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Sleep is an escape from trauma.

Lonely in the experience of time

Everyday life brings him back to war always.

Naps are vulnerable

Sleep is the safest coping option.

Sleep may worsen his trauma

(forget to hit post...)

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Recovery from the war - create a sense of comfort and escapism

Reflects the loneliness that he is experiencing

The reason to nap is that they take him away from reality and gives him a space where he is given a safe space to process those events instead of being thrust violently back into them

Sleep represents a state of healing, and the repetition of the naps represents the long road Billy has to walk down in order to process such a big traumatic event

Trauma is a huge part of his life, and has effects on every part of his life

Naps allow him to be vulnerable

What the doctor prescribes to him is the escape he uses

He uses his imagination to downplay his trauma and escape from the realities of the war

Trauma robs people of their autonomy and comfort in their lives.

He is trying to push through his trauma

People are trying to justify it or celebrate their contributions, but Billy is not able to escape his trauma or experiences.

Overall, the time jumps Billy experiences as well as his various coping mechanisms, such as napping, dissociating, or using his imagination to get away from the trauma, this discussion revealed how despite these all being intended as coping mechanisms, they actually show how he can never turly escape the horrors he experienced in the war.

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Sleep is reassurance, another form of coping, allowing a break from his trauma

Shows how lonely he is, he is the sole person experiencing this

The flashbacks are the processing, the naps are a safer form of processing

The war is dark, the effects are permanently affecting Billy

He is not a typical character, rather than growing he's deteriorating. He doesn't do much for himself.

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"Billy did the simplest thing, he drove on" (pushing through PTSD). "The house where Billy had grown up used to be somewhere in what is empty now" (loss of structure of his life into emptiness through PTSD). PTSD is seen as inescapable due to his constant time travel experiences that continually remind him of the source of his trauma, a time travel that makes it hard for his to distinguish present from history

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Q2: What is the importance of Billy going to the Lion's Club or what is the meaning of napping

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Q2: What is the importance of Billy going to the Lion's Club or what is the meaning of napping

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The doctor's suggestion alludes to the war and sleep he missed, he's getting the rest he couldn't get with violence constantly around him

Sleep is the trauma catching up to him, which allows him to feel his trauma and possibly heal it - "...would find himself weeping"

Shows loneliness as a characterization

"naps take him away from reality"

Naps = safe space - Ellie

Trauma is in every aspect of his life

Billy is a dynamic character, but rather than building up his character, Vonnegut is tearing him down to further support the theme of the book: war can't be encouraged - Truc

Stereotypes reveal vulnerability

uses imagination to downplay everything to avoid his trauma

Trauma = deadness, no vibrancy, shows the effect psychologically through imagery

Even the escape is guaranteed - lily s

He can try to make light of a situation but he'll never get past it fully, which connects to my discussion point of the permanence of war shown through the aliens.

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Sleep can be bad where he is allowed to think about his bad thoughts too much?

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Billy is truly unable to escape the war throughout his life. Although the doctors are trying to alleviate his PTSD, they still can't fend off the worst of it, and Billy can't escape his own memories. Many veterans have to deal with lonliness and PTSD without adequate support.

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Billy has many different coping methods. He attempts to downplay the impacts of war at the Lions Club meetings and uses his imagination to escape the horrors he witnessed. Because of his trauma, his life becomes disorganized and unfocused, which the book reflects with its narrative. The focus on trauma within the book reflects the need for veterans to get proper help.

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The doctor suggested sleep as a way to deal with his PTSD.

Billy is likely exhausted from being unstuck in time, so sleeping gives him a break from the flashbacks.

His trauma enters every aspect of his life, like how just driving around his neighborhood reminds him of the war.

Billy may not grow throughout the book, but get weaker.

He feels very alone, because his house is empty. His wife and daughter don't understand.

He thinks he cannot change the past, present, or future. He is trying to deal with his PTSD by just pushing through it.

