Eternal Present

Billy Pilgrim’s capability to bounce back and forth in time acquired him a new perspective towards the significance and tragedies of people who insist on living in an irreversible, linear history. He has encountered an overview of life, from the bombing of Dresden in World War II, being abducted by Tralfamadorians to his domestic life as a father, husband, and optometrist. As a result, he exists in an eternal present: “All moments [Billy writes], past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist…It is just an illusion we have here on Earth that one moment follows another one, like beads on a string, and that once a moment is gone it is gone forever” (SF, Vonnegut, p. 27). Vonnegut provides imaginative links to pure inner duration that Billy constantly visits. An idea, event, person, place, or conversation allows Billy to transcend the phenomenal world and enter pure duration. For instance, Billy’s description of the sleeping prisoners and him and his wife in exactly same terms: ”nestled like spoons” (SF, Vonnegut, p. 70-72). This condition elicits a response from Billy’s memory and he “ascends through them to inner duration.”