So it DOESN'T go

Vonnegut's text is littered with filler such as recycled jokes that are funny at first, grow old and older and yet even older. This is the dark humor that many people find Vonnegut has and is part of his style. However, I think its more recycled filler.

Vonnegut said so himself: That he did not know what to write about in his novel, and thus it took him a very long time to write Slaughter House 5. He manged to finally complete the book by dumping his beliefs, parts of his real life and filler to create the novel. Sometimes great things are made when you mix random things in a mixing bowl, sometimes delicious ideas and literature is born this way. But in the most cases... not.

Vonnegut's SH5 is one of those pieces that may have been an accidental wonder from the mixing bowl. But this does not mean that its perfect. What I found was most annoying in the book is the amount of filler, which made the book less exciting. Some of the filler that I am talking about is of course, "So it goes", which is always repeated at one's death. After the first few times it happens, you get the pattern and think its just the way the story is being narrated. But after the phrase is infinitely repeated through-out the novel, it starts feeling like something to fill in the space.

Apart from the jokes, I find that there are a number of events in SH5 that are pointless to say the least. An example of this is the pornographic picture that Weary had and was also found in the bookstore. I simply don't see significance of this is. Another element that I considered to be fluff was the whole scene with  the dull woman at the party, where she engages in conversation with Trout. Or again, the same recycled character re-appearing as Lily Rumfoord in the book. Whats the point with these pointless characters and fluff?

Writer's Block happens to all of us. It happened to Vonnegut as he was writing his book and he decided to write repetitive and pointless material in his literature which generally retracted from the book. His book is good, it was one of those rare occasions when the random mixing bowl produced something noteworthy, but perhaps Vonnegut should of polished his book more and removed the boring repetitive stuff.

So it doesn't go (with so it goes)
-Daniel