He doesn't see life as vibrant anymore, and became pessimistic.

He sees Dresden in the destruction of a much less harsh landscape.

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The naps allow him to be vulnerable and take time for himself, which he couldn't do during the war.

He often downplays serious events to protect himself from the trauma he experienced in the war. His disassociation is a coping mechanism.

Even during his naps, he time travels, showing how he cannot escape the war even during the time that is supposed to help him recover.

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Loneliness is an effect of PTSD, and Billy's mental state causes him to be disconnected from not only what is happening around him but also his family and personal safety. A concept that is supported by a structure that makes it appear that his mental state is collapsing (eratically changing time) and that he is slowly falling into an unemotional and "dead" state.

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1. Provides him with sleep he may not have gotten.

2. Feeling a sense of safety and security.

3. Escape from trauma.

4. Billy is exhausted by never knowing when he will be.

5. Take him away from reality.

6. Safe space to process his past.

7. Needs to heal for Dresden.

8. Might have dementia.

9. The war consumes him, it is always on his mind.

10. Naps allow to be vulnerable.

11. Billy needs help to sleep.

12. Wife & daughter would not understand.

13. Downplays some things to keep him from thinking of the war.

14. Disassociate from what is really happening.

15. Not considering what the son could be going through.

16. Healthy way to cope.

17. He no longer cares.

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Naps are able to act as a step to separate a person from their reality, work as a mental health help, and a way to cope with PTSD.

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Sleep is resetting a sort of reassurance which helps to reduce PTSD and gives a sort of escape from the trauma. This escape makes him very emotional as he remembers the trauma.

The sleeping allows him to slow down, the weeping allows us to see his loneliness of the experiences the has.

The naps give him a space away from reality, the naps give him a safe space to process the events without being inside of the events.

The need for sleep implies that he needs recovery and that he does need a lot of it.

Because a lot of the trauma that he experiences consumes his whole life. Especially with his character who seems to be fully consumed with his trauma, even forgetting his own age.

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The naps are a way for Billy to escape his PTSD. They help with his mental recovery by giving him time not to think about what happened in the war. Overall the naps reflect how the war had a major impact on him, which he cannot escape even after many years.

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He feels alone in life, where he cant talk to anyone about his trauma. His PTSD isolates him from everyone who cares.

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Billy's character isn't typical: throughout the book he often feels disoriented and his mind becomes more radical. He occasionally doesn't remember what time or year he is in, which demonstrates his lack of control.

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Even slight physical references (driving through a neighborhood or a 3 Musketeers bar) to experiences in the war damage Billy's current mental state and cause him to experience even more PTSD and act in a manner of self-harm (not sleeping or putting himself in dangerous environments).

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His trauma is in every aspect of his life, and his life after the war often reminds him of his experiences in war.

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Billy is lonely because of his experience of time.

The naps give billy a safe space to process the trauma that he experienced.

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Sleep is his escape

flashbacks are processing of the war

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"It's exhausting for Billy to never know what time he is. He's lonely in his experience of time because no one else understands it."

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The naps help him recover from Dresdon and give him an escape from the traumatic events that he experienced. The crying shows his loneliness in his experience and his inability to be understood by others.

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This assists in the mental recovery of Billy by giving him a "safe" escape from the trauma of the war and his constant, almost erratic personal experience of time.

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Sleeping is like an escape for him a life that he doesn't know where he's going to end up in

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Billy tries to rationalize the bombing and cope with the war by reflecting on God's role in it, again circling back to the inevitable part.

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billy describes them as friends or companions

move freely within time

"it can only be experienced of you see time of the moment"

coping mechanism for billy and his trauma

alien represents attitude towards fatalism for both billy and vonnegut

"so it goes" recognize that death is not a bad things and one moment doesnt describe the entire spectrum

novel not structured in cause and effect, jumping from time to time, place to place

"always goes back to dresden"

effects of war are permenant and make their wat into billy's mind through everything he is experiencing post war

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Different coping mechanisms are explored throughout the book. Not only through the concept of aliens and time travel, but rationalization is portrayed. Billy is rationalizing with his PTSD by putting others on a pedestal as higher or divine figures, and comparing them to Adam and Eve. Another coping mechanism is portrayed through Billy viewing the war documentary in reverse, wanting it to all go away.

