Contemporary criticism, enlightened and led by Fredric Jameson’s theoretical framework, frequently portrays postmodern literature as a product devoid of historical consciousness and politically apathetic, emphasizing its fragmented forms and diminished historicity. This paper challenges this view through a close reading of Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five (2000), arguing that its postmodern literary strategies -- non-linear narrative, black humour, and metafiction -- constitute not an evasion but a critical engagement with historical trauma and political violence. Drawing upon Linda Hutcheon’s concept of “historical metafiction”, it demonstrates how Vonnegut’s formal experimentation fosters profound critiques of war, memory, and narrative authority. The novel thus exemplifies how postmodern aesthetics can embody a resistant historical and political consciousness.
Jingyi Li (Wed,) studied this question.