Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut Published in 1969 Let’s take a quick look at the timeline from the book and the context in which it was written.

Year The novel The world 1923 ish Billy is born. Roaring 20s (strong world economy, especially in US); this would all end with the great depression after the stock market crash of 1929. High unemployment in most of the world. Germany hit especially hard. 1944-1945 Billy is a chaplain’s assistant. He is captured by Germans and transported to a prison-camp. Later he is sent to Dresden. After the invasion of Occupied France in 1944, Allied armies (American, British, French, and many others) began retaking territory conquered by the Nazis. Massive bombing raids in Germany reduce several cities to rubble. In Japan, firebombing destroys old-Tokyo and the first two nuclear bombs are dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 1968 Billy is injured in a plane crash, begins writing about Aliens. The US in dead-locked in the Vietnam War. The Counter-Culture revolution changes the make-up of American society: the civil rights era, 2nd wave feminism, first organized gay rights demonstrations. 1976 Alternate history – Billy is a famous author in a fractured United States Real history - Vietnam war recently ended, voting age changed from 21 to 18, military draft ended.

To a large degree, World War 2 created the modern world that we live in today; this would have been even more true when Slaughterhouse Five was first published. The first thing important to note is that before the war, The United States was not a global super-power. At this time, the British Empire, the largest empire that has ever existed, was still the main military, economic, and cultural power in the world. (Below is an illustration of the British Empire in 1921)

By the late 1950s, Britain’s Empire was quickly disappearing as native populations demanded independence.

Most European colonial powers, except for Russia (the USSR), lost control over their overseas holdings and became less and less powerful globally. New countries were formed in the Middle East, East Asia, South America, and Africa. Countries like Syria, Israel, Laos, Cambodia, Ghana, Libya, and many others came into existence as independent states. Before the war, several empires and colonial powers, including the Empire of Japan, The British Empire, France, Italy, and Germany, controlled large parts of the world. After the war, the only super-powers left, globally speaking, were the United States and The USSR.

The Cold War: 1946 – 1991 (roughly) Communist (sort of) “eastern” world against the Democratic (sort of) “western” world. 1st world: Blue Industrialized Democratic 2nd world: Red Industrialized Communist 3rd world: Green Developing un-aligned

So when you read the novel, remember that the world it depicts was informed and shaped by these realities. And my experience in and after the war is what motivated me to write this story.