Slaughterhouse-Five

By: Kurt Vonnegut

Finished: Mid April, 2024.

What's it about: A man who is going mad (by worldly standards) recounts his time in WW2 in Dresden, a city where tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, were fire bombed and killed at the end of the war. Main takeaway: Vonnegut is a great writer, saying a lot more in what he doesn't say that what he does say. He reminds me of Hemingway in that regard. Every time something terrible happens such as someone being killed by a firing squad, the refrain from the main character is "so it goes".

It's also telling how little at the time was paid attention to the incredible mental tax all people involved in the war likely took on. This was far before PTSD or mental health was discussed. Our main character is just thought to be "going crazy" when he seemingly can't return to a normal life of being an optometrist after watching horrific events in war, being a POW in a camp, being marched hundreds of miles shoeless, and then eventually surviving the fire-bombings to see the burnt corpses of tens of thousands of civilians. I would read more Kurt!