description: Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.” An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut’s writing—the political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit—that have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it.  Fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut's portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era’s uncertainties.
language: English
title: Slaughterhouse Five, or The Children's Crusade
titlecomplete: Slaughterhouse Five, or The Children's Crusade
characters: Valencia Merble, Barbara Pilgrim, Montana Wildhack, Bertam Copeland Rumfoord, Billy Pilgrim, Eliot Rosewater, Robert Pilgrim, Paul Lazzaro, Kilgore Trout, Roland Weary, Howard W. Campbell Jr., Edgar Derby
genres: Classics, American, Fantasy, Time Travel, Novels, War, Historical Fiction, Literature, Fiction, Science Fiction
ratings_count: 1330844
places: Tralfamadore, Germany, Ilium, Dresden, The United States of America
awards: awardedAt: 28800000
name: Hugo Award
category: Best SF Novel, awardedAt: -31507200000
name: Nebula Award
category: Best Novel, awardedAt: 28800000
name: National Book Award Finalist
category: Fiction, awardedAt: 28800000
name: Chicago Publishers' Award