Blobbing, Complete

Well, this is the end of the road for my blobbing career for the time being.
This was actually quite an enjoyable project to do, and I am impressed with how simple it really ended up being. It really was innovative and I think suits Slaughter-House perfectly.

My opinions have been captured in blobs of blogs and I don't have anything else to say.

Farewell!

Vonnegusto: Connections

To start, Vonnegusto by Ding, is a comprehensive blog.
I must note that I decided to call her up for some specific blog posts, so thanks Ding! For anyone who cares, she is the also one who sabotaged my profile picture while I was in Japan. Yeah, thanks again, Ding.
Oh, we also used to share Amber Blob, until she fell in love with Tumblr (half my friends are addicts), and the split became more convenient while I was away.
This turned out quite well, because now I can comment on her lovely blog, Vonnegusto.


There is SO much to work with!
Ding's content or points, will appear in red, my own will be blue.

I chose four different posts to focus on:

Putting on Some Spec[ulation]s

“What if a demon were to creep after you one night, in your loneliest loneliness, and say, 'This life which you live must be lived by you once again and innumerable times more; and every pain and joy and thought and sigh must come again to you, all in the same sequence. The eternal hourglass will again and again be turned and you with it, dust of the dust!' Would you throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse that demon? Or would you answer, 'Never have I heard anything more divine'?”

- Friedrich Nietzsche

• Billy Pilgrim will never stop travelling through time (Friedrich Nietzsche reference)
• He has "always lived and always will live."

It took quite a while to get through this post and understand it thoroughly, but I think that I am able to condense it into this: Billy Pilgrim is destined - or fated - into reliving his life over and over again, every "pain and joy and thought and sigh". 
Nietzsche puts the concept quite aptly with his quote, above. Make life worth it so that you would not mind reliving it over and over again, because like Billy, you might have to. 
Billy's "laissez-fair" view of life is the affects of the recycling of his life, he has grown apathetic, pathetic, and allows whatever happens to him, happen.

"Billy Pilgrim stood there politely, giving the marksman another chance." 

Nietzche and Vonnegut's ideas collide here. Nietzche encourages us to pretend that we will have to relive our lives repeatedly, and that we need to make life as bearable and good as possible. Vonnegut, uses Billy as an example of willingly giving yourself to Fate. I think Billy is an example of what not to do, given his pathetic character. Hold on and focus on the good.

This Post is a Fart

A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved.

- Kurt Vonnegut

• Vonnegut himself was a humanist
• Slaughter-House's "cataract of a thundering moral statement" is very well hidden
• Vonnegut insists that the most important thing in life is to be kind to one another
• Love is an essential part of being human, and make life livable

I don't think I could agree any more. Prior to reading the book, we were encouraged to do some background reading on Vonnegut, and I found many links to his own speeches about the message of world peace and humanism. 

Here are a few:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csrmqhxw-P8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGRyO1H6jOk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAcNFTu9gjU

He was a definite humanist and understood the need for love among fellow human beings on our Earth. I also agree with Ding, that, Slaughter-House Five's message is hidden excellently. I like that - it makes the novel serve purpose two-fold - as a piece of literature and a work of persuasion (think about the thin veil of symbolism in Orwell's Animal Farm, it is only enjoyable when read as a warning against fascism and Stalinism). It might seem that Vonnegut is apathetic to human life, especially with his repeating phrase "So it goes", which is used whenever life is lost. But, like Ding, I believe that it was the whole point: a way to wake us up to the reality that love is essential. 

With love, humans can be "quiet and trusting and beautiful".

The Ultimate Paradox

Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.

- Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness

• Billy Pilgrim is an "exemplar of what not to do"
• Billy Pilgrim did have a fate, not only in his fictional world based on reality, but also as he is a character manipulated by his author
• "Unlike us, Billy Pilgrim has met aliens who really do know the future. Unlike us, Billy Pilgrim is a fictional character. Fictional characters always have a fate: in books, authors play God."

In Ding's other posts I agreed with what she was saying. This time, I agree ever more enthusiastically. Actually, she used the same phrase "what not to do", italics and all, as I did earlier in this same post. I had not read The Ultimate Paradox at that time. Ding just made it sound a lot better :)

Billy Pilgrim cannot be used as an example for us in our own lives far a variety of reasons. He is fictional and he was meant to be an "anti-example". Billy Pilgrim was condemned to his fate, Slaughter-House, but we are condemned to be free, we have no author.

