From early on, Billy's time travelling did not appear legitimate, or at least as legitimate as time travel can be at this point. He would travel abruptly to seeming unrelated points in time, experience the anecdote that moment had to offer, and then return to the period from which he traveled. Sometimes, Billy would make multiple detours before returning to his original time period. Also, he did all this traveling without providing any explanation of how it was possible. Billy simply became unstuck in time and gained the ability to time travel. Rather than accepting Billy's ability to warp spacetime, one may entertain a more logical explanation: Billy has adopted the Tralfamadorian concept of time. A Tralfamadorian explains this concept when he says, "All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is," (Vonnegut 86). Viewing time as such, Billy would see all moments in time as the same moment. To time travel, then, all Billy would have to do, in essence, would be to remember a different aspect of this one moment, this single existence. In that way, Billy's memories, traumatic and joyful alike, give him the ability to time travel. This would also explain Billy's questionable sanity because in order to truly time travel through this method, Billy would have to view the past and future as the present just as much as he experiences the actual present as such. Living without any sense of now, or perhaps with a ubiquitous sense of the present, Billy would appear crazy to others, yet sane to himself. Hopefully Vonnegut will explain Billy's time traveling later in the novel.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Time Travel or Active Memory?
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
From early on, Billy's time travelling did not appear legitimate, or at least as legitimate as time travel can be at this point. He would travel abruptly to seeming unrelated points in time, experience the anecdote that moment had to offer, and then return to the period from which he traveled. Sometimes, Billy would make multiple detours before returning to his original time period. Also, he did all this traveling without providing any explanation of how it was possible. Billy simply became unstuck in time and gained the ability to time travel. Rather than accepting Billy's ability to warp spacetime, one may entertain a more logical explanation: Billy has adopted the Tralfamadorian concept of time. A Tralfamadorian explains this concept when he says, "All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is," (Vonnegut 86). Viewing time as such, Billy would see all moments in time as the same moment. To time travel, then, all Billy would have to do, in essence, would be to remember a different aspect of this one moment, this single existence. In that way, Billy's memories, traumatic and joyful alike, give him the ability to time travel. This would also explain Billy's questionable sanity because in order to truly time travel through this method, Billy would have to view the past and future as the present just as much as he experiences the actual present as such. Living without any sense of now, or perhaps with a ubiquitous sense of the present, Billy would appear crazy to others, yet sane to himself. Hopefully Vonnegut will explain Billy's time traveling later in the novel.
From early on, Billy's time travelling did not appear legitimate, or at least as legitimate as time travel can be at this point. He would travel abruptly to seeming unrelated points in time, experience the anecdote that moment had to offer, and then return to the period from which he traveled. Sometimes, Billy would make multiple detours before returning to his original time period. Also, he did all this traveling without providing any explanation of how it was possible. Billy simply became unstuck in time and gained the ability to time travel. Rather than accepting Billy's ability to warp spacetime, one may entertain a more logical explanation: Billy has adopted the Tralfamadorian concept of time. A Tralfamadorian explains this concept when he says, "All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is," (Vonnegut 86). Viewing time as such, Billy would see all moments in time as the same moment. To time travel, then, all Billy would have to do, in essence, would be to remember a different aspect of this one moment, this single existence. In that way, Billy's memories, traumatic and joyful alike, give him the ability to time travel. This would also explain Billy's questionable sanity because in order to truly time travel through this method, Billy would have to view the past and future as the present just as much as he experiences the actual present as such. Living without any sense of now, or perhaps with a ubiquitous sense of the present, Billy would appear crazy to others, yet sane to himself. Hopefully Vonnegut will explain Billy's time traveling later in the novel.
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