Sunday, April 28, 2013

Ch. 1-2 Slaughter House Five Notes

    As the first chapter begins you can see that the author is talking about himself and is the narrator. This makes this story so much different then any other book. The story starts out about him talking about the Dresden fire bombings. They raise money and go there to re-visit the place they were held captive in during the war in hope to spark enough emotion or information to write a book. He is pretty much telling us the story of how he wrote about the war that he was in and what he had to do. Its really breaking the fourth wall and giving a different perception on the book.

    In chapter 2 Billy Pilgrim is introduced and its all about him. While in war Billy can get un-stuck in time and relive a past moment or future one. This chapter to me is even more strange then the first because the way he refers to getting un-stuck in time. I think this is partly to show the affect of war on a person and how they can feel when they're in middle of a hell hole. Being a POW like Vonnegut was could cause you to think differently or act changed because of the things they experienced. I think Billy Pilgrim is there to capture that aspect of the war 

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Short Story Remix

I don't very much like the idea of trying to recreate what one person has already done so I'm going to explain the meaning of The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald wrote this book to encompass a much larger idea then love itself even though it is a love story. He shows how in the 1920's a lot of people lost sight of what the American dream truly was. Gatsby throws all these huge parties not caring about money and in my eyes he has stopped dreaming completely. The only thing he didn't poses was Daisy and this is a direct example that money can't bring you happiness. With all the wealth that is in East Egg and West Egg the people really start to lose social connections with other people. I want to say the Fitzgerald very much wanted to be rich and that in the pursuit of happiness in life he figured out that money wasn't the key. His wife Zelda opened his eyes to this when she agreed to marry him then said no because he didn't have the money to support her. Zelda was very materialistic in my eyes and just wanted to party all the time but she had Fitzgerald's attention. This sets the central theme of the book which is to never stop dreaming and to not let your life me consumed by material things which was happening a lot during the 1920's.