Download Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Slaughterhouse Five
by Kurt Vonnegut
Published in 1969
Let’s take a quick
look at the timeline
from the book and
the context in which
it was written.
Year
The novel
The world
1923 ish
Billy is born.
Roaring 20s (strong world economy, especially in US); this
would all end with the great depression after the stock
market crash of 1929. High unemployment in most of the
world. Germany hit especially hard.
1944-1945
Billy is a chaplain’s assistant. He is
captured by Germans and
transported to a prison-camp. Later
he is sent to Dresden.
After the invasion of Occupied France in 1944, Allied armies
(American, British, French, and many others) began retaking
territory conquered by the Nazis. Massive bombing raids in
Germany reduce several cities to rubble. In Japan,
firebombing destroys old-Tokyo and the first two nuclear
bombs are dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
1968
Billy is injured in a plane crash,
begins writing about Aliens.
The US in dead-locked in the Vietnam War. The CounterCulture revolution changes the make-up of American
society: the civil rights era, 2nd wave feminism, first
organized gay rights demonstrations.
1976
Alternate history – Billy is a famous Real history - Vietnam war recently ended, voting age
author in a fractured United States changed from 21 to 18, military draft ended.
To a large degree, World War 2 created the modern world that we live in today; this would
have been even more true when Slaughterhouse Five was first published.
The first thing important to note is that before the war, The United States was not a global super-power. At this time, the
British Empire, the largest empire that has ever existed, was still the main military, economic, and cultural power in the
world.
(Below is an illustration of the British Empire in 1921)
By the late 1950s, Britain’s Empire was quickly
disappearing as native populations demanded
independence.
Most European colonial powers, except for Russia
(the USSR), lost control over their overseas
holdings and became less and less powerful
globally.
New countries were formed in the Middle East, East Asia, South America,
and Africa. Countries like Syria, Israel, Laos, Cambodia, Ghana, Libya, and
many others came into existence as independent states.
Before the war, several empires and colonial powers, including the Empire of
Japan, The British Empire, France, Italy, and Germany, controlled large parts
of the world. After the war, the only super-powers left, globally speaking,
were the United States and The USSR.
The Cold War: 1946 – 1991 (roughly)
Communist (sort of) “eastern” world against the Democratic (sort of)
“western” world.
1st world: Blue
Industrialized Democratic
2nd world: Red
Industrialized Communist
3rd world: Green
Developing un-aligned
So when you read the novel,
remember that the world it
depicts was informed and
shaped by these realities.
And my experience in
and after the war is
what motivated me
to write this story.