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Kurt Vonnegut wrote Slaughterhouse-Five in the late 1960s, but the setting of the book ranges from the year 1922, when Billy Pilgram was born, to 1976, the year Billy died. Because Vonnegut wrote this novel in 1969, he had experienced World War II and was very knowledgable of that subject, especially since he had participated in it. The nation wasn't very far ahead of the World War in 1969, and were instead involved Vietnam, so Vonnegut brought it back to the people, and re-entered World War II into their thoughts. He gave very in depth accounts of being a prisoner, and first-hand knowledge of the firebombings of Dresden, and wrote this novel in a time period when he felt that people needed to be reminded of the horrors of World War II. At this point in time, UFOs were being searched for frequently, since the "UFO" Roswell had crashed in the late 1940s, and Americans were in a UFO hype. With his inclusion of Billy's abduction by a UFO, he interested more readers, and gave them an insight to UFOs that was not scary or harmful to a person. Vonnegut only had knowledge of events and lifestyles up to the year 1969 though. He predicted what the future would be like when Billy died in 1979, and was very inaccurate. Vonnegut predicted that the United States was split into 20 small nations, so as to stop wars and harbor world peace. He also includes the fact that Chicago had been hydrogen-bombed. This prediction must have come from the fear of communism in the 1950s. He also predicts that people will own "zap guns," and "high-powered laser guns," which of course were definately not widely used in 1979, nor are they widely used now. In 1969, however, Vonnegut must have had high expectations for future generations.
The novel does not progress in chronological order. Billy Pilgram is capable of jumping around in time. These jumps are triggered by events that remind him of past experiences, and cause him to go back in time, or threats of death, which causes him to skip most of his life and go straight to his death day. The sporatic setting of time in this novel does not pertain directly to the year that is was written because there is no time that Billy goes back to after a travel through time. The war is the most prominent time period that Billy visits throughout the course of the novel; however, this is not when it is set. Billy decided to expose his ability to jump through time in 1968, after a tragic plane accident in which he was the only survivor. One might think that the whole novel was based in 1968,which was around the time that it was written, due to mild brain damage that Billy recieved in the crash, causing him to make up the whole time travel charade, except for the fact that Billy had "come unstuck in time" for the first time in 1944. Due to this fact, readers are constantly being exposed to different events in Billy's life, and come into contact with a wide range of years, none directly related to the year 1969.
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