Lart Pour Lart
"Art is the stored honey of the human soul"

- Theodore Dreisier

• All art is not useless, in contrary to Oscar Wilde
• Art is like "corrective lenses for human souls"

Sigh. I could probably go on about this subject forever at is one of my passions. As an artist myself (I used to feel uncomfortable saying that, but really everyone is in their own way), I strongly believe that art is what makes humans humans. Not language, not intellect, not complex emotions - although those add to our identity. Art is the sweet, enduring, eternal nectar of ourselves, and is one of the most important things to leave behind on this world before you pass. Why? Because it is unique, and no one else will give birth to the same thing. Yes, science is good, and beautiful in many other rights, but, in science, great minds think alike. In the realm of the arts, alikeness is unattainable.

This subject isn't very relevant to Slaughter-House, or my blog, but it is in one way: Slaughter-House Five is a gift from the essence of Kurt Vonnegut's being. That in itself is something great, but as he is a veteran of life, and war and love, it makes it something even greater.

I thought this was a nice way to end  my final assignment. 

Slaughter-House Five, is a piece of art.

Now that is something worth reading.

Culture, Again

I admit I've never been very good at thoroughly reading instructions.

I totally missed the Alternate Blog Topic, and although I've done 6-9, I want to write about this one!

I will keep it sweet and simple though, and simply make my point in beautiful point form

• Vonnegut dedicated Slaughter-House to a German taxi driver, who had fought for Germany
• He treats both sides of the conflict as equals
• He does not once attack Germany
• He does not once defend, or condone, Germany and it's actions in the war
• although he mentions Hitler, he does not say anything offensive, but just wishes that he was an innocent baby again
• "The dog who had sounded so ferocious in the winter distances, was a German shepherd. She was shivering. Her tail was between her legs. She had been borrowed that morning from a farmer. She had never been to war before. She had no idea what game was being played. Her name was Princess". Need Vonnegut say more? The German soldier body was just embodied by an innocent puppy-dog. They looked big, mean, tough, but had no idea what was going on.
• German soldiers are portrayed as fairly harmless and friendly, on the POW camp
• Although he portrays Americans in a rather pathetic way, I think that he had to do so to prove his point, and encourage a bit of good ol' humility

As an end note, I cannot think of any reasons today that can justify assimilation and culture conformity. I love multiculturalism. I relish in it, in the language, the diversity, the music and oh, the food! I am the first one to stand up for it and I will be the last to destroy its beauty.

However, Vonnegut is not from my time. The Holocaust and other events of genocide, are not either.

I can, and do understand that when one's life and family's lives are on the line, sacrifices must be made, and sometimes that is culture. It's unfortunate and tragic, but time and time again, history has proven the sad reality that humans have not valued one another as equals.

So, in conclusion:

Vonnegut loves America.

Vonnegut loves Germany.

Vonnegut regrets not having the opportunity to become more familiar with German culture.

I understand why, and I understand why he could not.

Slaughter-House and the World

While reading through the topic suggestions for writing assignments 6 through 9, none of them really grabbed my attention, except for the second one: "How would the novel be received in different areas of the world? Would the novel have the same impact in different areas of the world? Would the novel have the same impact in another country or culture?". 


As you may have noticed from my other posts, I have indeed been to Japan recently. I have experienced the culture first hand, and I think that I would do a decent job on this topic. Also, being a mixture of two ethnicities, with complete opposite cultures, has given me some idea of how Slaughter-House Five would be accepted – and interpreted in different cultures.
Slaughter-House Five was written by an American for an American audience.
Yes, there are many themes that can only be picked up by an audience familiar with American society and ideals, however, the topic is universal. War, and the effects of war, has touched every corner of the inhabited world. Also, the novel is centered on the Second World War, which touched all major political powers of the day.


I can also make arguments that Slaughter-House could make a big impact in Japanese society. Japan was completely and utterly devastated during the war, and at the end was left weak and desperate. They had refused to back down and surrender to the Americans because of one thing: Honour. Ever since the time of the samurai, it brought shame to your family to surrender, it was better to commit suicide. After the atomic bombs however, this way of thinking has greatly changed. Many of the strong, stubborn ideals of prior generations were snuffed out. I feel that the Japanese would greatly sympathize with Vonnegut’s message and pathetic characters. The Japanese hate the idea of war, but have learned to accept what has happened in the past. Kurt Vonnegut hates war too, but accepts them “like glaciers”. 


