Kurt Vonnegut's novel Slaughterhouse-Five, uses the biblical allusion of Lot's wife returning to the destroyed cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to parallel the story of Billy Pilgrim during the war and his experience afterward, upon his return to the United States. Although the reference is brief, it has profound implications for the depiction of America during World War II, particularly the bombing of Dresden. Even if the action of Lot's wife condemns her to transforming into a pillar of salt, the narrator underlines her choice to indicate the importance of showing compassion and having perspective. Ultimately, Slaughterhouse-Five criticizes the American social attitude of ignoring the unjust nature of its actions during World War II. Furthermore, Vonnegut's novel explains this by elucidating the horrors of war, particularly regarding the slaughter of innocents, how it leaves soldiers stagnant upon returning home and leaves them empty with an American dream that cannot come true. In order to combat violence, the novel emphasizes that one must place a higher value on human life and show compassion towards others; America must own up to its mistakes so that the soldiers who fought and died for it can move on. The narrator deeply appreciates Lot's wife because she "looks back," something American society fails to do after World War II, and in doing so fails to recognize its own flaws. Rumfoord embodies this attitude when he tells Billy, a survivor of the Dresden firebombing, that the bombing of Dresden “had to be done” (253). The diction of "had" and the emphasis placed on this term indicate an attitude that America is obligated to destroy the civilian, unarmed city. Also, "fact" has a double meaning middle of paper......and Gomorrah, except Dresden doesn't represent inherent evil. Through the biblical reference to Lot's wife and her role in Sodom and Gomorrah, a critique of war and the slaughter of innocent lives is presented in Slaughterhouse-Five. Ultimately, the work creates a dichotomy between the narrator and the protagonist, Billy Pilgrim. It emphasizes the narrator's value on human life and emphasizes the importance of compassion and being human. Slaughterhouse-Five elucidates the horrors of war and the stagnation it leaves on those involved and fails to offer a way forward, but powerfully relishes the value of human life and the importance of nonviolence. Work cited Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse-Five. New York: dial. 2009. Print. Rackstraw, Loree. “Vonnegut’s Cosmos.” The North American Review 267.4 (December 1982): 63-67. JSTOR. Internet. September 25. 2011.