Billy The Tralfamadorian Concept Of Time Analysis

Virginia Satir said that “Problems are not the problem; coping is the problem” (Brainyquote).In the novel Slaughterhouse-5 or The Children’s Crusade a Duty- Dance with Death by Kurt Vonnegut, the protagonist, Billy Pilgrim, is under the impression that he has been abducted by an alien race called the Tralfamadorians, and Billy uses the Tralfamadorian’s views on time as a way to cope with tragedy. According to Billy, the Tralfamadorians are able to see all of time, and this ability allows them to know that when a person dies it is merely a low point in their life. Billy Pilgrim latches on to this concept of time, and then never feels any sort of remorse when experiencing the death of another human being, instead saying “So it goes.” Billy …show more content…
When Billy embraced the Tralfamadorian viewpoints on time, he used it to prevent himself from reacting in full to any of the various horrors that he had seen and would see in the future. It can be said that these views on time act as an ameliorative, but in reality they worsen Billy’s overall state of mind through pushing his feelings to the side until resurface due to strange and irrelevant seeming triggers. Billy had a very troublesome life, and, by working to not react towards any of the negatives, he has placed a number of heavy burdens upon himself that would not be present otherwise. The emotional reactions to the traumatic events that have been experienced by Billy Pilgrim can be suppressed, but they cannot disappear, so he is never really at peace with his own existence. The sadness surrounding Billy’s existence can be seen when he is at a party, listening to a barbershop quartet, and when he hears the music he “found himself upset by the song and the occasion” (Vonnegut 172). This is an event that is meant to bring joy, Billy is in a happy environment with happy people, but, because the barbershop quartet triggered these repressed emotions, Billy is unable to enjoy one of the favorable moments in his life. The barbershop quartet that Billy was listening to at the time acted as a trigger to bring back the feelings that had been pushed back with the Tralfamadorian concept of time. Billy used these ideals to prevent himself from experiencing certain emotions, but, in doing so, Billy eventually experienced these tragic feelings at a seemingly random time. Billy accepted the Tralfamadorian values of time as a coping mechanism, and, because of this he has a surfeit of unresolved feelings that cause the better times in his life to become much