Vonnegut vs Horace

Kurt Vonnegut writes two limericks early on in his book “Slaughterhouse-Five”; the first one, which starts with the line, “There was a young man from Stamboul,” and the second with “My name is Yon Yonson.” (8) Both limericks send us a different message that has to do with time and effort. The young man’s limerick tells about him yelling at his tool and saying it took his wealth, health, and he won’t even pee anymore. The Yong Yonson verse talks about Yon Yonson being asked about his name by people who pass by and he answers with his name. It implies about life being repetitive and never-ending.
Later in the book he refers to these limericks multiple times to briefly remind us of their message. For example, when there is an occurrence that resembles their deeper meaning. On page 14, Vonnegut uses a quote from Quintus Horatius Flaccus, who is known as Horace in English. He was the leading lyric poet of Rome thousands of years ago. The quote Vonnegut used comes from Latin which reads, “Eheu, fugaces labuntur anni.” This can be translated to “Alas, our fleeting years pass away.” All that means is that unfortunately our years pass by so fast that we don’t have enough time to realize it sometimes. I think he used this quote to illustrate that the time that has passed since the war passed by so fast compared to when he was fighting that he didn’t realize how far ahead he was. Maybe also because by the time he visited his friend, he had so many ideas in his head that he had been thinking about what to write for so long that he forgot how long it has taken him to do all these things to get a book together. There’s many different views you can take on it...

Laurenz S