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Cause-and-effect relationships can be seen in the novel. World War II has caused Billy to live in uncertainty and fear. The author tries to redefine what PTSD means by showing the reader how infatuated Billy is with his past. There are many instances where he chooses to give up, even in war times, and focus his attention on his past.

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I think the use of a made up word by the author also attempts a comical spin on something very serious, which shows coping techniques as well. The "so it goes" emphasizes that point that when you can't do anything to fix it you just keep going.

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Billy tries to rationalize with himself to make sense of the traumatic events he experienced.

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Billy uses the time travel to try and rationalize what happened to him and cope, by placing people on a pedestal.

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Billy tries to rationalize constantly with situations that come up as being traumatic or fueling for his PTSD, showing that he is coping with the PTSD by putting people up on a pedastol.

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Billy tries to reason with himself as to why things happened

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The use of so it goes is a motif that details his approach to moving on from death.

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Billy's coping mechanism of "as it goes" through his interludes shows the impact of the atrocities that were committed at Dresden, on him, and others. He always revisits his experiences in Dresden chronologically between events of his future, emphasizing war's impact. Specifically, it outlines that the effects of war are concrete and permanent.

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"the effects of war are permanet." This is the basis for all of Billy's quirkiness because they are all coping mechanisms. so it goes and the aliens are ways to view his past memories like traumatically.

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The effects of war are permanent. His time travel starts during the war and is structured around it. It shows that time travel was an escape during the hard times in the war.

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Memories can be surprised but the worse they toll on someones health and view of the world, the harder they are to overall ignore in the grand scene of life and every moment witnessed as a whole.

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The effects of war are permanent and cannot be ignored.

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The time travel is very chronological and even though he has been jumping back between periods of time this one is uniform which stands out.

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Tanner said that "seeing death is the same as birth" in the book, and that makes sense. I think that Billy Pilgrim perceives the idea of time as emotionally bottomless. There is a momentary bliss in many of his time traveling until the negative emotions take over. At this point, Billy visits his past memories to get a feeling of nostalgia until the dreadful feelings of the present catch up with him, breaking him out of a trance.

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I think the comment about him only mentioning the aliens after the plan crash is important. Because the majority of his trauma was during the war but I think the plane crash is a turning point that he continues to face traumatic events even once he is "out" or "free" and should be living a peaceful life.

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The Dresden period is chronological, unlike the rest of the chapters. This shows a difference in perspective and uniformity with how the events occurred within his lifetime.

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"It's always back to Dresden."

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This book is not written in a typical narrative structure; events are told in random order, which immerses reader in Billy's experience with time

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The non-linear structure of the book puts the reader in Billy's perspective and conveys that all moments are happening at once and are connected.

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By telling the story in a non-linear order, we are forced to experience the story from the author/Billy's perspective.

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"because of Billie's time travel, the events are not cause and effect, we get one moment, and one from 50 years before... it puts us in the shoes of Billie... we are forced to see it from the author's perspective... they are connected"

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He mentions the crash once he realizes how everyone else has died but he survived

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This book connects to Interstellar because both perceive time in a different way. He waited to talk about the aliens until after the plane crash because he had more trauma.

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They percieve time as a 3-d box which allows them to view all experiences not just the bad one that ended someone's life

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"So it goes" is used to explain how trauma isn't necessarily ongoing, meaning life will go on even when someone experiences horrible things.

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"Seeing death at the same as birth... the bad experience doesn't define a person's entire life"

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I also think it is interesting how it is not just traumatic flashbacks, sometimes he also just revisits an earlier past. Such as being a baby, which in a way is itsown version of lack of control but provides more peace than being an adult without control.

