Slaughterhouse Five Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut is an anti-war novel written in 1969. This novel shadows a soldier, Billy Pilgrim, during the Second World War. The bombing of Dresden, Germany is the main event. Due to the fact that this is the main event, Slaughterhouse Five is a semi-autobiographical novel. The main character of Slaughterhouse Five is Billy Pilgrim. Billy is a confused, defeatist, and an ill-trained soldier for America. Billy refuses to fight in the war “Billy wouldn’t do anything to save himself” (Vonnegut 43). He journeys back and forth through time “From there he traveled in time to 1965” (55). Billy was a prisoner of war in World War II and was taken by the Germans. He also believes that he was taken by aliens to a planet called Tralfamadore. Many people in Slaughterhouse Five do not like Billy Pilgrim. One person in particular is Paul Lazzaro, another bizarre and ill-tempered prisoner of war. Paul does not like Billy because Billy was blamed for the death of Paul’s noble acquaintance, Roland Weary. Regardless of Billy’s objections, Paul Lazzaro vows to kill Billy. Paul retains a mental list of his rivals and he claims the he will have any person “Killed for a thousand dollars plus traveling expenses”(140). The narrator also said that Lazzaro “threaten[ed] to have his personal enemies killed by hired gunmen after the war” (1). Roland Weary, a man infatuated with blood and gore, does not like Billy either. In hope of a military medal, Weary saves Billy from gunfights. As a result, Billy rejects that he was saved by Roland. The narrator says “He had been saving Billy’s life for days” (43). During the train ride to the prisoner of war camp, Roland Weary dies and faults Billy as his final words. One decision Billy makes during the novel is when he decides to say “So it goes” (8) after every death throughout the novel. Due to