The Portrayal of Death in Slaughterhouse-Five, a Novel by Kurt Vonnegut

The author Simon Travaglia once said “Death is inevitable, but life – that’s the tricky bit where things happen. Within our world, in the great scheme of things, death is but a small, inevitable part of life. Similar to the quote by Travaglia, the author of Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut, portrays death as just another notch in the circle of life that is inevitable, but also has limited significance, represented through the various ways he uses diction and voice throughout the book Vonnegut utilizes diction throughout the novel to show the inevitability of death, as well as the insignificance of it.

An example of such diction used is “I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is ‘So it goes‘”. Vonnegut’s word choice here is particularly interesting, as he uses “say about dead people”, which presents the complete lack of emotion regarding a death.

Usually, when one mentions death, there is usually a tone of fear or mourning as opposed to what Vonnegut has done, using an indifferent tone with simple words> to possibly show the simplicity of death as nothing more than just a part of the circle of life Another notable word used within the quote is ‘dead people’ which excludes other species than humans, also displaying the lack of emotion (due to the simplicity of his word choice) to death caused by wars, only rampant in the human race, which is just one of the many ways there are to die, thus expressing the inevitability of death.

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Another example found within the book that relates to the inevitability of death is “Since she had to manage her mother’s funeral”. The way that Vonnegut uses the word “has“ depicts managing Valencia ‘s funeral as a chore, thus showing how even though that death is inevitable, the impact that death itself has on others is not as significant as what happens throughout one’s lifetime. Another quote that represents the inevitability of death, but also shows its limited significance of it is how the Tralfamadorians View life, “When a Tralfamadorian sees a corpse, all he thinks is that the dead person is in bad condition in that particular moment.”

The author, Vonnegut, refers to a dead body as just a ‘Corpse’, thus impairing the assumption that one has a connection to whom the corpse belonged to, such as in statistics from wars and such, and in particular, the bombing of Dresden, which can refer to how unpersonal death is to many, compared to life, which has a far greater impact on others. It also again shows the inevitability of death, and represents how one’s life can be over suddenly, such as in the case of the Dresden bombing, in which thousands of people turned into corpses, and within just a split-second became a statistic, logos, instead of the bombing appealing to one’s emotions, pathos, The Tralfamadorians view memories of life as permanent, and death as just a moment within life “He is still very much alive in the past, so it is very silly for people to cry at his funerals”. The way that Vonnegut portrays this section shows a sense of him almost joking, as well as close to his tone being indifferent.

This takes away the notion many people believe to be mourning and sadness of death, and turns it into something of a much less serious tone, thus showing the insignificance and inevitability of death, and almost taking it to a stage where it is a joke, and shows how unimportant it is compared to one‘s life A strong example of how death is inevitable can be shown through the voice of this passage, as well as the irony within it. “He dug it out, discovered that it was a book, The Execution of Private Slovik, by William Bradford Huiei It was a true account of the death before an American firing squad of Private Eddie D. Slovik, 36896415, the only American soldier to be shot for cowardice since the Civil War. So it Goes“ Vonnegut utilizes an indifferent voice whilst summarizing the death of Private Slovik, again demonstrating the insignificance and inevitability of death. This passage also contains irony, as Private Slovik was shot for evading war, thus symbolizing that death is inevitable no matter what one attemps to do to evade it.

This passage also contains a motif, the phrase ‘So it Goes’ which is used throughout the novel after every death to emphasize how life was viewed by the tralfamadorians, including the degrading of death to a mere moment in a lifetime, but inevitable at that. In conclusion, the message of Vonnegut in his novel, Slaughterhouse-Five, is represented through two different literary devices. Diction is used throughout the novel to show the link between humans and inanimate objects, both of which are unable to control their own fate. The repetition of the motif “So it goes” is another example of diction, which conveys how death is inescapable by humans, and is a component of their fate, which is sealed Voice is used throughout the book to represent the insignificance of death within the great perimeters of life. Ultimately, Diction and Voice both convey the inevitability of death and also how insignificant it is within our world compared to life, in which the tricky things OCCUR.