This might actually start being a thing. Some of you may remember my 1984 blog that I forgot, here it is - 1984:Thoughts. Anyway, I got this book as a pre-birthday birthday present. I did not actually receive the book itself as a gift, but I received some money which I used to buy this and a couple of other books; they are Farenheit 451, The Great Gatsby, and The Fault in our Stars.
The Fault in our Stars by John Green is an incredibly inane book that I regret purchasing. The language is weak and the dialogue is forced, the characters speak as though they're from the Victorian Era, and is trying to fit into the 21st Century, where they've arrived through a time machine. The author should take note that because he mocks the pompousness of certain literature, it does not give him a free pass to insult the intelligence of his readers by producing a turd wrapped in a sickly cyan package.
Well, here:
Introduction
I'm not sure if I should be ashamed of this, but Vonnegut is my favourite author and the only book of his that I've ever read is Breakfast of Champions. No need to waste any more time explaining how much I loved it - Vonnegut's my favourite author. Throughout this blog, I intend to share my thoughts and interpretations of the book. I don't think I'll talk too much on the political ideologies because any attempt to do so on my part would ultimately result in me making a fool of myself.
Entry 1
I am currently reading Chapter 5. The previous chapters were enchanting, but slow. I love how Vonnegut writes, it's simplistic and yet so sophisticated. There was a bunch of stuff in the beginning about how war is an incredibly foolish act performed by children, how it's a children's crusade, and other anti-war ideas. Vonnegut continues to build upon this idea, the children's crusade, throughout the book. The soldiers coo and gurgle. I found this quite clever, how Vonnegut was able to portray the children's crusade so seamlessly.
One thing in the book that I find to be an annoyance is the entire "So it goes." business. It seemed philosophically deep for awhile, but it quickly became bland, if that makes any sense. I particularly enjoyed the use of the phrase when he wrote that a bottle of champagne became dead, flat.
I'm guessing that Billy Pilgrim being unstuck in time is some sort of metaphor that tries to explain how war veterans often experience flashbacks of wartime. I'm not entirely sure what Trafalmadore is supposed to represent at the moment, given that all I know about it is that they (supposedly) abducted Billy and taught him about unsticking-time. My highly imperfect theory about them is that they are war. Billy gets abducted and finds himself in their spaceship with nothing to do. The only form of entertainment other than the single English novel are the Trafalmadorian novels. It's like Trafalmadore is Germany, and when Billy is in the spaceship, he is a prisoner of war. Billy acknowledges that he will be abducted by the Trafalmadores at one part of the book, just like how you know you'll be enlisted. It makes some sense, and yet it doesn't. I'll have to read on.
Just a fun bit before I conclude this entry - my favourite two consecutive sentences in the book thus far:
Billy coughed when the door opened, and when he coughed he shit thin gruel. This was in accordance of with the Third Law of Motion according to Sir Isaac Newton.
I thought the "So it goes." was simply letting go of trying to find a meaning. That it isn't possible to understand something that had no logic behind it to begin with. A lot of the novel is just humans being their illogical selves. And if I remember correctly he says something about anti-war story being an impossible idea right at the start.
Found it:"that writing an anti-war book is like writing an anti-glacier book,". Like there is no point in trying to understand it, because you can't stop it anyway.
Think on why you consider the repetition of "so it goes" bland after a certain point; bland can still be useful, as though the world around us constantly barrages us with little phrases meant to satisfy our investigative desires when in reality aphorism can only provide so much comfort. "So it goes" but what then, and how does this reflect on how you see the world?
Someday Azera we should discuss the literary critical device of deconstruction, because I find Vonnegut deconstructs beautifully. In the meantime, however, keep on reading, young man of Singapore
What's the difference between thinking about the world from inside the world and thinking about the world from outside the world (i.e. unstuck in time)? Would you have trouble evaluating certain things that you could evaluate before, or vice versa?
edit: What different attitudes do the Tramalfadorans have than typical humans do?
On January 23 2013 21:33 marttorn wrote: You should look forward to The Great Gatsby. Most likely my third or fourth favourite novel that I've ever read
On January 24 2013 01:47 HwangjaeTerran wrote: I thought the "So it goes." was simply letting go of trying to find a meaning. That it isn't possible to understand something that had no logic behind it to begin with. A lot of the novel is just humans being their illogical selves. And if I remember correctly he says something about anti-war story being an impossible idea right at the start.
Found it:"that writing an anti-war book is like writing an anti-glacier book,". Like there is no point in trying to understand it, because you can't stop it anyway.
On January 24 2013 04:08 farvacola wrote: Think on why you consider the repetition of "so it goes" bland after a certain point; bland can still be useful, as though the world around us constantly barrages us with little phrases meant to satisfy our investigative desires when in reality aphorism can only provide so much comfort. "So it goes" but what then, and how does this reflect on how you see the world?
Someday Azera we should discuss the literary critical device of deconstruction, because I find Vonnegut deconstructs beautifully. In the meantime, however, keep on reading, young man of Singapore
Guys, guys, guys! A thought just hit me. "So it goes" does get bland. It represents the death of something, right? But people will die, and when they keep dying, it becomes more like part of a cycle rather than being something of significant impact. Ack! How do I word this? It's like this: it gets more and more bland, just like how death becomes more and more normal as war progresses. Death becomes insignificant as war goes on because we forget how important it is. We forget because we become desensitised to it.
Did I get it?!
On January 24 2013 10:55 sam!zdat wrote: What's the difference between thinking about the world from inside the world and thinking about the world from outside the world (i.e. unstuck in time)? Would you have trouble evaluating certain things that you could evaluate before, or vice versa?
edit: What different attitudes do the Tramalfadorans have than typical humans do?
Alright so, I'm guessing that if you look the world when you're inside it you'll focus on the little minute details, right? You process things like the feelings of individuals and relationships between small groups of people, and so on, if that makes sense. But when you look at it from outside the world, you see everything as a whole, where you don't really pay attention to what makes the world, but what the world is as you look at it. It's something like only looking at one line of Beethoven's 9th Symphony and looking at the entire score put together.
Trafalmadorians do not bother with details because they (presumably) have no ability to change what happens. It was mentioned that they do not have free will. Trafalmadorians are living life as a long roller coaster, where there are ups and downs, but they are able to anticipate these bumps, just like how you're able to at a theme park. Humans on the other hand, like to obsess over small matters because they do not know what the future holds for them, and it makes the scope of the world small and narrow. When your view of the world is limited, you start to take the trivial things too seriously; making mountains out of molehills - something like the Suburban neighbourhood in Edward Scissorhands, where the community lives in this tiny slice of the world and every happening is blown out of proportion because of how small their world is.
i dont really think it's 'about' death becoming blander and blander as time goes on (kind of peculiar to think in terms of time going on in this book the way that it is structured/the things that he talks about)
feels tough tho, the last final in my last lit class before i graduated was about slaughterhouse 5 and kind of basically about 'so it goes' and also 'po-too-weet' etc. and i gave up 'thinking' about it because im pretty sure even vonnegut would probably think that it's impossible too (i think he might even talk about it in the book, dunno its been a while since i read it).
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/HfDy1C6.png)
