Vonnegut in-class Writing Assignment

Take this opportunity to practice threading a written discussion between two different “moments” within a text. Just as you compared two different scenes from two different war films for Short 3, now attempt the same using two different passages from Vonnegut’s Slaughter-House Five.



To begin, select one of the passages your group discussed and noted last Wednesday, or pick a relevant passage from our class discussion today. Write up a summary of that passage into sentences; be sure to address the who, what, when, where, why, and how of the passage.

In other words:

Who is speaking and to whom
What they are saying (summarize)
When the passage takes places (if relevant)
Where it takes place (if relevant)
Why the passage was written (author’s intention, narrative necessity, etc)
How the passage was written (voice, tone, style, point of view, etc)

Next, do the same for a passage of your own choosing in the pages assigned over the weekend.

Finally, write a paragraph where you compare and contrast these two passages.

You may want to contrast the intention or “why” of the two passages.

You may want to contrast the different point of view or tone of the two passages.

You may want to contrast what idea or ideas each passage explains, addresses, or problematizes.

To problematize is to turn a statement into a question, or to complicate a simple or accepted idea by presenting information that refutes it, challenges it, or adds another perspective required to understand the idea.

Statement: War is a force that gives us meaning.
Problem: War is a force that gives us meaning? (Define war. Define Force. Define Us. Define Meaning.)

Statement: War films often try to show war heroes.
Problem: Some war films try to show that in war, the heroes are often those who don’t do the killing. (Example: Hotel Rwanda, Life is Beautiful)