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Billy Pilgrim's Birth
Billy Pilgrim, the protagonist, is born in Ilium, New York. He graduated high school in the upper third of his class. He attended one semester of optometry college before being drafted for WWII. -
Unstuck In Time
Billy, unfit for actual combat, is a chaplain's assistant for an Army regiment in Germany. His entire unit had been bombed, leaving only him alive. He joined three other similarly stranded soldiers and decides to stick with them. During his party's march back to the Allied front, he "becomes unstuck in time" for the first time. He travels back to sometime in his childhood, when he's first learning to swim. He nearly drowns, and "resents the person who rescued him" -
Awakening
Billy wakes after being violently shaken by one of his party members. This is the first time Billy vocalizes his contempt for being alive. The other two party members ditch them, and are found and shot by German scavengers soon after. -
Billy's Discharge
Billy is honorably discharged from the military, returns to Ilium, and marries the daughter of the founder of the Ilium School of Optometry. -
Lion's Club
Billy is elected president of the Lions Club. Suddenly, he blinks and is in 1944 again, about to be severely beaten by the party member who hadn't abandoned him, Roland Weary. -
Baseball Banquet
Billy blinks in 1965 and finds himself in 1958, at a banquet for Ilium's little league baseball team, in which his son Robert is a member. -
Optometrists Party
Billy blinks in 1958 and opens his eyes in 1961, at a party for optometrists. He blacks out drunk. -
Plane Crash
Billy is involved in a plane crash in Vermont that kills everyone on board except him. This is the first time Kurt Vonnegut, the author, uses the phrase "so it goes." He writes this motif every single time death is mentioned in the story, even when it's not directly applied to someone dying (Ex: Vonnegut describes a flat soda as dead). While in the hospital, his wife dies of carbon monoxide poisoning. So it goes. -
Return From Hospital
Billy, after returning home from the hospital, drives to NYC to be on a late-night radio talk show, where he discusses how he came unstuck in time. He also discusses how, in 1967, he was abducted by a race of fourth-dimensional aliens called "Tralfamadorians" and put in one of their zoos. -
Tralfamadorian
A month later, billy writes a letter to his town's newspaper, describing the physical appearance of a Tralfamadorian: "... They were two feet high, and green, and shaped like plumber's friends... At the top of each shaft was a little hand with a green eye in its palm. They could see in four dimensions. They pitied Earthlings for being able to see only three" (26). His second letter describes how the Tralfamadorians perceived four dimensions.
