Books

Universal City: Universal Studios, 1970. First Edition. Very good. Production number 00114. 188 leaves; two identical title leaves; screenplay text numbered 1-140, 140a, 140b, 141-186. The final script for the movie was 134 leaves, meaning this version has 52 pages that were cut by the time George Roy Hill started directing the action. This is an early draft of this adaptation of Vonnegut's science fiction anti-war novel, which magnificently weaves together the Dresden firebombing during the Second World War, optometry, time travel, and space aliens. And so it goes. Of course, the film never uses Vonnegut's catchphrase, employed whenever someone dies in the novel, which is often. It appears that the decision to leave it out of the film was made even in this first draft (your lazy cataloguer did not read the whole screenplay, but if Billy Pilgrim says "so it goes", I couldn't find it). Instead, Geller uses "So it goes" to replace the traditional "THE END" on the last page,…

Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death is a science fiction-infused anti-war novel by Kurt Vonnegut, first published in 1969.

Look for the statement 'Published by Delacorte Press/Seymour Lawrence in March 1969' and no mention of subsequent printings on the copyright page.