How Is Formalism Illustrated in Slaughterhouse Five?

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Characters are portrayed differently in the story. They include

Billy Pilgrim

He is the main character and the protagonist in the slaughterhouse five, born in 1922 in New York. He loses his father during a hunting accident just before he is deployed overseas to fight in World War II. He returns from the war ordeals, and appears to be successful, he survives a plane crash and loses his wife after which he begins to describe his belief that he has traveled between events in his life. He is presented as being unable to process his war events consciously, suffers from flashbacks and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Kurt Vonnegut: The author writes himself in the play as Kurt. He is seen as an American prisoner through Billy’s stories. He goes on to misdial Billy after the war, witnesses the bombing at Dresden and builds on the non-fiction aspect of the story.

Bernard O’Hare: He is Vonnegut’s friend; they return together from the war. In the opening chapter, the author visits him hoping to get help in remembering the war experiences and to get material for the novel.

Mary O’Hare: She is married to Bernard. Upon Vonnegut’s visit in the first chapter, she angered by his idea of the book as she believes that it would glorify a war fought by babies.

Gerhard Muller. He is a taxi driver in Dresden after the war. A friend of the narrator and Bernard.

Valencia Pilgrim (Merble): She is married to Billy and adores him. She is the daughter of the owner of Ilium’s optometry school. She purports her father’s dealings in business and in Billy’s material success. She is overweight and unattractive and dies in a car accident.

Edgar Derby: A fellow soldier in the war, older than his camp-mates. They elect him as their leader; he survives the Dresden bombings only to be executed for stealing a teapot. Roland Weary: He is described as angry, unpopular, mean and a bully. He contrasts Billy’s pacifism.

The Tralfamadorians

Are the aliens who abduct Billy. Their idea that all time is continuous and occurs simultaneously builds Billy’s traumatic war experiences and his ability to be unshaken by death. They exist only in Billy’s mind as are his way of dealing with the traumatic war experiences

Barbara Pilgrim

She is Billy’s daughter. She personifies the hypocrisy of the middle class. Although concerned about her father’s developing mental breakdown, she is haunted by the worry of how people will view her and what they will think.

Robert Pilgrim: Billy’s son. Becomes a Green Beret and fights in the war in Vietnam.

Eliot Rosewater: A roommate of Billy’s in the hospital. He tries to reinvent himself in order to atone for his war misdeeds.

Kilgore Trout: A writer of science-fiction and a great inspiration to Billy, also a circulation manager for the Ilium Gazette. The scouts are two unarmed American soldiers who spy on enemies.

Paul Lazzaro is a former car thief from Cicero. Promised to have Billy killed, a promise that is delivered in 1976

Mr. Pilgrim: Billy’s patriarchal, overbearing and self-righteous father. He dies in a hunting accident before Billy’s deployment.

Mrs. Pilgrim. She is Billy’s mother described a s self-sacrificing. Her son places her in a nursing home.

Montana Wildhack: A young actress who is a delusion in Billy’s mind just like the Tranlfamadore. She bears their child.

Bertram Copeland Rumford: A retired Brigadier and historian of the US Air force. Shares a room with Billy in the Veterans hospital after the plane crash. He brings out the role of the authorities and historians in bending the stories told about events.

The plot of the story is well laid out. The story begins with Billy completing school in New York. He is taken to fight the Second World War in Germany (Merill, Robert & Peter 72). The story also shows the recovery face that Billy undergoes after living the war. The plot also has suspense where Billy leaves the war and we are not told what he was up to till chapter nine of the story. All the above factors have been arranged to pass the message to the readers of the story.

Works Cited

Bharvad, Rajeshbhai K. Narrative strategies in postmodern fiction. (2016).

Kavalir, Monika. "Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-five: a functional grammar perspective”. Acta Neophilologica 39.1-2 (2006): 41.

Merrill, Robert, and Peter A. Scholl. "Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five: The requirements of chaos." Studies in American Fiction 6.1 (1978): 65-76.

Moretti, Franco. "The slaughterhouse of literature." MLQ: Modern Language Quarterly 61.1 (2000): 207-227.

Pavlich, Michael S. "Slaughterhouse-Five: A Shell-Shocked Schizophrenic's Trip through PTSD." (2010).