Take it Easy, Bro.

Suicide. Is it really that horrible? I think it is too mainstream and overrated. No, I am not saying that suicide is an act of cowardice, but people take it to a public extreme where it seems to me that they are even bragging about it. This doesn't apply to the Old Lady case, I just wanted to get that off my chest.

"I have wanted to kill myself a hundred times, but somehow I am still in love with life." (page 57) I am almost completely sure, that everyone, even as stupid as it looks like, everyone has thought that. Having suicidal thoughts is not only for the depressed, I can assure you that at least once we've all thought "It would be better if i didn't have to go through this. I bet they would miss me. What then? Huh?" I've done it, and I can admit it. But I'm just so stupid that I have gotten taken away by the beauty of life, and at some moments I am in love with it. (First and last time I say that. Ever)

Of course, there is no point of comparison between an Old Lady who once was a princess and lost it all, and me. I live a perfectly normal life, but we all have troubles.

Anyways, I take that sentence literally its just that people over think it too much and end up philosophizing about the labyrinth of life. I sense that what Voltaire honestly meant was that people have the capacity of reaching that level of stupidity. Guilty.

The Philosophy of Philosophers

Is it just me? "The University of Coimbra had pronounced that the sight of a few people ceremoniously burned alive before a slow fire was an infallible prescription for preventing earthquakes..." (page 37) Or is that not messed up? I don't think it is. But you be the judge. Don't get scared by these things that Voltaire says, he only means them in extreme cases. Just to give you a clue, its called satire...still don't know? Google it.

"He wanted to throw himself into the sea after the Anabaptist, but the great philosopher, Pangloss, stopped him by proving that Lisbon harbour was made on puropse for this Anabaptist to drown there," (page 33) "all is for the best" and "there is no cause without effect." Hmmm...who could that possibly be? Surely not Voltaire, c'mon. I mean, that doesn't sound familiar at all. Notice that this guy we don't know about, sometimes named "narrator" pauses the sentence and specifies, "...the great philosopher, Pangloss..." If you haven't got it yet, he's making fun of poor old Pangloss. Man, can satire be tricky.

They say great minds think alike, well not in my case. Voltaire and I don't get along very well, but when we do, we do it big time. Although I have got to admit that the message is pretty clear. It is a critique against society. Though what I have come to understand through these clue-sentences is that there is so much more out there that we don't know of and it takes a lot more than just to name ourselves philosophers, to actually know.

Taking into account that Voltaire does make fun of philosophers and questions their position, that leads me to think: are philosophers a joke?

If this is so, aren't we philosophers?

Everything is as it Seems!

I don't know if it's resentment, or simply intolerance, but one of those two nouns make me onerous and fidgety when it's about Candide. I have met ignorant people, and I may be one of them. But I have never met someone like Candide. Not that I ever will.

I am not thoroughly informed on what Voltaire did, but starting off from the fact that he was a philosopher, gives me the confidence to believe that the book is good.

However, Candide is a boy who thinks that everything is made out of chocolate and the world is composed of flowers and bases his beliefs on a man that thinks the same way he does, Pangloss.

Even when one of the most horrible and tragic episodes that can occur in someone's life happens to him, he still doesn't lose "faith." For many people, this can be an act of courage fullness, that believes in the beauty of promise. No. He is an ignorant child that can't tell the difference from right or wrong, good or bad, and most importantly, truth or lie.

I sensed that the omniscient narrator was trying to portray the same image as Candide, ignorance. He tells the satire in such way that one can feel that he thinks everything will be okay, no one will harm a homeless boy, and that everyone or everything "means/is for the best."

That was what got you into the arms of the Bulgars, right Candide? Why can't you see ahead? Stupid boy.

Actually, I am glad that he got the chance to experience the outdoor liberty. Not everything is as it seems, but it takes much more than one simple torture for Candide to realize that.

The taste of freedom must feel splendorous for such philosopher. I mean, it is Candide who we are talking about here.

What Music Has Become

"Happily Ever After," is it True?

Great life? What is a great life? Is it having a great amount of money, two children and a wife, but still being in a mid-life crisis? I think Billy Pilgrim and Cinderella are different, in some ways. She could be a metaphor for what happens to Billy, but not the perfect one.

