Slaughterhouse Five Quotation Analyzation

“People aren’t supposed to look back. I’m certainly not going to do it anymore.”

At this point of the book, the narrator is proposing something that he plans to carry out through the entire novel. After spending an entire chapter trying to “look back” into his old war memories, hoping to write a story about them, Vonnegut (narrator) decides to make a different approach towards the situation. Obviously, he wasn’t going to continue using himself as the center of attention, therefore created Billy Pilgrim, a character who didn’t need to “look back” into his memories. Pilgrim, was a very unique individual who could actually go back (and forth) in time instead of having to look, or remember. 

“He has seen his birth and death many times, he says, and pays random visits to the events in between.”

This quotation, is referring to Billy Pilgrim, who we know has the ability to travel in time and re-live several moments of his life. Although everyone has obviously experienced birth, nobody has seen their death. Its probably true, that by knowing how you’re going to die, the moment is made less painful. In a matter of fact, any depressing moment which we can foresee, is allot more bearable. Without pain though, there would be no feelings at all, including happiness, pleasure, or love. Billy Pilgrim did end up living a emotionless life, feeling either pain or warmth in the moments throughout his life. 

“It begins like this: Listen: Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time. It ends like this: Po-tee-weet?”

Here, the narrator is stating the first and last sentences of the book he is planning to write. He mentions the words “unstuck in time”, which means to have the ability to travel through the past present and future, instead of always being stuck in the present (like we all are). Maybe the author’s intention with this piece, was to make the reader unstuck in time by giving a peek into the beginning and the end, without even starting the story. In is the moments in between which we know must find out, and discover why the last sentence was “Po-tee-weet?”