Slaughterhouse-Five By Kurt Vonnegut

Family  Stock Market crashed when Vonnegut was seven years old - Father and the arts - Mother became despondent - Vonnegut went to public school  Mother committed suicide 1944

Schooling  Public school – positive experience  – Attended Cornell University  Major – chemistry and biology (biochemist)  Managing editor and columnist for the school newspaper (Cornell Sun)  Enlisted in the U.S. Army after losing deferred status  Studied mechanical engineering as part of his military training

Soldier  What was happening in the World War II - Nazi, Japanese and Italian war effort was in decline - Battle of the Bulge - age of 23 – captured by Germans - worked in a factory making vitamin- enriched malt syrup for pregnant women

Dresden  February 13-14, 1945  Bombing - U.S. Air Force - Royal Air Force

Post-War  Masters in anthropology  Began to write fiction  Took 20 years to write Slaughterhouse-5

Dresden  When?  Why?  Casualties

Modernism v. Postmodernism  Similarities  Differences  When?  Why?

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