This is what Gabriela Aldana said in her blog entry "Billy Pilgrim Was Cinderella, and Cinderella Was Billy Pilgrim." She said that Billy goes to war, which could be the time that Cinderella had to work with her stepsisters and stepmother. Then, she gets married to the prince and lives a happy life, for ever, until she dies. In Billy Pilgrim's life this would be the part where he gets married to Valencia, she's rich, he becomes wealthy and "lives happily ever after." Does he? Does even Cinderella live happy ever after?

We assume that Cinderella lives a fully satisfactory life, since it is a fairy tale. But, are you sure that every single day of her life she was completely happy just because she is away from her step-family and she is a princess? You never are. Maybe, she never is happy (all the time, there are moments you can be happy now).

I think it is the same with Billy, maybe in that way they would be similar. (Still, I think they are not similar). Billy went to war, Vonnegut has explained how war is, it's horrible. Then he married a horrible woman (inside and out) and then he "lived happily ever after," with a bitter wife, and an intolerant daughter. Oh and I forgot to mention that he somehow hates Valencia, he just didn't tell her. He didn't tell her anything. Not even his Tralfamadorian thing. Such a happy life. Honestly, I wish I had a family to which I couldn't tell them anything because I would be called freak! It would be amazing, having a completely socially awkward family and be stuck there...'TILL YOU DIE.

The "Writing Tick"

"Poor old Edgar Derby," "Billy Pilgrim." Doesn't that seem familiar? Well, it should. Kurt Vonnegut says it all the time, throughout all the book. But why? Why does he do that? It's like a writing tick: you can't stop saying the same things over and over again. Whenever he mentions Edgar Derby, he must say "poor old Edgar Derby." Whenever he talks about Billy he can't say "Billy" or "Pilgrim" or "old Pilgs," he must say "Billy Pilgrim."

I can't blame him too much for that, I think I have that writing tick too. But the thing that I can't stand is that maybe it's his weird way of telling us something and I can't figure out what that something is.

But, lets not forget that old Vonnegut was at wart too, with old Pilgs, and we take that for granted. (Well at least I do). Just because he is writing the book I think he was not at war (or maybe it was because he writes in third person). Suddenly a sentence like "That was I." (pg. 148) is what reminds me that Kurt Vonnegut, was there. I've talked about how Billy is traumatized because of war in my other entries, but I've never talked about Vonnegut. What if he also has a trauma and cant stop repeating THE SAME THINGS OVER AND OVER AGAIN?

But enough of the writing tick. Lets talk about Paul Lazzaro. Who I think is kinda funny. The only thing that I don't get about him is that stuff he says about killing people...is he serious? Well, I don't know if he is (people in desperation can say many things, I mean he did break his arm) but I find it humorous: he goes pointing at every one (with his good arm) and say's like "I will kill you because...you were in my way when I was pointing to another person to kill them!" There's always one of those at war. Fo' sho.

War's Left and Right

My dad always tells me to look on both sides when I cross the street. Even if it's a one way street. It may sound silly, but it's true. People are silly, stupid, ignorant and sometimes drunk when they drive a car. I feel like that is what happened to the Americans when they were told about Dresden.

They were told it was beautiful, undefended and "off war," but they are at war. And they are in Germany. Why didn't they look to the other side of the street?

They were getting bombed in thirty days and Billy knew. He knew everything: when he was going to die, when Derby was doing to die, he knew many things. Somehow he kept everything to himself, he never said a thing about what he saw, I guess that would make him look foolish. Maybe, just maybe, he may not be totally insane, people that don't like to keep an image are the crazy ones, right? I suppose. Everyone cares what other people think, even if it's just a little, even Billy Pilgrim.

I wouldn't know how it is to be a prisoner, and specially at war. I mean, sure, it is very tough and "impersonal," I would say. But still, I wouldn't know how it is to be a prisoner. Kurt Vonnegut has shown me a little of how if feels like. He has shown me a little of how it is to be a captured soldier and he has shown me a little of how it is to not see trees, comfortable beds and kids for three years. He has made me feel sick about war.