Catch-22 by Joseph Heller | Characters, Summary, Analysis

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller | Characters, Summary, Analysis

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Catch-22 is an American satirical novel written by Joseph Heller that was first published in 1961. It is a satirical war novel set in World War II which also satirizes McCarthyism and the Red Scare during the 1950s in the United States. The Red Scare was a period of public fear and anxiety over the supposed rise of Communist and Socialist Ideologies in a noncommunist state such as the United States. Joseph Heller began writing the novel in 1953.

The term Catch-22 is also used in logic and it means a paradoxical situation that arises from rules, regulations, or procedures that an individual is subject to, but has no control over because to fight the rule is to accept it. Let us suppose that you need a loan. Still, the bank says that if you need a loan, it means your financial situation is not proper and hence a loan to you will be a bad investment, hence denies the loan unless you prove that you do not need a loan in which case, it will be proven that your financial situation is strong. But if you prove that you do not need a loan, you won’t get the loan. Joseph Heller coined the term Catch-22 and used it as the title of his novel. Joseph Heller employed a distinctive non-chronological third-person omniscient narration in the novel, describing events from the points of view of different characters.

Characters of Catch-22:

Captain John Yossarian is the protagonist of the novel. He is a squadron bombardier in the U.S. Air Force but he hates the war. His powerful desire to live has led him to the conclusion that millions of people are trying to kill him, and he has decided either to live forever or, ironically, die trying. Orr is Yossarian’s roommate. He almost always crashes his plane or is shot down on combat missions, but he always manages to survive. Yossarian believes that Orr is crazy but one day Orr disappears after another typical crash landing. Mudd is another roommate of Yossarian who is killed just two hours after he arrives in Pianosa. Clevinger is an idealistic member of Yossarian’s squadron. He is a Harvard graduate who firmly believes in such concepts as country, loyalty, and duty, and argues about them with Yossarian. One day, Clevinger mysteriously disappears and is presumed dead. Havermeyer is another leading squadron bombardier who, unlike Yossarian, never takes evasive action but volunteers to go on every mission. Chief White Halfoat is an alcoholic Native American from Oklahoma who has decided to die of pneumonia. He curses the Americans for the wrongs they have committed against his people, and he enjoys scaring Captain Flume, his roommate. Lieutenant Milo Minderbinder is an unscrupulous businessman in the squadron. He is a powerful mess officer who controls an international black-market syndicate named M&M Enterprises and he makes great profits during the war. Corporal Snark is Milo’s cynical, bitter assistant cook. Doc Daneeka is the medical officer who is sad because the war ruined his lucrative private practice in the US. He refuses to help any of the men with their illnesses or problems. Ex-P.F.C. Wintergreen is a nasty man who is in charge of the mail. He constantly manipulates and plays politics with everyone's correspondence. Chaplain Albert Taylor Tappman is a friend of Yossarian. He is kind and weak-willed but he firmly believes in trying to save human life. He enjoys his job and hopes to win a medal for his exemplary work. Corporal Whitcomb is a jealous assistant of the Chaplain who tries to make his superior's life as miserable as possible by criticizing him and taking over his operations. Dunbar is a friend of Yossarian who understands the gravity of war. Captain Aardvark or Arfy is Yossaian’s navigator. He pretends to be friends with Nately in an attempt to endear himself to Nately's rich father. Nately is one of Yossarian’s co-pilots who falls in love with a whore whom he wishes to marry. Colonel Cathcart threatens to send Nately home without the whore unless he continues to fly more missions. He gets killed during one of the missions. Lieutenant Colonel Korn is Colonel Cathcart’s wily, cynical assistant. McWatt is Yossarian's pilot. He enjoys infuriating Yossarian by flying his airplane just a few inches over Yossarian's tent. General Peckem is a pseudo-sophisticated general who is trying to displace Dreedle. Lieutenant Scheisskopf works under General Peckam who despises him for being too ignorant and stupid. However, Scheisskopf is accidentally promoted to Lieutenant General due to an oversight and a misunderstanding of memos by General Peckem. General Dreedle nasty man who taunts General Peckem for his veneer of sophistication. He also hates his son-in-law Colonel Moodus. Appleby is a handsome, athletic member of the squadron and an excellent Ping-Pong player. Captain Black is the squadron’s bitter intelligence officer. Captain Black wants nothing more than to be squadron commander. Major Major is a shy, awkward boy misnamed by his cruel father. Nurse Cramer is a puritanical nurse who helps the injured soldiers. Nurse Duckett is a co-worker of Nurse Crammer who flirts with soldiers. The Soldier in White is injured and encased entirely in white bandages. Nurse Cramer takes care of him.

