Tralfamadore, where the flying saucers come from. Peace.

Since Slaughterhouse-Five is “a novel somewhat in the telegraphic schizophrenic manner of tales of the planet Tralfamadore,” the Tralfamadorian worldview is incorporated in great detail in the novel. The Tralfamadorians live forever and are unstuck in time, jumping from memory to memory, much like Billy Pilgrim. Vonnegut states that he is not overjoyed with this idea (269). Eternal life is one of those qualities that many people desire, so why does Kurt Vonnegut not want eternal life?
On the first page, Vonnegut states, “All this happened, more or less. The war parts, anyway, are pretty much true. One guy I knew really was shot in Dresden for taking a teapot that wasn’t his. Another guy I knew really did threaten to have his personal enemies killed by hired gunmen after the war” (1). Although Kurt Vonnegut had many good times in his life, there was also an overabundance of memories of war. Throughout the book, there are also many interjections from Vonnegut, such as, “That was I. That was me. That was the author of this book” (160), “That was I. That was me. The only other city I’d ever seen was Indianapolis, Indiana” (189), and “I was there. O’Hare was there” (271). Considering that Vonnegut is present in parts of the novel and Billy Pilgrim seems haunted with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, it is likely that Kurt Vonnegut feels mild symptoms of PTSD as well. Therefore, not many of his war memories would be pleasant. World War Two was a very rough and horrific experience for many of the soldiers and many of them would never want to relive that, especially over and over again like the Tralfamadorians. In theory, the Tralfamadorian worldview looks good on paper, but everyone’s life is going to be filled with sad and angry moments that should not be replayed for the rest of time. The average person’s life that has never had to go through a major tragedy would still be terrible played over and over and out of order all the time. Someone’s life like Kurt Vonnegut or Billy Pilgrim’s would be a very depressing way to be for the rest of all eternity.