Saturday 12 March 2011

Connections to Billy Pilgrim by Marie Price

Greetings from Japan!


The let lag is starting to get to me so I've decided to blog rather than wake everyone up by showering. I'm drinking 100% milk while I write it, and wow, it is delicious! Getting on topic, visiting Japan has provided me new, unique way to experience Slaughterhouse-Five. On the flight here, I lost a day and returning I will gain it back, it is definitely a strange feeling, let alone trying to talk to family and friends back home at a reasonable time, as Japan is 14 hours ahead of Windsor's time zone. Perhaps it is a similar feeling to what Billy Pilgrim experienced! More importantly however, with the recent earthquakes, the messages of Slaughterhouse-Five hold even more importance. When the strongest earthquake hit, my mother, my two younger cousins and I were on the subway platform waiting for a transfer, after visiting the National historical museum. I'm lucky to not have been on the train or at my relative's, as both places would have been much more dangerous. Similar to Billy waiting to be shot by the sniper, while everything shook I stood there with a very blank expression. Tokyo tower rocked like a pendulum. It was nauseating. Then with all the deaths due to the earthquake and following tsunamis, I'm ever more grateful I wasn't father north. Anyways, I feel like one very lucky Billy today, so perhaps I'll be lucky again so that the trains will open so I can continue my journey to Kyoto. Oh by the way, I'm perfectly fine and safe.


There's so many more connections to Slaughterhouse I just can't mention all of them! I'll blog again soon, and actually do a writing assignment... in the meanwhile, I'm going to make more rice.


Have a great march break everyone!


Marie

Saturday 5 March 2011

Slaughterhouse-Five Censorship by Marié

Where and why was Slaughterhouse-Five banned in America?


  • Banned in Rochester, Mich. because the novel "contains and makes references to religious matters"
  • Banned in Levittown, NY (1975), North Jackson, Ohio (1979), and Lakeland, Fla. (1982) because of the "book's explicit sexual scenes, violence, and obscene language." 
  • Banned from the Fitzgerald, Ga. schools (1987) because it was "filled with profanity and full of explicit sexual references." 
  • Restricted to students who have parental permission at the four Racine, Wis. Unified District high school libraries (1986) because of "language used in the book, depictions of torture, ethnic slurs, and negative portrayal of women."
  • Challenged at the Owensboror, Ky. High School library (1985) because of "foul language, a section depicting a picture of an act of bestiality, a reference to 'Magic Fingers' attached to the protagonist's bed to help him sleep, and the sentence: 'The gun made a ripping sound like the opening of the fly of God Almighty.'" 
  • Challenged in the LaRue County, Ky. High School library (1987) because "the book contains foul language and promotes deviant sexual behavior."  
  • Challenged in the Baton Rouge, La. public high school libraries (1988) because the book is "vulgar and offensive." 
  • Challenged in the Monroe, Mich. public schools (1989) as required reading in a modern novel course for high school juniors and seniors because of the book's language and the way women are portrayed.
  • an obvious anti-American sentiment, unpatriotic
Religious Matters
I personally think that reference to religion should cause the censorship or a novel, and especially in Slaughterhouse-Five, there is nothing overtly offensive. Unless a novel contains material propagating hate about a religious sect or people, similar to Nazism, a novel should not be censored for questioning belief systems. If someone is convinced in their beliefs they should be able to defend themselves from the doubts of others, and only make them stronger in their faith.

Sexually Explicit
Sex is natural, and we all learn about it or do it someday! I don't understand why very young people would be reading this book, and if they were, they are clearly at a level of maturity that they can handle some sexual material. Otherwise, don't read it.

Obscene Language
Similarly to sexual material, we will all come across obscene language at some point in our lives, whether it is in Slaughterhouse-Five or while watching TV. If you can't handle the language, once again, put the book down.

Sexism
Now this is one that can be debated, and I am particularly sympathetic to this reason, as I am female. However, books with sexist undertones of the past should not be banned nor censored as a reminder of the social and political progression we have seen, and how wrong it really is. Slaughterhouse-Five, I do not find offensive, women just seem very archetypal,  but I don't think that is justification to ban the novel. Besides, Slaughterhouse is a war book, and men fought the wars Vonnegut experienced. Women did much on the home-front, but the novel is more focussed on the tragedy of the front-lines.

Anti-American Sentiment
Although there isn't official documentation that this was used as a reason to ban the book, it is a wrong reason to do so. If the American Government was truly confident of themselves, and open about their dealings, small comments in a novel should not concern them. However, if a novel does bring light to political controversy, citizens should be encouraged to read it and set things right. Unfortunately, there is the problem of insulting veterans and the families of those who lost loved ones in war, but as Vonnegut experienced the war in similar ways, he should be allowed to say what he wants. If you can't handle unpatriotic literature, don't read it.

I think very similarly about other literature we have read this year like Animal Farm, 1984 and Brave New World. I especially applaud Eric Blair for publishing his novels during a time of political turmoil.

Friday 4 March 2011

Wisdom from Kurt Vonnegut by Marié

"Any reviewer who expresses rage and loathing for a novel is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on a full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae."


Slaughterhouse Five, like many of Vonnegut's novels, are largely based on the author's life. He reveals so much about things he has experienced, many of which are traumatizing or highly personal. He offers himself, completely unguarded and completely truthful, a mushy mess of strong emotions, like a hot fudge sundae. For reviewers to attack his work is completely unfair, as critics are often guarded by a pseudonym, a company name or their critical authority. It is often easier to criticize harshly, than to applaud. 


Although in Slaughterhouse, Vonnegut admits some details have been altered and many of his experiences are masked by those of Billy Pilgrim. "All this happened more or less. The war parts, anyway, are pretty much true". Billy Pilgrim's war experiences are very similar to Vonnegut's, Billy Pilgrim might even be Vonnegut. Thus, Vonnegut is near completely laying out his past for anyone who reads the novel to see. 


Some examples of Billy Pilgrim's experiences;


- being a social outcast during the war
- coming to terms with war and it's effects
- being emotionally and physically inferior
- humiliation by Roland Weary and German guards
- Dresden fire-bombing
- clearing away dead civilian bodies


Many of these we known Vonnegut himself experienced, things no one has ever gone through. It isn't fair to express rage and loathing towards something we do not completely understand.

Fate vs. Free Will by Marié

If Fate is an already set series of events, that is completely unalterable, I do not believe in it. However, I do not completely believe in free will entirely either, because as there is much chaos there is some order in the world. I like to think that the relationship between Fate and Free Will is magnetic. When a person is born, the place into which they entered will somewhat define how they will live their life, and thus the person they become. A child born to well-to-do parents will most likely be "fated" differently to one born to a single mother, with an income below the poverty line. Free will can change the course of someone's life, such as winning a lottery ticket, but the condition of their life will have a "magnetic" tendency to return to how their social position has defined them to be. Aldous Huxley seemed to have argue that Fate can be artificially produced in his utopian society in Brave New World. Babies were genetically programmed and conditioned to meet their determined purpose in life, and nothing else. However, I wonder if someone's free will can be a result of fate, and that the two are intertwined in such a way they work as one to give the illusion of free will to us mortals, who are truly, on a one way ride.


The more and more I think about it, I am increasingly torn between the two. I'll settle at a happy medium.