A 70-year-old Harvard professor and the official Air Force Historian, Bertram C. Rumfoord recuperates from a skiing injury in the bed next to Billy, who has recently been in his plane crash. Rumfoord at first does not believe that Billy was present at the firebombing of Dresden, and only grudgingly acknowledges the horrors Billy must have seen.
Bertram C. Rumfoord Quotes in Slaughterhouse-Five
The Slaughterhouse-Five quotes below are all either spoken by Bertram C. Rumfoord or refer to Bertram C. Rumfoord. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 9
Quotes
The staff thought Rumfoord was a hateful old man, conceited and cruel. He often said to them . . . that people who were weak deserved to die. Whereas the staff, of course, was devoted to the idea that weak people should be helped as much as possible, that nobody should die.
Related Characters:
Kurt Vonnegut (speaker), Bertram C. Rumfoord
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Slaughterhouse-Five LitChart as a printable PDF.

Bertram C. Rumfoord Quotes in Slaughterhouse-Five
The Slaughterhouse-Five quotes below are all either spoken by Bertram C. Rumfoord or refer to Bertram C. Rumfoord. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 9
Quotes
The staff thought Rumfoord was a hateful old man, conceited and cruel. He often said to them . . . that people who were weak deserved to die. Whereas the staff, of course, was devoted to the idea that weak people should be helped as much as possible, that nobody should die.
Related Characters:
Kurt Vonnegut (speaker), Bertram C. Rumfoord
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis: