Slaughterhouse-Five Quotes
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Source: Slaughterhouse-Five
Author: Kurt Vonnegut
Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.
Context
The star of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy Pilgrim, thinks this when his wife is asking him questions about what it was like to be in the war.
Yeah, that doesn't sound right.
The narrator, presumably Vonnegut, says that it would make a good epitaph for Bill—and for himself, too (there's even a nice little drawing of it). Of course the epitaph would be completely ironic. As we know, Billy's life has been anything but beautiful and painless.
Where you've heard it
You might say this about your most recent trip to the dentist.
The extreme language in this quote (the "everything" and "nothing") is a dead giveaway that it's not meant to be taken seriously. Not everything can be beautiful...and some things are definitely painful.
If you ask someone how their day was and this is their response, they were probably stuck in line at the DMV.
Pretentious Factor
If you were to drop this quote at a dinner party, would you get an in-unison "awww" or would everyone roll their eyes and never invite you back? Here it is, on a scale of 1-10.
Discussing the woes of humanity by quoting some classic Vonnegut satire? Why not?