Catch-22

Summary: Set during World War II, this story centers on a bombardier named Yossarian and his companions. It portrays the lunacy of war, sometimes by using humor and sometimes by exposing just how atrocious it can be. The novel can be confusing at times because it does not proceed in regular chronological order.

I tried to read this years ago and found it laborious to the point of apathy. This time was different. Maybe it was my military service. Maybe the amount of cynicism I've contracted since that first attempt. Or maybe it's just dumb luck, but I found this book more delightful this time around.

Not entirely delightful. Some parts swing into the realm of meandering and uninteresting but on the whole this was enjoyable.

The parts that were hilarious were 100% slap-your-knee funny. Lots of it is dark. It's all dry and the satire bites hard. I can see myself referencing this in many ways in the future and recommending it to the right person will be a joy.

Amazing book from cover to cover. I found myself laughing out loud at the ridiculousness of the outlandish rock and hard place situations depicted while simultaneously feeling a great deal of empathy for the characters' plights. This book is timeless because these themes, while exasperated in times of war, are still found all around us. These catches are inescapable and that's exactly what makes Heller's ability to make us laugh as we mull them over so powerful.

What should I say about this book. That I understood it? Partly, but not all, and I think this book is almost impossible to understand. The writing stile was excellent and for me, as a non native english reader, also quite challenging and I was happy that I could read that on my Kindle where looking up words is just so nice and easy.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to read some really good literature and wants to challenge their brain and end up with a much richer vocabulary than before.

I read the greatest satirical piece called The Good Soldier Svejk, long back and was amazed by the wit and callousness it displayed. And then I heard Catch 22 being compared with it. I decided to read it then. But I couldn't get hold of a copy since it was before ebooks became popular.

Meanwhile I read another novel by Heller titled Something Happened and was thoroughly dissappointed by it. It took another couple of years and recommendations from online forums to try Catch 22.

My verdict: The second greatest satirical piece that I read...

Tough book for me to get through. The audio version made me think of the movie “Airplane” with the Major Major Major... I know it's satyrical humor, but the struggle was real.

Thoroughly enjoyable; deceptively comedic. Heller's masterful writing kept me laughing, even at things I shouldn't be laughing at. Great critique of war and its intricacies, absolutely succeeded at creating a minor crisis of conscious once I was finished. I found the characters extremely compelling.

What a brilliant and maddening book

Excellent book. Hard to read with flies in my eyes.

Read this for school and I was really happy about it!

I will say, I do wish I hadn't read this during the soccer season because I think some things went over my head when they really shouldn't have, but I had so much on my mind and so much to do that something had to give. I'll just have to re-read it someday.

The plot was very interesting, if not a little confusing- but that may be due to the time in which I read it. It was satirical, so it was amusing and fascinating to see how Heller made comments on various parts of war in this novel.

I loved the characters. For me, they were what really brought this novel to life. They were all funny, quirky, and had complex relationships and interactions with one another that connected the book. I loved them all, but I do have a soft spot for good old Yossarian. The one complaint I have with characters is that there were so many of them that at times I lost track of who was who and who did what. But for the most part, it was fine, and I attribute that to the strange names that the characters had.

Also Milo Minderbinder? What a whacky dude.

The book was interesting and engaging and I wish I had had more time to read it in the past few weeks because I definitely would have finished it sooner- and probably retained more information as well.

All said, I totally recommend this book to everyone, it's definitely a must-read at some point and I'm happy to have read it even if I don't think I got to experience it completely.

It took me a while but then I really got into it and found myself laughing out loud at points (well, as out loud as you dare when on a packed commuter train!).

As of December 2017, I have read Joseph Heller's “Catch-22” 4 or 5 times with the first read during the mid-nineties. I remember finding the book a laugh riot during that first pass, whereas I pick up a lot more darkness in this reading; the book is still absolutely hilarious and does not get old after multiple readings.

My Great Books discussion group had an excellent, thought-provoking discussion about this book
(see the questions at the bottom of this review). For example, we drew parallels to Mark Twain's “Huckleberry Finn,” in which the author ratchets up the nonsense to move the story from humor to tragedy. One of the group's members asked what the reciprocal obligation of taking the benefits from an organization without standing up against the negative actions that organization takes, and this was a question we really couldn't answer, despite several members having actively protested in the 60s or recently. That question is one of the central conflicts at “Catch-22”'s core and is even more applicable today when the individual is surrounded by faceless, logicless bureaucracies in the form of corporations, think tanks, and government.

Below are the discussion questions that I pulled from other, existing discussion questions lists, including the publisher.

1. One of the most challenging aspects of the novel is piecing together the order in which events occur. How does Heller manipulate time, fragment the action, and confuse cause and effect? Does this form fit the function?
2. Heller's dialogue style is reminiscent of Abbott and Costello's “Who's on First?” comic routine of the 1940s. How does Heller use this back-and-forth disorderly logic to develop character?
3. Heller is sometimes criticized for his failure to develop female characters. Do you agree or disagree with this assessment and why?
4. Chief White Halfoat is illiterate, yet he is assigned to military intelligence. Does Milo Minderbinder, head of the M&M Syndicate, represent the individual's triumph over bureaucracy, or is he a symbol of what is wrong with capitalism? Would you include one of the major themes of the novel as the struggle between the individual and an institution?
5. Chapters tend to be named for individuals in the story; however, titles are deceptive because they tend to be about other characters. Why might Heller have named chapters after one character but have written them about another?
6. How does the Chaplain's religious faith develop and change as the story progresses? What does his timidity say about the power of moral absolutes in the world of the military? What is the significance of his sensation of déjà vu in relation to religious faith?
7. Is Catch-22 a comedy, tragedy, story of morality, or an allegory?
8. What does Catch-22 say about war? How does Catch-22 compare to other war stories you have read or seen, particularly those about World War II? How does it compare to other satires?
9. Does there seem to be any system of justice in the novel? Are “good” characters rewarded while “evil” ones are punished? Can we clearly say who is “good” or “evil”? If not, is there such thing as justice at all?
10. Circumstances surrounding Snowden's death are revealed slowly. What does his death mean to Yossarian? To others?
11. What are some of the examples of Catch-22s found in the novel? What is the true meaning of the title? Ironically, at the end of the novel, Yossarian has the opportunity to go home a hero and has the system in a Catch-22. Do you think the ending is a victory or a defeat?