Summary of Catch-22

The novel begins on the island of Pianosa a small Italian island not far from Rome, at the end of the Second World War. Captain Yossarian is stationed at Pianosa as the squadron bombardier. He begins avoiding missions by faking illness but learns that the Air Force regulations prevent him from being grounded for illness or obtaining a leave. Yossarian wasn’t like this before but he saw too many crazy incidences on the war front. He often remembers Snowden, a soldier who died in his arms on a mission. Yossarian lost all desire to participate in the war after Snowden’s death. He began observing the discrepancies in the war. He also witnesses the death of Mudd who was killed just two hours after his arrival and was dumped in his tent. Everyone denied the existence of Mudd, so he lied there despite Yossarian's protests. He continues to spend time in the hospital but gets bored. Thus, he began to write letters using the pseudonym ‘Washington Irving.’ This creates a ruckus and the government sends two C.I.D. men to investigate.

His squadron gets bombed by its own mess officer, and colonels and generals volunteer their men for the most perilous battle to enhance their own reputations. He observes that his squadron is thrown thoughtlessly into brutal combat situations and bombing runs in which it is more important for the squadron members to capture good aerial photographs of explosions than to destroy their targets. He notices that the superior officials continually raise the number of missions that they are required to fly before being sent home so that no one is ever sent home. Thus, he starts believing that the war is actually to kill him while he desires to live as long as possible. He continues to fake his liver ailment and remains in the hospital. A Chaplain named Albert Taylor Tappman visits him. The chaplain feels uncomfortable talking to most officers, but Yossarian is kind to him and invites him to return in the future. Many other men seek the haven of the hospital by feigning illness.

Yossarian’s roommate, Orr crash-lands every time he goes on a mission and talks about putting apples and horse chestnuts in his cheeks. Clevinger, a Harvard graduate, argues with Yossarian about whether or not people must obey their institutions and fight the war. Havermeyer munches on peanut butter brittle all the time, loves to shoot innocent field mice with his pistol, and earns the wrath of his men by never taking evasive action on a mission. The war takes an especially harsh toll on the men and their morale. Yossarian continuously opposes the war and Colonel Cathcart’s frequent increases in the number of missions required to obtain leave. Yossarian argues with Clevinger that everyone is trying to kill him. He says that anyone who tries to make him fight is just as dangerous as the enemy. Yossarian's various attempts to be grounded fail. He meets the group medic Doctor Daneeka and asks if he can be grounded from flying on account of insanity. Doctor Daneeka answers that it is not possible and when he explains why, the idea of “Catch-22’ comes in front. Doctor Daneeka says that Yossarian is sane enough to ask to be grounded, he is sane enough to fly. Only those crazy enough to want to fly are crazy enough to be grounded. This is called a Catch-22. Yossarian begins observing ‘Catch-22’ everywhere. He notices a law that is illegal to read. Ironically, the place where it is written that it is illegal is in Catch-22 itself. Another similar law is that the enemy is allowed to do anything that one can’t stop him from doing. Yossarian realizes the paradoxical and circular illogic of these laws and notices that such laws only serve those who have made the law. He notices that most of his colleagues and superior officers are also trapped in similar Catch-22 situations. Chief White Halfoat is an alcoholic who forges other men's signatures to procure more alcohol. He curses the Americans for the wrongs they have committed against his people, and he enjoys scaring Captain Flume who is in constant fear that Chief White Halfoat will slit his throat while he is asleep. Consequently, Captain Flume goes to live in the woods where the chaplain finds him. When winter comes, though, he moves back inside, hoping that Chief White Halfoat will die of pneumonia. McWatt, Yossarian's brainless pilot, irritates Yossarian by flying his airplane a few inches above Yossarian's tent. Hungry Joe has screaming nightmares although he denies them each morning, and he gets into fistfights with the cat that belongs to his roommate. Nurse Duckett, a good friend of Nurse Cramer. She despises Yossarian at first, but later, she pursues a passionate fling with him. She enjoys flirting with the other men, but she eventually leaves Yossarian for a doctor.

Meanwhile, the Chaplain continues to meet Yossarian and tries to help him because he believes that saving human life is most important. He tries to convince Colonel Cathcart and Korn to send the pilots who have flown enough missions home. Cathcart, Korn, and other higher-ups rebuff the chaplain. The C.I.D. officers investigating the group for supposed forgeries of letters settle on the chaplain as their prime suspect; he is tortured and threatened with imprisonment, but later set free.

The Chaplain spends his time peacefully in the woods on the periphery of camp but his assistant Corporal Whitcomb is furious and constantly abuses the chaplain and collaborates with Colonel Cathcart to have the chaplain court-martialed.

The superior officials too engage in meaningless competition and squabbles. Colonel Cathcart and his assistant Colonel Korn try to gain favor by constantly raising the number of missions that the men must fly to obtain leave. Korn merely wants a promotion to Cathcart’s job, and Cathcart wants to be made general, replacing Dreedle and Peckem, the two warring commanders in charge of the Italian campaign. Dreedle is mostly concerned with his mistress, and Peckem does not care what gets bombed so long as bombs fall in an appealing “bomb pattern” for documentary photographs. Ex-P.F.C. Wintergreen doesn’t like General Peckem and his verbosity. Since he is in charge of the mail, he always ruins General Peckem’s letters while favoring General Dreddle. Colonel Scheisskopf is so obsessed with winning the weekly parades that he ignores his own wife's sexual overtures.

