So It Doesn't Go

                Though I’ve already read Slaughterhouse Five a couple of times, the insight I’ve gotten from class has been a bit different from my personal interpretation. Generally speaking, I came to the same conclusion my class did about Billy and Tralfamadore, but without the basis or deeper understanding of the irony Vonnegut includes in the novel. One of these ironic statements that I somehow managed to gloss over was the ever present “so it goes.” I’m actually astonished I managed to miss how often it was used, only really seeming to notice it with the larger incidents such as the fire bombing. I missed the irony in the lesser moments such as “The water was dead. So it goes.” On one hand, the statement serves as a statement on death to undermine it, and on the other serves to outrage. In my mind, the provoking “so it goes” is certainly one of the most important aspects of the novel in terms of how it gets us as readers to reevaluate the scenes we are reading and the prospects of war.

                Obviously, war is terrible and causes suffering for all involved, but when Vonnegut chooses to describe the scenes of war and death with the statement “So it goes”, it drains the event of all weight and emotion behind it. Perhaps one of the best examples of this may be from the conversation between O’Hare and Vonnegut over the population of Dresden at the beginning of chapter 10:

On an average, 324,000 new babies are born into the world every day. During that same day, 10,000 persons, in an average, will have starved to death or died from malnutrition. So it goes. In addition, 123,000 persons will die for other reasons. So it goes. This leaves a net gain of about 191,000 each day in the world.

                Any sort of emotion that may have been felt by reading that 10,000, on average, die of malnutrition daily and over a 100,000 more die from other causes as well is just gone. Frankly, it’s disconcerting how it’s just passed by like, “It just happens. Oh well! Let’s move on with life.” We get upset at the injustices of the events or the lack of caring behind the loss of life, and by doing so, fulfill the other aspect of “so it goes”. The statement just sticks out like a sore thumb with the moment it is injected into. Because of this jarring contrast, we get up in arms at these extreme cases of death, longing to do something about it, but not with more violence. If you think about it then, Vonnegut did manage to make a sort of anti-war novel, discouraging violence and encouraging action against the violence and war. That’s not to say that the message can be taken the wrong way, especially considering the end of Billy’s story and his family, but with an understanding of “so it goes”, it does succeed at least on some level.