A Study Of Violence In Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five

Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five,published in 1969,is one of the most representative anti-war novels in postmodern American literature,with the Second World War as its mother theme.In the midst of the counterculture wave of the 1960 s,Vonnegut’s anti-war writing was not only a denunciation of the Second World War,but also a warning against the mechanism of violence that he saw underlying the war and threatening contemporary society.Taking Zizek’s theory of violence as the approaching point,the thesis conducts an intensive analysis of the phenomenon of violence in Slaughterhouse-Five,exploring the evolution of violence,the protagonist Billy’s response to violence and his realistic predicament,as well as Vonnegut’s attitude toward political violence.The thesis consists of three parts: introduction,body,and conclusion.The introduction presents an overview of the current studies of Slaughterhouse-Five from the war perspective,the theory of violence and the structure of the thesis.The body is divided into three chapters: the first chapter examines different phenomena of violence in the novel before,during,and after the war through Zizek’s classification of violence,revealing the influence of violent elements ingrained in American society and culture.The second chapter analyzes Billy’s resistance to various forms of violence.However,his submission to alien fatalism reveals the limits of his resistance to violence and suggests his eventual loss of subjectivity to violence.The third chapter explores the connection between violence and American government,tracing the reasons for the difficulty of eradicating violence from the violent practices of the political system in language and technology.Finally,Vonnegut’s attitude toward political violence is noted.The conclusion clarifies the argument of the thesis.The thesis argues that through Billy’s failure to resist violence,the novel proceeds to critique the implicitly violent nature of the modern American political order.Vonnegut doesn’t confine himself to a narrow critique of violence in the realm of war.He realizes that violence can reshape modern human life at various levels,from physical harm to the symbolic and political spheres,and the abuse of power in the political sphere is the root cause of violence.Therefore,the way to effectively suppress violence is to perceive it from multiple dimensions.This enable a man to break out of the complex dilemma of violence.