Two months ago, Yossarian and the other pilots were given a mission to fly to Bologna, north of their base near Rome. Yossarian nearly died during the mission when his plane was struck by enemy fire. After returning to the base, Yossarian sneaked away to Rome. He met a woman named Luciana in the Italian capital and enjoyed the night with her. When he returned to the base, he learned the mission quota was increased again, and he immediately left for the hospital with his fabricated liver problem. Since he is in the hospital, life on the base becomes darker and more ominous. Deaths become more frequent, and some pilots simply vanish and never return. Not all these disappearances are due to enemy activity. Yossarian knows a man named Dunbar whom American generals target because he complains about the frequency of the dangerous but purposeless missions. Dunbar deliberately “disappeared” during one mission by the commanding officers, and he is never mentioned again. Orr has to crash land his damaged plane in the Mediterranean Sea and float away on a raft. McWatt, buzzing the camp once more, kills Kid Sampson by accident and, in recognition of this, flies his plane into a mountain.

The squadron’s mess hall officer Milo runs a syndicate in which he borrows military planes and pilots to transport food between various points in Europe, making a massive profit from his sales. He persuades everyone to join his syndicate by arguing that, because everyone has a share in M&M Enterprises, everyone profits from his work. This promise is later proven false. Milo’s enterprise flourishes nonetheless, and he is revered almost religiously by communities all over Europe. Milo also tempts the officers with offers of delicious food such as lamb chops and fresh eggs doused in butter. He recruits people from both sides and, since he owns the planes for both sides, he charges each side a commission when they engage each other. Milo makes a critical business error when he purchases the entire crop of Egyptian cotton only to discover that there is no market for it. His attempt to destroy his own crop creates widespread fury, but Milo pacifies his angry clients by bribing the government to purchase it from him. In the end, Milo tries to persuade Colonel Cathcart to relieve him of the enterprise so he can fly missions like everyone else. At first, Colonel Cathcart agrees, but when he realizes how much work there is, he instead offers Milo all the planes he wants and any medals that may result from the men being killed during the missions.

An injured soldier completely covered in white bandages is being nursed at the hospital. Nurse Cramer announces that the soldier in white is dead. Yossarian doubts that Nurse Crammer killed the soldier because she was attending to him. Two C.I.D. men visit to investigate the mystery of letters written by ‘Washington Irving.’ Major Major, an assistant of Colonel Cathcart is promoted to squadron commander and is banished away to a trailer where he is forced to sign piles of useless papers. Eventually, he pretends to be "Washington Irving" and pits the two C.I.D. men against each other for his own amusement.

Yoassarian learns that Nately, one of his colleagues who accompanied him during the mission in Bologna, fell in love with a whore he meets in an apartment. Aarfy and the other soldiers mock him, and the whore rejects Nately and says he is boring. Nately, however, insists that he wants to marry her, despite her continued indifference and the fact that her kid sister constantly interferes with their romantic rendezvous. Captain Black sleeps with her repeatedly to torment Nately. Yossarian learns that Colonel Cathcart threatened to send Nately home without the whore unless he continues to fly more missions. While Nately agrees, Yossarian argues against it. During their argument, Yossarian gets furious and attacks Nately. The whore defends Nately and expresses her love for him.

Later on, Colonel Cathcart sends Nately on another dangerous mission during which he dies along with Havermeyer and Dobbs. When Yossarian brings her the bad news, she blames him for Nately’s death and tries to stab him every time she sees him thereafter. Yossarian is utterly disturbed by now. He refuses to fly any more missions. He wanders the streets of Rome, encountering every kind of human horror—rape, disease, murder. He is eventually arrested for being in Rome without a pass, and his superior officers, Colonel Cathcart, and Colonel Korn, offer him a choice. The only catch is that the deal is ethically repulsive to him; they will send him home as long as he likes them. If he does not give in, he will be court-martialed for being involved in black market practices. Initially, Yoassarian tends to agree with the deal but the Chaplain interrupts and subtly explains that Yossarian liking his superiors would mean injustice to other soldiers. It would mean as if he was an accomplice in the death of his innocent colleagues. Yassarian then understands the gravity of Catch-22 he has been trapped. He remembers how Orr, Dunbar, and Clevinger disappeared. He is convinced that Orr and Clevinger are still living while remaining disappeared. Yossarian decides to run away to Sweden both to avoid a court-martial and to avoid Nately's whore, who is trying to kill him to avenge Nately's death. The novel ends with Yossarian running out the door on his way to neutral territory where he wishes to wait until the end of the conflict. The confusion of wartime life remains unresolved.

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