Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut is the story of Billy Pilgrim. A former American soldier and prisoner of war in Dresden, Germany. Billy faces several difficulties during his service in Dresden. He was an optometrist by profession. Billy's story is told in flashback in many episodes. The construction of the novel is typical of postmodern fiction, this is because the events are told both through the narration of the author who tells Billy's story and through Billy's telling of his story in Dresden. Postmodernism portrays a great deal of human experience. The most obvious human experience in the novel is the metanarrative essence, which makes it a postmodern novel based on metanarrative. For example, the first chapter of Slaughterhouse Five represents the author's perspective on how he came to write the novel. We say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay My name is Yon Yonson, I work in Wisconsin, I work in a sawmill there. The people I meet when I walk down the street say, 'What's your name?' And I say, 'My name is Yon Yonson, I work in Wisconsin...' And so on and on (Vonnegut, pg 3). These were the lines of the song that Vonnegut remembered while writing about Dresden. Postmodernism is represented throughout the novel. Slaughterhouse Five provides examples of living suffering, needing freedom, and building hopes for peace. The Second World War left its mark of victims not only on the continent, but throughout the world. To begin with, the devastating consequences of the war inspired many thinkers to give world history the terminology of postmodernism. Consequently the human arts, especially literature. Before the advent of postmodernity, literature was regularly advertised in a unified way and had certain labels, for example modern literature, characterized by stable and expressive poetics. Vonnegut consequently provides an "anti-traditional narrative point from the author's point of view in the novel". Referring to Edgar Derby, the author expresses his opinion on the structure of the novel. “Edgar Derby, the high school teacher who would eventually be killed, snored on another (Vonnegut, p.136).” Therefore the reference to the climax is the author's emphasis on the importance of "executing Edgar Derby". Who is touted as the embodiment of the status of modern literature. Edgar was killed for stealing a teapot from the rubble of Dresden. Vonnegut comments on the irony of the situation in which Edgar survives the misery of the bombing of Dresden only to be executed for a trivial "crime". However, the most viable positioning involves deepening the experimentation of the narrative device within the fictional text. In Slaughterhouse Five there is a comment evidently aware of the metanarrative structure of the text. Since the entire plot of the novel shows the tragic consequences of the Dresden fire. The plot lays out the catastrophic events that occur in the city following the attack: “Hopefully this little book will be useful… …of how Dresden came to look architecturally; (Vonnegut, p.17).” It is the depiction of the true tragic events that may have happened during Vonnegut's life. It describes the effect of the bombing on Dresden which destroyed almost everything and how it was placed in a new architectural environment after the destruction. Thus, the fictional work provides an example of postmodern metafictional status. The conjunctions used place emphasis on the postmodern text. Additionally, postmodern examines the innovative techniques and literary devices used in the works offantasy. It is the process of reconstituting what had been experimental in terms of literary imitation and no longer experimental with the advent of postmodernism (Majeed, p.74). Vonnegut is a practitioner of such literacy. He describes himself as a composer of the forte as a technique. The author's voice is approached in terms of double-voiced speech. The novel plays an important role in determining the author's position in the novel. Furthermore, Vonnegut does not directly introduce himself as the author in the novel. Use dual-voice vision. With this technique he provides his perspectives on the novel. The focus factor is the most important technique used in storytelling. It is one of the factors that situates the narrative point of view from which the story is told. Like many other narrative elements, focalization adds a self-reflexive intrusion into the text. Like metafiction, it carries the authors' or narrators' comments on the novel. The critical potential of focus is subtle and manipulates a normal event in the plot into a rather abnormal event. Instead they tell a story of extraordinary events happening in Dresden. The term focus, however, is somewhat manipulative. While this manipulation is consciously produced, a self-reflexive commentary appears on the surface of the novel's exposition. On the other hand, the space setting is Dresden, Germany. From the beginning of the novel it is connected with the temporal setting of the novel: "I think about how useless the part of my memory dedicated to Dresden was, and yet how tempting it was to write about Dresden, and the famous limerick: (Vonnegut, p.2).” Here, the connection of time and place is the object of focus. These are therefore linked to break with the usual representation of a setting in fictional texts. Since the texts are narrated in a specific time period, the place is the reference ground for the time frame. The object of focus consolidates the technical aspects of Slaughterhouse five as it is constructed as a postmodern metanarrative device. Furthermore, the authorial voice is approached in terms of bivocal discourse. The categories and classifications of the speech are subject to the author's voice. However, the text plays an important role in determining the author's position in the text is not initiated abstract voice of the author that materializes in the imaginary context. Even the most penetrating technique of two-voice dialogism attributes the author's perspective to the textual scenario represented. Therefore the text, and all its relevant devices, are elaborated through the main narrative voice. It is critically argued that the main voice of the text is the narrative point of view, where the narrative begins from a certain point in the text. From a dual-voiced narrative perspective, however, the author's voice participating in the narrative emphasizes a specific ideology in postmodern fiction. The narrative-author interaction in the text is a rather metanarrative device. Similarly, Slaughterhouse Five mixes an abstract authorial voice and stages it in the text. Vonnegut's main concern is with the consequences of World War II and how they demolished American individuality. This is represented in the novel, when Billy wanders the streets he feels that everything is normal. The normality of the entities that surround him does not represent the truth but a false facade of the reality that surrounds him. Please note: this is just an example. Get a custom article from our expert writers now. Get a custom essay Slaughterhouse Five is a postmodern literature. It is the representation of fictional novels that,1-215.