s and renews his life many times, enforcing the cyclical nature of the book.Vonnegut keeps this series of cycles going through the use of excessive repetition. Um is uttered often by Billy, as is the description of smelling like mustard gas and roses. He uses this repetition to stress underlying messages that he wants to convey. The poo-tee-weet of the birds at the beginning and end of the book represent Vonneguts own so it goes. Readers are told that there is only the sound of birds at the end of massacres and all that they can say is poo-tee-weet (Vonnegut 19). Pilgrim is accused of having echolaia, a mental disease that makes people repeat things that people around them say. The audience could also accuse the author of having this disease. This is just one of the connections that can be made between the author and the main character.Billy gets caged by the Tralfamadorians in order for them to study human behavior and our thought processes. This is very similar to Vonneguts own caging as a prisoner of war. The mere idea of being caged seems mortifying, but both Billy and Vonnegut can escape the reality of being imprisoned by revisiting the past. The important thing for us to learn is that although we may not be able to physically escape a horrible situation, we can mentally get away, and that is where we find our inner peace. No matter what happens to us, we should retain our humanity and never let anything influence our personalities.The lesson of keeping our humanity is expressed through the biblical story of Lots wife. Although she was warned not to look back at the destruction of the town and its people, she did anyway out of human instinct. Vonnegut claims to love her for that because it was so human (Vonnegut 21-22). Most humans would do the same thing out of curiosity. Even though she turned into a pillar of salt for doing this, Vonnegut feels as though it was the right thing to do just because it was human and p...
