So much for the last post being the very last one on the blog. Errr.
As much as I love to write short stories, I don't think three paragraphs could really do Vonnegut's writing style justice, or that I could even come close to emulating the unrestrained purity of a master's conversationalist tone. I'll probably turn it into a private project that I'll work on over at least a few weeks, so here I go writing on the Alternate blog post allowed. As most readers of the Slaughterhouseeleven blogs probably haven't come across the alternate post too often, I'll post it here:
Kurt Vonnegut grew up in America and always identified with American culture. However, he expressed his sadness at the fact that his parents and grandparents were ashamed of their German heritage. Vonnegut claims that he did not grow up knowing many German recipes, children's stories, or customs. Examine Vonnegut's attitude towards Germany and the Germans in Slaughterhouse-Five. Does Vonnegut attack or defend his ancestry through his comments about all things German in the novel? More importantly, do you think that such attempts at assimilation and culture conformity are ever justifiable?"
Germany has a real self-hate problem since the second world war.
One one hand, I suppose being responsable for Hitler, the Nazis and 11 million extinguished lives (not to mention all the children and grandchildren that never came to be) is more than enough cause for some national shame. As a jew with family that was murdered in the war, I suppose I'm greatful for the fact that it hasn't been brushed off, and the responsible country isn't pretending it never happened, a-la Japan and the Rape of Nanking that it has edited out of its history books (Here's some information about it)
The problem that arises from this, of course, is that Germans aren't bad people. Germany has a rich culture spanning thousands of years, and one very short (though very terrible) period in it's history shouldn't be enough to negate everything else it has accomplished and celebrated. It seems kind of sad that in a culture that has given so much, young Germans who had nothing to do with the war or the Holocaust can't be allowed to feel a bit of national pride, even today. In Germany, it's not actually okay to wave or hang a flag unless it's a government building or something of that sort. They're all too afraid of showing national pride and becoming Nazis, apparently.
I don't think Kurt Vonnegut either attacks or defends his ancestry in the novel Slaughterhouse-Five, there's no doubt in my mind that Vonnegut, of all people, would have realized that people are only human. He would have taken his ancestry for something that was sad to lose, although Germany made some pretty bad choices fairly recently on the history scale. I don't think cultural assimilation is right, but it's certainly inevitable, as you are the product of your surroundings. Hopefully when brought to a new culture, though, you add something rather than completely re-moulding yourself to blend in.
-Ellana
-Ellana