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"So it goes" is also a coping mechanism because they do not allow death to be sad, they just recognize that someone is not alive in a certain moment, but celebrate they are alive in many other moments.

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Tralfamadorians embody Billys trauma and are a representation of how he views the actions of his life and what has happened to him- seeing death as the same as birth is a full spectrum of awareness and memories through traumatic coping mechanisms.

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The book is structured in a way that is not in chronological order, at least in Billy's mind. The jumping between timelines creates a fast pace that shows Billy's mind is spiraling. The war has a hold on him and he tries to escape by constantly moving to different times in his life.

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Aliens are his form of escaping from his war trama

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The aliens are his form of escaping

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Billy and Vonnegut cope with the war and their trauma afterwards by viewing it as inevitable and accepting that there is nothing they could have done to change it

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Vonnegut created Billy to cope with his trauma from the war. The tralfamadorians exemplify the inevitability of the war and his death.

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The time travel and aliens represent the inevitability of war. The aliens also act as a form of escapism.

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"The aliens are the form of escapism and PTSD we see throughout the book"

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"Suddenly we're back in the war, or now we're in space with aliens, and these aliens sort of represent this attitude towards fatalism and like the end of inevitability that like more has and their attitudes towards it."

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I think you can also connect this recurring reference to aliens to the effects of trauma and PTSD. The time traveling almost mimics the vivid flashbacks PTSD causes, and also the lack of stability and control individuals feel like they are jumping around.

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Change in time- fatalism is represented dby the aliens and how everything can and is inevitable.

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"Reflection of how Billy and Vonnegut cope with the trauma of the war...this alien represents this attitude of fatalism... the inevitability of war"

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Tralfamadorians represent the lack of control that Billy has. It shows that his PTSD is taking over him and the comfort he seeks by looking at the past when things were better in his life.

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People often can feel very small in specific situations. They state is as being a coping mechanism for what happened to Billy in war. The mentality of war is shown, as people die but life has to move on without them.

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"Even though it is fiction, it is still connected to the reality of the situation"

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"Even though it is fiction, it is still connected to the reality of the situation"

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"It describes the lack of control that humans have."

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(Fiona MP)

I like the description Felicity used of "friendly" is important to point out because you would think these aliens would not be friendly. Especially because Barbara sees her father's description of them as worrisome, and thinks he's going crazy. But it is not worrisome to him it is just truth.

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Billy describes the aliens as friends and they see in four dimensions

They are green pan creatures and kidnap him on the night of his daughter's wedding

They move within time and don't view it the same as humans

Everything is happening at once and has already been decided!

Earth is the only planet that has free will.

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"We often feel very small and withdrawn in situations we don't have control of"

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We've visited so many planets and Earth is the only one where free will is a discussion."

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"Earth is the only one with discussion of free will"

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"Why anything, because this moment simply is." The aliens look at all of time in one glance, just like looking at the rocky mountains.

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"It can only be experienced if you see time in one moment"

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"It can only be experienced if you see time in one moment"

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Past Present and the Future have always existed and they're all just memories in time.

If you can see a box but 3d allows all sides to be seen- kind of is like what they're doing with time. They talk about free will being experienced when you only see time in one moment, You cant have free will if you already know what's happening.

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"this moment simply is" considers how time just simply passes. The Tralfamadorians are acknowledgeable about time, and I think Billy is trying to find himself by making sense of all his time-traveling in his mind.

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"They are not time travling rather have the ability to see all parts of time"

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"I never interpreted it as time travel, but seeing all parts of time"

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"I never interpreted it as time travel, but seeing all parts of time"

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"All moments, past, present, and future have always existed"

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"One of the most important things about the aliens is that they can move freely within time...they consider how everything passes."

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The tramafaldorians are seen as friendly and caring

Small pocket creatures

The move free within time