Summary of Slaughterhouse-Five

Summary of Slaughterhouse-Five Slaughterhouse-Five tells the story of Billy Pilgrim, the main character, in chronological order, starting with Billy's capture and imprisonment by Germany during World War II. This story is interspersed with incidents of Billy's life on earth before and after the war, and from his fantasy voyage to the planet Tralfamadore. The plot is somewhat autobiographical, in reference to Kurt Vonnegut Jr. This book has a lot of minor characters. For this reason, …

…Tralfamadore. Billy feels that the Tralfamadorian philosophy is correct, and so he tries to tell everyone of it through the newspapers as well as through a radio talk-show. Some Tralfamadorian philosophy includes beliefs such as: "Everything that happens must happen. Nothing can be done to change it because each movement is structured in its own particular way." "A human cannot pick and choose; he must live each moment, pleasant or unpleasant, as it comes along."