Slaughterhouse-Five Freedom and Confinement

The definition of freedom in this book goes beyond freedom from POW camps. Here, Billy is completely under the power of Roland Weary, who insists on saving his life even though Billy wants to die. The problem with being under someone's power like that, even someone who is saving your life, is that you have no choice if he suddenly changes his mind. When Weary turns on Billy, Billy has absolutely no defense against him.

Again, Billy has no idea what he is in the middle of. He goes along with the Germans throwing him into a bush the same way he goes along with Weary in the preceding passages. Billy seems to have a gift for submission: he's just looking for people to tell him what to do.

There's a level of bureaucracy to this whole life, death, and freedom question that keeps coming up throughout the novel. Billy's squad is reported killed before they are even sent to Europe, and the British compound of the POW camp is kept amazingly well-stocked with supplies thanks to bureaucratic mix-ups. Billy only comes to back to "life" after going missing in action when the Germans log him as an official prisoner of war.

Another form of confinement we find in the book involves Billy's complicated relationship with family. He seems to view family as another duty he has to fulfill: he makes money to improve the Pilgrim family name and he marries Valencia because he seems to feel he has no choice. But we get very little insight into how he feels about his family. When he's in the hospital trying to escape from life, his family just seems like yet another prison he has to deal with.

This line appears in an account of Edgar Derby's capture by the Germans. Even though much of the book seems to be about the possibility of escaping various literal and metaphoric prisons, life is still usually more appealing than death.

Marriage is just another layer of confinement in Billy's life. And yet, he never considers not marrying Valencia despite his family's wishes. How much responsibility should Billy bear for his own loss of freedom? What would Billy do with real freedom if he had it?

Billy is happier in captivity on Tralfamadore than he is back on Earth, even though he is naked and exposed to the gazes of aliens who want him to perform for their amusement. What's to like about this situation? How does Billy describe his confinement? How does his confinement sound to you—like good times?

Barbara is really getting off on this power trip over her old man, we'd say. In what sense does aging seem like another kind of confinement? Billy has various encounters with aging people: his dying mother (2.26) and an old man in a doctor's waiting room (9.19). How does Vonnegut represent aging?

Note how the British colonel represents his own feelings of confinement. He is perfectly comfortable and warm in the compound, but he misses activity and social community. In fact, Billy's postwar life seems a little like this, except that his captivity isn't quite as obvious. Billy, too, is physically comfortable and well provided for, but he doesn't get to make choices about where to go or what to do with his life. All those choices are made by his family and social circumstances.

Derby is one of the very few characters in the novel, with the possible exception of post-Tralfamadore Billy, who actually takes some initiative. He is in captivity, just like all the other men in this POW camp, but his mind is still actively considering right and wrong. It is this taking of initiative that makes Derby seem like a real person, or a "character."