Black Humour in Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughter house-Five

Abstract

Slaughterhouse-Fivedepictsblack humorwithinthe fragmented structure of the novel covering the draconic act of fire bombing of Dresden in Second World War. Throughout the novel, the central character, Billy Pilgrim travels back and forth to all the dimensions of time, and he has been aptly termed as a 'time traveler but it is absurd that he cannot control where or when he will travel to.Moreover, in 1945, allied firebombing of Dresden killed more than 135,000 civilians, ironically, the climax occursnot with the bombing of Dresden but with the execution of an American foot soldier(Edgar Derby) who committed a petty theft of teapot.Amidst all of the horror, death and destruction, so much time isspenton the punishment of one man.Itbecomes blackhumour thatmakes the reader feel a sense of unease and powerless.