Slaughterhouse-Five Quotes

"All moments, past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist."

"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be."

"When a person dies they only appear to die. They are still very much alive in the past, so it is very silly for people to cry at his funeral."

"I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres."

"There is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre."

"That is a very Earthling thing to want to tell time perfectly."

"Why don't you write an anti-glacier book instead?"

"Honest to God, I'd consider it an honor just to be water boy for these kids."

"Business reasons," said Billy. "It would also make him seem slightly magical, since there weren't any other grown Billys around."

"If everybody would leave him alone for just a little while, he thought, he wouldn't cause anybody any more trouble. He would turn to steam and float up among the treetops."

"The most dangerous thing they found on his person was a two-inch pencil stub."

"That is a very Earthling question to ask, Mr. Pilgrim. Why you? Why us for that matter? Why anything? Because this moment simply is. Have you ever seen bugs trapped in amber?"

"Only on Earth is there any talk of free will."

"Each clump of symbols is a brief, urgent message—describing a situation, a scene. We Tralfamadorians read them all at once, not one after the other. There isn't any particular relationship between all the messages, except that the author has chosen them carefully, so that, when seen all at once, they produce an image of life that is beautiful and surprising and deep. There is no beginning, no middle, no end, no suspense, no moral, no causes, no effects. What we love in our books are the depths of many marvelous moments seen all at one time."

"Well—," said Billy's father, manfully kicking a pebble into space, "there it is."

"It was worth the trip," said Billy's mother raptly. "Oh, God—was it ever worth it."

"Yes, sir," said the ranger. "About three folks a year." So it goes.

"How nice—to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive."

"Everything is all right," said Billy gently. "Please don't be afraid."

"Would you talk about the war now, if I wanted you to?" said Valencia. "It would sound like a dream," said Billy. "Other people's dreams aren't very interesting usually."

"I'm so happy." "Good." "I never thought anybody would marry me."

"That's the attractive thing about war," said Rosewater. "Absolutely everybody gets a little something."

"It isn't much fun if you have to pinch every penny till it screams."

"In time, Montana came to love and trust Billy Pilgrim."

"Billy now backed toward it again, looking at it over his shoulder, feeling the magnetism increase."

"He was proud of never having hurt an innocent bystander."

"If you stop taking pride in your appearance, you will very soon die."

"The syrup tasted like thin honey laced with hickory smoke."

"There was a fire-storm out there. Dresden was one big flame."

"The curves were smooth only when seen from a distance. The people climbing them learned that they were treacherous, jagged things—hot to the touch, often unstable—eager, should certain important rocks be disturbed, to tumble some more, to form lower, more solid curves."

"Nobody talked much as the expedition crossed the moon. There was nothing appropriate to say."

"Billy's story ended very curiously in a suburb untouched by fire and explosions."

"They had polished the glasses and wound the clocks and stirred the fires, and waited and waited to see who would come."

"Good night, Americans," he said in German. "Sleep well."

"The minute you go away, he'll start doing it again."

"Everything is all right, and everybody has to do exactly what he does."

"The cattle are lowing, The Baby awakes. But the little Lord Jesus No crying He makes."

"It had to be done," Rumfoord told Billy, speaking of the destruction of Dresden.

"On an average, 324,000 new babies are born into the world every day."

"The Population Reference Bureau predicts that the world's total population will double to 7,000,000,000 before the year 2000."