Culture in Dresden Waurich"). Kurt Vonnegut's novel "Slaughterhouse-Five" describes the bombing of Dresden in February 1945 seen from a slaughterhouse near the old city of Dresden. Vonnegut was prisoner of war in Dresden during that event. Contemporary novelists who are active in Dresden include Uwe Tellkamp and Ingo Schulze. Both broach up the theme of "Mythos Dresden". Tellkamp is known for his novel "Der Turm" ("The Tower") plotting the life of an academic family in its educated social environment (ivory tower society) of Dresden in the last seven years of former East Germany. Dresden's heterogeneous cityspace strongly influences the lifestyle of the city.
Trams in Dresden line opened between the city centre and the former village of Blasewitz, now a borough of Dresden. The Dresden tramway network is a mixed system of traditional street running, especially in the inner city boroughs close to the city centre, and modern light rail. The network uses the unusual gauge of , which is just wider than . In recent years, street running has been replaced by independent right-of-way arrangements wherever possible, and new extensions created in the same form. In November 2008, a extension of line 7 was opened from Gorbitz to Pennrich, in Dresden's south eastern suburbs. In