Although I don’t know an awful lot about other cultures around the world, I feel that the subject matter in the novel is very universal. Vonnegut sympathizes with both sides of the conflict, does not glorify death and suffering, and most importantly does not place blame on anyone. 


We are all equal in the eyes of Vonnegut and I think that is the most important thing in an accepting audience.

Dot of Time

"The guide invited the crowd to imagine that they were looking across a desert at a mountain range on a day that was twinkling bright and clear. They could look at a peak or a bird or a cloud, at a stone right in front of them, or even down into a canyon behind them. But among them was this poor Earthling, and his head was encased in a steel sphere which he could never take off. There was only one eyehole through which he could look, and welded to that eyehole were six feet of pipe... Whatever poor Billy saw through the pipe, he had no choice but to say to himself, 'That's life.'"
- Kurt Vonnegut (Slaughter-House Five)
 

What's Up with the Tralfamadorians?

 

Reading Slaughter-House Five, the only thing that really takes the audience by surprise is Billy's founded belief in Tralfamadore and it's inhabitants. Billy seems to be normal (remember, that's a relative term), until he begins to go on about his "two feet high, and green, and shaped like plumber's friends" friends. His daughter, Barbara, thought the same thing. He's gone bonkers.

 Maybe there is a planet called Tralfamadore somewhere, and maybe the little creatures do exist, don't ask me, I don't know.

However, there is plenty of textual evidence revealing the development of Billy's mind. 

Billy and Vonnegut both needed closure and an explanation for all the atrocities that had occured during the war. So it goes, what Tralfamadorians say when they see a corpse, at first glance seems to be an apathetic way to address someone who has died. But it makes perfect sense: "One death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic". Billy/Vonnegut needed some kind of mechanism to deal and process the immense destruction that they witnessed.

The Tralfamadore philosophy also states that when someone is dead, they are simply having "a bad day", and soon enough they would be reliving their happier moments. This must have been greatly reassuring to Billy, as he saw thousands of people die around him, and knew the manner of his own death.

The Tralfamadorian motif could be understood differently all together: Vonnegut's way of excusing himself from describing war in such a light mannered way. It screams, "Don't take that too seriously, I also believe in this." He is still trying to make sense of it all, and the novel represents this inner struggle.

The sketches above I made while considering this blog post. 

The top sketches were inspired by the Carl Sagan video about the 4th dimension. If 2-D objects can only see 3-D ones as slices, then it would make sense that humans see time as progressive slices. Tralfamadorians see it all as one shape, one continuous Time.

On the left and right side are little drawings of the aliens, just to give an idea of what they are like.

In the centre, I sketched out what I find to be one of the most fascinating things that the Tralfamadorians describe. 

"[They] don't see human beings as two-legged creatures... They see them as great-millipedes -'with babies' legs at one end and old people's legs at the other'"

We are all young, middle-aged and old, simultaneously.

My Opinions on Slaughter-House Five

To be very honest, although I do not regret reading it in the least, I am rather disappointed with Slaughter-House Five. I admit I had high expectations for Slaughter-House Five because of the things I had heard about Kurt Vonnegut and the book itself. I also felt like I needed a break from the several dystopian texts we had read: 1994 and Brave New World. Although I thoroughly enjoyed both and each got me thinking, it was a lot to process. My father, an avid historian, had talked about the bombing of Dresden on several occasions as he studied both history and political science in university. I hadn't understood the big picture and I am usually quite interested in the history of the two world wars.

Having that said, I was not prepared - in the least - for the non-linear way this book is written. At first I marveled at the ingenuity of it all, but my enthusiasm slowly died as it became increasingly difficult to get much meaning out of the novel. The ideas, themes and style were captivating, but the characters, plot, lack of clarity and strong emotion, was utterly appalling. Perhaps it would be more correct to say that I was disappointed in myself for not being able to squeeze more out of it, as many others have been able to do so.

And so, I attempted reading parts of the book over, such as Billy's death and the night he was abducted by the Tralfamadorians, but I found myself becoming even more lost. One unanswered question led to another, and as my brain tried to make logic of the story, by sorting it in linear way, it became impossible to find exactly where something was in the book. 

I think that Slaughter-House Five is so genius, that it cannot be constrained to, or is compatible with the physical pages of a book. It doesn't work the same way that three dimensional shapes try to interact with two dimensional ones. When I get the chance, I am determined to read the novel over again, and perhaps follow along with a time line, or some other graphic organizer.

Until then, Slaughter-House Five, you remained unconquered.

I wanted to end this post with a quote... but flipping through the book now, I can't find it. Darn.