Slaughterhouse Five - pgs 182 - end

In the final chapters of the novel, the reader finds out how Valencia dies. Strangely, Valencias death is kind of humorous, at least how Vonnegut describes it. "But the rear end of the Cadillac was a body-and-fender man's wet dream (pg. 182)" "The Cadillac, with both mufflers gone, sounded like a heavy bomber coming in on a wing and a prayer (pg 183)." This death isn't the cold and impartial death that left a feeling on the reader, it was a death where some might even grin while picturing it. Why did Vonnegut choose to show Valencia's death in such a picturesque way? Why not keep it cold as in the rest of the novel? Was it because she died for love while trying to reach her loved one? Is that death actually worth it unlike many others in this book?

Later on, next to Billy theres a military historian and his wife. She is reading President Truman's announcement of Hiroshima, and the reader can see and excerpt of it. I believe Vonnegut inserted that text so the reader could see the absurd justifications for such destruction:

The Japanese began the war from the air at Pearl Harbor. They have been repaid many-fold. And the end is not yet. With this bomb we have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing power of our armed forces (pg 185).

Vonnegut shows us how pure destruction is in the minds of humans and how absurd that seems, even form the leaders of the world.

Following his stay at the hospital, Billy time travels back to the end of the war. He is lying in a wagon and oddly enough, it is his happiest moment ever. "He might have chosen as his happiest moment his sundrenched snooze in the back of the wagon (pg 195)." Why would Billy choose this simple moment as his favorite memory? Perhaps it was because he was, for a moment worry-free, no more death, no more pointless fighting. However, he later saw the horses that pulled the wagon, "When Billy saw the condition of is means of transportation, he burst into tears. He hadn't cried about anyting else in the war (pg 197)." What significance did the horse's pain bring to Billy? Was it perhaps the thought that in even his moment of greatest joy, there was still pain near him? Was it perhaps the accumulation of sorrow form all his experience that culminated in that moment?

In the last chapter of the book, the narrator starts talking of himself again and shows how death is ever present, however he also mentions how good times must also be thought of and be enjoyed to the fullest. Still he continues adding to the anti-war impersonal feeling by showing how normal the end of the war was:

And then, one morning, they got up to discover that the door was unlocked. World War Two was over. Billy and the rest wandered out onto the shady street. The tress were leafing out. There was nothing going on out there, no traffic of any kind (pg 215).

The end of the novel reminds me of the final episode of a mini series named Band of Brothers. At the end of the war, the platoon of the series is given orders to stay at a certain German country side and its like if nothing had changed after the war, daily life began again, boredom became a problem and one second the soldiers were heroes and the other they were regular people again.

After finishing the novel, I realized I didn't notice a clear rising action, climax or falling action. Everything was set in a similar tone and the whle novel came and left without much difference. Vonnegut probably did this to add to the impersonality of death and war. "Its terrible, its impersonal, and it happens every day, without you noticing it."