Catch-22
by Joseph Heller
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Book Summary Information
Author: Joseph HellerEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1994-10-06
ISBN: 0099477319
Number of pages: 576
Publisher: Vintage
Book Reviews of Catch-22
Book Review: A Great Read
Summary: 5 Stars
This was a very popular book when it first came out. Millions of copies were sold in the paperback version in the 1960s. There are a few different versions on the market. The present version has an introduction by the author in which he describes the process of getting the manuscript accepted for publication, and then he describes the first book reviews after it came out. It was his first novel and he received a $1500. advance. The book was written after he taught English composition at Penn. State and while he was working in the advertising business in New York City in the 1950s .
When the book first appeared, the reviews were mixed. The Sunday Times, for example, thought that the book was far too "repetitious" and it lacked "craft and sensibility." But a reviewer from the Herald tribune in New York thought it was "a wild, moving, shocking, hilarious, raging, exhilarating, giant roller coaster ride of a book." Those two reviews summarize the basic traits of the book. I quote Joseph Heller himself who wrote a piece on the reviews in the introduction.
The reviews were not unanimous because - and this is a simplification that I make here - this is not a novel in the purest sense as one might think of a novel such as Madame Bovary. It is not a well balanced work of art where one has a few strong characters and a strong plot. Rather, it is a wandering story or a series of short stories all linked by a common protagonist. The hero, Yossarian, is an air crew member in a bomber wing which is stationed off the coast of Italy during World War II. The book has a series of strong characters, all held together by a weak plot; it is a series of very funny portraits of various characters in the bomber wing. Each chapter is about a different member of the wing: various colonels, generals, fellow crew members, the chaplain, etc. It describes their actions, motivations, and inner thoughts.
The book describes how they cope with the isolation, the pressures of war, and the ambitions of the regular officers, especially the colonels who want to become generals.
So, this is a great piece of literature but perhaps not the great American novel. It took Joseph Heller about 8 years to write this story of World War II, and we assume that he has drawn on his knowledge of the bomber wing from his own time in the air-force. It is irreverent humor which leaves the reader laughing out loud on many occasions during the read.
The only other similar book that I have read is Slaughterhouse Five, but the present work is much longer and more complex than that book.
This is an interesting and entertaining read that can be read in a day or two.
Summary of Catch-22
At the heart of Joseph Heller's bestselling novel, first published in 1961, is a satirical indicement of military madness and stupidity, and the desire of the ordinary man to survive it. It is a tale of the dangerously sane Captain Yossarian, who spends his time in Italy plotting to survive.There was a time when reading Joseph Heller's classic satire on the murderous insanity of war was nothing less than a rite of passage. Echoes of Yossarian, the wise-ass bombardier who was too smart to die but not smart enough to find a way out of his predicament, could be heard throughout the counterculture. As a result, it's impossible not to consider Catch-22 to be something of a period piece. But 40 years on, the novel's undiminished strength is its looking-glass logic. Again and again, Heller's characters demonstrate that what is commonly held to be good, is bad; what is sensible, is nonsense.
Yossarian says, "You're talking about winning the war, and I am talking about winning the war and keeping alive."
"Exactly," Clevinger snapped smugly. "And which do you think is more important?"
"To whom?" Yossarian shot back. "It doesn't make a damn bit of difference who wins the war to someone who's dead."
"I can't think of another attitude that could be depended upon to give greater comfort to the enemy."
"The enemy," retorted Yossarian with weighted precision, "is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he's on."
Mirabile dictu, the book holds up post-Reagan, post-Gulf War. It's a good thing, too. As long as there's a military, that engine of lethal authority, Catch-22 will shine as a handbook for smart-alecky pacifists. It's an utterly serious and sad, but damn funny book.
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