Heroism In Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five

Billy, in his typical disoriented mode of detachment, doesn’t answer the doctor, but instead pulls from the seam of the tiny overcoat a large diamond and a partial denture he had found lodged there to show the German.

Furthermore Billy is not portrayed as a courageous and brave hero of the war but on the contrary he becomes a synonym of weakness, laughter and an incapable soldier not even in control of his own fate however beside all this negative attributes Billy manages to survive where a lot of his war companions don’t, he manages to make it through one of the worst atrocities of the war, the Dresden firebombing, Billy even manages to survive a plane crash on top of Sugarbush Mountain, in Vermont after the war where lot of people died

Using the dark humor to describe one of the characters of his book Vonnegut achieved to show the readers that wars aren’t always fought by heroes as portrayed in movies and books, but at the meanwhile he also achieved to show us another side of the war through his strange character Billy Pilgrim, incapable, innocence and lack of control, soldiers find themselves in war

Among the principal characters Vonnegut portrayed the characters of Weary and Lazarro extremely hateful. Lazzarro thinks only how to seek revenge and Weary’s main purpose is to get a medal of war. Among all the war scouts Vonnegut portrayed Edgar Derby with honorable attributes and he sees as the only one who knows what he is doing. He is a mature man who was a teacher of Contemporary Civilization before he becomes a soldier despite his maturity, his leadership skills and his knowledge of war he is executed by the army for taking a souvenir teapot from the ruins of the city that has just been massacred by the military. Execution of Edgar Derby is one of the memories that Billy keeps repeating and recalling all over the novel from the first chapter to the last one;

"One guy I knew really was shot in Dresden for taking a teapot that wasn't his" (1).

Destruction of Dresden and the death of his best friend, Edgar Derby were one of the most traumatic war experiences that happened to Billy. In sixth chapter Billy had been told by the English prisoners of war