What ‘Slaughterhouse-Five’ Teaches Us About Trauma Writing

Grappling with trauma through writing is the hardest, but most rewarding thing any survivor can do. Whether they are processing the horrors of war, an abusive relationship or a devastating diagnosis, writers often employ coping mechanisms in their work to aid in searching for their own truth and inner peace.

On February 13, the German people recognized the 75th anniversary of the Dresden firebombing, often obscured in the history books but undoubtedly one of the deadliest attacks of World War II where 25,000 people lost their lives.

Young soldier Kurt Vonnegut was a prisoner of war in Dresden when the bombing happened and the trauma of that day would stay with him for the rest of his life. Before the effects of PTSD were fully understood and treated by mental health professionals, writers like Vonnegut processed their trauma through writing.

Twenty four years after Dresden, Vonnegut published his anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five. The story drew largely from his own experiences of being held prisoner before the bombings and later helping to dig out bodies from the debris.

On the 50th anniversary of his novel, Vonnegut’s daughter Nanette recalled her father’s symptoms of PTSD to the New York Times, mentioning his flashbacks, sleeplessness, dissociative episodes and mania. She added: “He was writing to save his own life and in doing it I think he has saved a lot of lives.”

Billy Pilgrim Has Come Unstuck In Time

Vonnegut struggled to write Slaughterhouse-Five for two decades because the memories of that time were too painful. Eventually he employed time travel as a structural device to connect various threads of time and to make it easier to process what happened.

Readers of the novel can also recall how Vonnegut repeated the phrase “so it goes” throughout the story, a total of 106 times to be exact. This simple phrase was a coping mechanism in itself, a way for him to ponder the past and ultimately accept life’s unexpected tragedies through his own storytelling. Or so it goes.

Vonnegut’s extraterrestrial beings in Slaughterhouse-Five, the “Tralfamadorians,” also abduct his main character, a young soldier named Billy Pilgrim. Billy goes to live in a Tralfamadore zoo with a beautiful new wife and spends his time explaining the ways of Earthlings to his alien hosts. As a vehement anti-war advocate, this device allowed Vonnegut to examine the way our society behaves from a safe, “literary” distance.

When You Can’t Do Anything But Laugh

Most writers of trauma typically have one thing in common — very dark humor. This device is often used to soften the pain of traumatic memories. Vonnegut, specifically, was a master of pointing out the dark humor and absurdities of life.

In one scene, while time traveling, Billy Pilgrim found himself intoxicated and searching for the steering wheel of his car. Vonnegut wrote: “He was in the backseat of his car, which is why he couldn’t find the steering wheel.” As much as Billy searched the backseat for the wheel, he couldn’t find it. This was clearly a metaphor for the author’s own mental instability.

One example of the absurd from Slaughterhouse-Five is when Billy arrived at the German POW camp and met a group of British officers who at first complained about the state of the Americans, but later treated them to a musical performance of Cinderella. This sort of behavior wasn’t what anyone would expect in a POW camp and ends up being funny.

Vonnegut chose to use time travel, extraterrestrials and dark humor to craft his novel, but there are other examples of coping mechanisms found in many genres that writers use to wade through painful and traumatic memories. These could include characters lying to themselves or others, experiencing memory loss or being plagued by addiction. They can also include the creation of an entire fictional country, civilization or world to examine the disturbing aspects of our society.