Catch-22 Study Guide
Joseph Heller wrote his satirical “Catch-22” novel in 1961 under a very loyal and democratic President Kennedy leadership. Other ways it’s hard to imagine such a critical piece being published under the governance of Truman or Eisenhower.
The plot is centered around the protagonist Captain John Yossarian during the Second World War. Location is at one of the American Air Forces base stationed in Italy.
The chronological order of the novel is broken into different flashbacks and relived memories. A neutral person who never reveals himself tells the story, neither does he introduce his feelings or judgments. All these tools used by the author created an impression of the physical presence of the reader on the scene and adds to reader’s confusion and gravity of the situation.
Despite the setting of the book, the descriptions of the events happening around airmen are very funny. The officers who weren’t fit to fly due to their mental condition weren’t obliged to do so. Yet, if they applied to be excused from flying, that would mean exhibiting appropriate concern for the safety of the mission, which goes in line with being sane and fit for flying….
In the midst of this chaos, the soldiers take the liberty to insubordination, inappropriate relationships, sabotage, theft, negligence, leaving the base at their own wish. And all this goes without any punishment. Maybe that was the army democracy in the making?
“Catch-22” is no glamorous Hollywood action movie: fights here are frequent but drunk and clumsy, the names of characters are far from firm and heroic, the medals are awarded to naked soldiers and aviators are wishing to avoid dangerous missions instead of purposely facing death.
At the very end, all of the pilots, bombardiers and other soldiers only have one aim – to survive the war and return home. But each and every one of them has their own ways of beguiling the time.
Author: Timmothy Bishop
New Essays
Catch-22 is a novel that tells many stories, but the crux of the novel concerns Joseph Yossarian, a bombardier stationed at the United States Army Air Force base on the fictional Mediterranean island of Pianosa. A war rages between the Allies and the Nazis, but there is another, more important war...
The Hypocrisy of Distortion in Catch-22 Joseph Heller's novel Catch-22 is represented through “a long series of similar ironies” (wikipedia. org). The utilization of distortion is seen in numerous instances to get his views across. But what is distortion? Distortion is “a statement that twists...
I Can See Clearly Now Flannery O’Conner argued that “[Distortion] is the only way to make people see”. This famous statement is initially contradictory and incongruous, but in Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 it is easy to see the truth of this paradox. The pages of Catch-22 are...
The critical reputation of Joseph Heller's Catch-22 (1961) is a curiosity. The book is often praised, even celebrated, yet most critics are still puzzled by such basic matters as the structure of the novel. Friends and foes alike tend to agree that the novel is hilarious but also that it is...