Slaughter House Five Analysis

In Kurt Vonnegut’s book, Slaughter-House Five, he makes a connection from a situation in his book, to Genesis 19:26. In an excerpt from his book, he says how “people aren’t supposed to look back.” This is referring to the story of Sodom in the bible. In this biblical story, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah takes place. God destroys this city because of the sin that overtook it. God told them not to look back, but Lot’s wife did and God turned her into a pillar of salt. Vonnegut uses words like failure when referring to his book and looking back, because that’s exactly what Lot’s wife did. She did something she wasn’t suppose to do. Vonnegut is looking back at tragedy in this book, which he is not suppose to be doing. Lot’s wife is looking at the tragedy that was her home.

No one may have written what he wrote about and no one may have looked back like Lot’s wife, so they had to. It had to be because it was written and done by a human. The both of them had free will to do what they did, which is what God gives us. Both of their actions showed that they were human, which can be related to any issue in today’s society. Like Oscar Wilde’s quote on disobedience, “It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” By this war book, many people probably were able to relate to it and help themselves in some way. Through what some may call Vonnegut’s “rebellion” he did what he felt was needed to be said. Although some may not consider what Lot’s wife did made progress in some way, she still disobeyed and it shows its readers, or some at least, that she was human and all humans make