Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

I recently came across an interview featuring Kurt Vonnegut in which he stated that the novel Catch-22 is based on Homer's The Odyssey.  This piqued my interest: if Vonnegut is correct, then it was something I missed in my original reading of the novel.  So I re-read it, and Vonnegut is right.

The action is set in the Mediterranean basin, mainly on the island of Pianosa (Odysseus - or Ulysses - visits many islands in the Mediterranean).  Captain John Yossarian (Odysseus) is a soldier trying to get home from the war.  He is prevented from doing so by the orders of his wrathful superior officer, Colonel Cathcart (Poseidon).  One by one almost all of Yossarian's comrades die (as did Odysseus' crew).  At one point, Yossarian even likens himself to Ulysses; and like Odysseus, he sustains a wound to his thigh.  So there it is: The Odyssey, this time set in 1943 during the Second World War.

But Catch-22 is so much more than The Odyssey. On one level it is about how humans stay sane or succumb to insanity in an insane situation:

Men went mad and were rewarded with medals.  All over the world, boys on every side of the bomb line were laying down their lives for what they had been told was their country, and no one seemed to mind, least of all the boys who were laying down their young lives.

On another level it about self-serving bureaucracy and the abuse of power:

You have no respect for excessive authority or obsolete traditions. You're dangerous and depraved, and you ought to be taken outside and shot!

Of course, there is the title of the book: Catch-22.  This phrase was invented by Heller to describe and give a raison d'etre to the logical double binds found throughout the book.  The central Catch-22 of the novel runs like this:

1. Regulations say a military doctor must ground anyone who is crazy and asks to be grounded.
2. Only a crazy person would voluntarily continue to fly on highly dangerous bombing missions; and being crazy, they would never ask.
3. Only a sane person would make the request, and so cannot be grounded.
4. Therefore, both the sane and the insane, if so ordered, must continue to fly.

And this is exactly the position the sane Yossarian finds himself in: he must continue to fly or, otherwise, disobey Colonel Cathcart's orders.  Both options could lead to his death.

I was a teenager when I first read Catch-22.  I remembered it as a quirky and comical tale I enjoyed greatly.  On re-reading it, I found it at turns puerile and profound, or frustrating but compelling. I suppose that is also true of war (and bureaucracies) as a lived experience.  There is a lot in this book to offend modern feminist sensibilities; but it was written in a time different from our own and describes an even different time: total war, with its concomitant brutalities. On the other hand, there is also the tenderness that is to be found in life's little acts, such as Yossarian's poignantly impotent 'There, there' as he nurses his injured comrade Snowden.

Catch-22 is one of the great books: dangerous and depraved, sane and crazy, comical and serious, crushing and elevating, and well worth reading.  Thank you, Joseph Heller.