Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five at Forty: Billy Pilgrim—Even More a Man of Our Times

TLDR: In the post-September 11, 2001, America, Billy's static meekness may be even more representative of the nation's mood than it was forty-one years ago as discussed by the authors.

Abstract: Critical consensus agrees that Slaughterhouse-Five, forty-three years old this year, remains Vonnegut's canon masterpiece. In the 1960s and '70s, the novel was perceived as commenting on World War II, America's putative “good” war, through the lens of the controversial Vietnam War and proving that no war is ever fully righteous. Billy Pilgrim's story, an Everyman saga, condemns American apathy and the defeatist notion that the lone individual is the helpless plaything of juggernaut forces. Vonnegut vehemently argues that individual agency can still influence events in humanistic ways. Currently, in post-September 11, 2001, America, Billy's static meekness may be even more representative of the nation's mood than it was forty-one years ago. If America's current fascination with apocalyptic scenarios is any indication, the psychological exhaustion of the two-front War on Terror, the economic crisis, and disillusion with a new President's inability to reverse everything overnight has led to a near national d...