Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children’s Crusade, Vonnegut, Kurt Jr. Published by Delacorte Press, New York, 1969. Stated Fourth printing, May 1969 on the copyright page. Dustjacket shows $5.95 with code 8021 on front flap and 0369 on rear flap. 8vo up to 9½” tall., 186pp. Turquoise cloth boards with two colour gilt spine titles; black end papers. Volume is in fine condition with tiny inked name to blank flyleaf. Light toning to jacket and small closed tear to lower edge front panel. A very collectible copy.
“Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.”
