Dike, Donald A. “The Difficult Innocence: Blake’s Songs and Pastoral.” The Johns Hopkins University Press ELH 28.4, 1961: 353-75. Print. Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory: An Introduction. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1983. Print. In a way, Slaughterhouse-five is Vonnegut’s way to show or portray his emotions after his experiences.

Experiences like the ones presented in Slaughterhouse-Five cannot be conveyed through conventional literature and the confines of the novel as it was formalized in the 19th century. As the two world wars and Holocaust broke the conventions of Western society, new storytelling methods must be found or even created. In his epigram to the novel, Vonnegut notes to the reader about the “telegraphic schizophrenic manner of tales” the work contains. Caveny, Graham. Screaming with Joy: The Life of Allen Ginsberg. New York: Broadway Books, 1999. Print.sounds in literature can be construed in a variety of ways, and there is always the risk of sentimental pastoral or escapism (Marx 5-11). An overly thematic approach reduces literature to a kind of costume party of rustic dress, baaing sheep and rippling brooks. Throw in a flute, and the pastoral soundscape is complete. Unfortunately, a thematic approach circumscribes the aural locus amoenus in the worst sense: it is conceptually parochial and easily slides into caricature. instance, Blake’s “Introduction” to Songs of Innocence describes a process, which emerges from the narration of an encounter experienced by the Piper: Blake, William. Blake’s Poetry and Designs. Eds. Mary Lynn Johnson and John E. Grant. New York: W.W. Norton, 1979. Print.

Standardisation and Variation in English Language(s) / 2. Modernist Non-fictional Narratives: Rewriting Modernism The birds in Slaughterhouse-Five make the sound “Poo-tee-weet”—something that is heard after a massacre. The sound “Poo-tee-weet” is a stand-in, a nonsensical noise made by birds that represents the fact that there is nothing intelligible that can be said about war or massacres. The death and loss from war is not something that can be analyzed or effectively eulogized; the only thing we can say is utterly insignificant in the face of the devastation. should also be clear that if “ Poo-tee-weet?” is a pastoral sound, it’s not because it can make a claim to being more “natural” than other sounds. It is certainly not more natural than the screeches of birds fighting over corpses in a bombed-out city. Moreover, if nature is culture and culture nature, the bird’s sound is not more natural than the symphonies of Wagner and Strauss that were performed at Dresden’s Semperoper Opera House. Or, to press the point, the bird’s sound is not more natural than the detonating Allied bombs that destroyed the Semperoper Opera House. Cross-Dressing in Fact, Fiction and Fantasy / 2. Transnationalism and Modern American Women Writers

Grands Entretiens : Archéologie d'un parcours

the above examples, literature simultaneously attests to the desire to blur distinctions between sound and meaning while respecting the fact that these distinctions exist. So where does that leave the reader? Beyond the question of how pastoral sounds are represented, there is the larger question of what they might have to tell us, not only about the text but about ourselves. Interpretation is problematic, but so is a formalist reading that limits itself to the mere description of processes. Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. (1902). Ed. Jerome Beaty. Norton Introduction to Literature. New York: W.W. Norton, 1973. Print.

This statement is likely close to the real author’s sensibility, as suggested by the book as a whole. Still, it need not be taken as the last word. Thomas Pughe has underlined the importance of the act of reading in constituting pastoral texts (5) and for Slaughterhouse - Five , many readings are possible, especially from a 21 st century, post-pastoral perspective, which can interpret a seemingly affectless representation of sound not as a marker of an indecipherable mystery but as an invitation, as a possible opening in the text.

Gifford, Terry. “Five modes of ‘listening deeply’ to pastoral sounds.” Green Letters: Studies in Ecocriticism. 20:1 (2016): 8-19. Print. Another occurrence of “ Poo-tee-weet?” is found midway in the novel shortly after Billy, under the influence of morphine, dreams of friendly giraffes in a garden. The giraffes accept Billy and even kiss him (99-100).