THE NOVEL - THE PLOT - Billy Pilgrim, like Kurt Vonnegut, was an American soldier in Europe in the last year of World War II. If you come to know a combat veteran well- a veteran of that war, of the Korean War, or of the war in Vietnam- you will almost always find that his war experience was the single most important event in his life. The sights and scars of war remain with …showed first 75 words of 10766 total…

…showed last 75 words of 10766 total…see in this a parallel to Billy's fantasy of the Tralfamadorians, who choose him to represent the human race in their zoo. But it's also just common psychology. How many times have you felt "left out" and dreamed of doing something extraordinary that would "show" the people who snubbed you? Notice the difference between Weary's "Three Musketeers movie" which is full of violence, triumph, and manly camaraderie, and Billy's gentle, noncompetitive fantasies. Billy wins f