In chapter one we discover how the alternative title, The Children's Crusade, is chosen. While visiting Bernard O'Hare for help with the novel, Vonnegut also meets his wife Mary. As the two talk about their memories from Dresden, Mary is in the kitchen making a lot of unnecessary noise in order to show her anger towards the topic. She eventually comes out angry and complaining about how everyone fighting the war were "just babies." Mary was afraid of what would happen to the world after the book came out. She was afraid that it would be written to make war look far less horrifying then it really is.
"You'll pretend you were men instead of babies, and you'll be played in the movies by Frank Sinatra and John Wayne or some of those other glamorous, war-loving, dirty old men. And war will look just wonderful, so we'll have a lot more of them. And they'll be fought by babies like the babies upstairs" (14).
Every soldier fighting the war was someones child. They all meant something to their families back home. Mary understood this which caused her anger towards war. "She didn't want her babies or anybody else's babies killed in wars" (15). With Mary's opinions on war came the second title of the novel. Not only are we reading Slaughterhouse Five, but The Children's Crusade as well. What do you think about Mary's opinion on war and the soldiers being babies too young to be on the line? What does keeping his promise of titling the book The Children's Crusade show about Vonnegut?
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