The Violence of Warfare and Traumatic Experiences in Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Abstract

Slaughterhouse-five is Kurt Vonnegut's breakthrough novel that was published in 1969. It is based on his own Second World War experience in Dresden. It is, in general, an anti-war book and is primarily concerned with free will and warfare. Therefore, the primary purpose of this study is to demonstrate the violence of warfare and traumatic experience, and the main focus is on Billy and Vonnegut. In conclusion, Vonnegut's incapability to live an everyday life is under the effect of the violence, massacres, and traumatic experience that he has seen in the Second World War. The traumatic experience Billy has seen on the battlefield is mainly reflected in his hallucination to viewing past and future. They have made him think that there is no difference between being alive or dead, because those who died have been rescued from their bad memories of warfare, but he dies a hundred times in his life. Vonnegut wants to confirm that wars destroyed humanity physically, mentally, and psychologically since in addition to the millions of killed and injured people in the massacres of the battlefield, even the survivals have psychologically become dead with terrible and merciless views of the memories of warfare.