All Time is All Time

"All time is all time. It does not change...It simply is".
Once again, like in the "So it goes" phrase, the Tralfamadorians make another statement that is basically saying to just live, instead of thinking that once moments have passed they are gone forever. Once again, they explain Billy Pilgrim's "Let it be" attitude. In this chapter we see again how after some tragic events, like the hobo's death, the author says "So it goes." This however, doesn't mean that Billy Pilgrim is like that, since the book is written in third person, but the author never writes about Pilgrim's emotions, he just writes about what happens and moves on. I am starting to think that after the Tralfamadorian kidnapping, Pilgrim's attitude towards life changes, and that even the events that happened before the kidnapping were written after it, because the entire second novel (meaning the book after chapter one) is written with the apparently careless attitude. The Tralfamadorians are definetely very important to Pilgrim's life.

The Prayer on the Wall

"God grant me

the serenity to accept

the things I cannot change

Courage

to change the things I can,

And wisdom always

to tell the difference."(p60)

This prayer may be the piece that explains the way the book is written. Undoubtedly, the way the book is written gives you the feeling as if Billy didn't care about anything, as if life just went on and on for him, no matter what happens. In the war he never says something like "I felt bad about it." or "I felt good about that other thing." He just went on with life, or if he did feel something he didn't say. You can see again the "So it goes" phrase from time to time. For example, "There was so much to see...corpses with barefeet that were blue and ivory. So it goes."(p 65) This phrase also makes you feel as if Billy didn't care about dead people being right there, in front of him." Maybe this is because of the lesson that he learned from Tralfamadore, since they told him that nobody really dies, and that you can change the moments of your life in any way you want, but the piece above is written while Billy is at the war, so he hadn't been kidnapped by the Tralfamadorians yet, although it can be written after he was kidnapped at some time when he decided to go back to the war maybe to remember for his Dresden war book. I don't know yet.

So it Goes...

As Vonnegut starts the second chapter, as well as the second novel, he is more relaxed. I'm not sure if the story is fictional or if it's based on some of Vonnegut's real life events. He starts talking about this guy named Billy, instead in the first chapter he was talking in first person. Well, Billy has a weird ability which was taught to him by aliens from the planet of Tralfamadore. This ability allows him to kind of travel in time, although they may also be just flashbacks. But what makes the book different and almost funny is the phrase "So it goes.", which he uses a lot. What's puzzling though, is that he uses it only after events that are tragic. For example, "While Billy was recuperating in a hospital in Vermont, his wife died accidentally of carbon-monoxide poisoning. So it goes."(p 25) In a regular book, you'd sort of expect the writer to make the moment more sad or at least longer. In this book, it's sort of saying "Well, too bad. Moving on then...", so it makes it funny, but you won't laugh because he just said his wife died. "So it goes" is up to now my favorite phrase of Slaughter House Five.

A Pillar of Salt.

Kurt Vonnegut ends his first Dresden war book like this:"I've finished my war book now. The next one I write is going to be fun. This one is a failure, and had to be, since it was written by a pillar of salt." Now, I wouldn't say its a failure, but it is written as if it was sort of a journal and not a novel. I can't see much emotion in that first Dresden war book. This may be intended to be so, he's just saying how he wrote the novel, instead of really telling the novel, since he knows that it was a failure. What really caught my attention about how Vonnegut ends the novel was "The Pillar of Salt". In the Bible, when Sodom and Gommorrah are destroyed by God because they are full of sinners, the few people who are told to leave the city are also told not to turn around and look at the destruction of the city, however, some of them do look back and are turned into pillars of salt. Kurt Vonnegut says at the beginning of the first chapter (also the first novel) that he knew that writing a book about Dresden would make him rich, but when he starts, he realizes that he cannot look back to the war. First of all, he has forgotten everything, and when he turns to his friends to remember he finds that he has changed, and that his friends have changed as well because of the war. They've all turned into pillars of salt, and when he realizes it he gives up with his first book because he realizes that it was written by a pillar of salt.

The Wayuus in the Inferno

According to Dante’s Inferno, What happens to the Wayuus when they die?

The wayuus would be in the first circle (Limbo), or the circle of the Virtuous Pagans. They have another religion, and since they were never enlightened by Jesus then they cannot go into paradise, but they would not be tormented. As wayuus, they would only lose all hope of enlightment, but they would not be subjected to any kind of punishment. In this circle reside also the people who lived before the coming of Christ, such as Homer, Horace, and Lucan. Perhaps some of the wisest wayuus would be among the master souls of pagan antiquity, which are, to my understanding, the wisest of the pagans. According to Dante this is the highest rank someone can achieve without God.

"...they did not sin; and yet, though they have merits, that's not enough, because they lack baptism, the portal of the faith that you embrace." pg. 33

Blogs

Blogs:

1. What is the difference between a blog and a book?
A blog and a book differ in many ways. A book is necessarily shorter. A blog is as long or short as you need it to be. A blog can allow you to skip the stuff you’re not too interested in, while a book does not offer that privilege. Once you close the book’s cover, then that’s it. You’re done reading and too bad if you are missing some information or would like to keep researching. It’s done. Go find another book. Meanwhile, a blog gives you links; it takes you to videos, pictures and other blogs. It may offer many different points of view, and you will never stop learning. You will never stop exploring. It would take a lifetime to finish studying a topic if you’re using blogs. Each blog takes you to another blog, and then another and another. Blogs are an updated version of books.

2. How have blogs changed recently?
Well, first of all, there are more blogs than ever. Every time a new blog is created, existing blogs are updated. New information is available, new points of view are available, and more readers are available, encouraging others to create new blogs and re-starting the cycle and creating a massive endless encyclopedia that is adding new information in every single second. However, some blogs are abandoned as well, and others can exclude the readers unless they are the blogger’s friends. Private conversations can sometimes go on in blogs that were not made with that specific use, and sometimes the blogger and his/ her friends can be talking about a topic that you have no idea about.

3. Why might you read a blog?
Well, Why not? As said in the text, blogs offer more points of view, there are blogs about everything and you can skip the bits of information you don’t want to know about. Blogs are permanently growing and new information is added every few seconds. The existing information is improved every time and…it does not waste as much paper!
Meanwhile, a book can stay lying on a shelf gathering dust after you read it, leaving you curious about the topic since you just didn’t find enough information, and leaving the book and its many pages there, useless.

4. Is there reason to doubt the objectivity of a blog? Why? Why not?
Yes, there is reason to doubt the objectivity, but, that is exactly what is fascinating about blogs. You can read from many different points of view and not just from the one of the same, boring author. Anyways, you can always doubt objectivity on everything. People have feelings about stuff, so even if they try to hide those feelings to show “objectivity”, deep down we know they are not objective, so what’s the point in hiding them?

5. Identify three blogs that mention our summer reading.

http://e-cuneiform.blogspot.com/2009/01/canto-21-inferno-dante-alighieri.html

http://williamostrem.net/nl/2009/01/12/dantes-inferno/

http://mosquito-blog.blogspot.com/2009/01/white-phosphorus-in-gaza-dante-inferno.html