocks down an American prisoner for seemingly no reason at all. The man was perplexed by the guard's action, so he asks "Why me?" The guard responds with a stereotypical German accent "Vy you? Vy anybody?"

If you remember in chapter four, Billy asks his Tralfamadorian captors why he was being captured.This shows dramatic irony because the reader knows that the responses were the same (minus the accent), and the characters do not.

Chapter Four: Why?

When Billy is abducted by the Tralfamadorians, he asks a question that all of us would ask in a similar situation: "Why?"

I think this shows that the human condition is full of curiosity. In our lives, when an act of pure chance occurs (good or bad), we often wonder why we were the one chosen over all the other people who could have been. Vonnegut showed an accurate depiction of human behavior by making Billy ask such a simple question.

Chapter Four: Explication

Chapter four has an interesting moment where one could use explication. While rummaging through his daughter's former room, her phone rings. "Billy answered. There was a drunk on the other end. Billy could almost smell his breath—mustard gas and roses. It was a wrong number. Billy hung up." After finishing the chapter, I realized that the drunk was actually Kurt Vonnegut himself. Vonnegut mentioned that he had a habit of becoming inebriated and calling former girlfriends.



In addition, the use of roses, symbolic of romance, and mustard gas, a deadly chemical weapon, seems strange. However, I think it shows how deeply the war affected Vonnegut, and that he can no longer appreciate normal things (roses) without remembering the horrors of war (mustard gas).