Product Description

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.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #761 in Books
• Published on: 1994-10-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 576 pages

Review
Catch-22 has been canonized since its first modest print run of 30,000 copies. It spoke to the Vietnam generation in 1961 with its savage, masculine humour and heartfelt indictment of the grotesque lunacy of warfare. The eponymous Catch-22 states that a man can be exempted from bombing missions if he is mad, but that the desire to be exempted is proof that he is sane. (It would have crept into the English language as Catch-18 but for Leon Uris's novel Mila 18 - Heller wanted to avoid possible mix-ups.) The cavortings of Captain Yossarian with officers, men and Roman prostitutes on the island of Pianosa drive the plot as he desperately tries to reason his way out of imminent death. (Kirkus UK)

Observer
The greatest satirical work in the English language since EREHWON

Chicago Times
An apocalyptic masterpiece

Customer Reviews

Disappointing to put it mildly
I waited a long time to buy and read this book. For one reason or another it always slipped my mind when I was shopping for books. Then one day I remembered and wish I hadn't.

Maybe I read it in the wrong era. Is this sixties humour, American humour, or student humour or all three? I found nothing to laugh about at all. I found each page filled with nonsense. I really isn't my idea of humour.

It really has struck a chord with many people, as these reviews testify.

For anyone wishing to buy it, read several pages and see if it suits your taste. Don't make the mistake I did, and assume because it's a so called classic it will be good.

Great Characters Living with Death
The amazing CATCH-22 essentially has three overlapping narratives. One shows senior officers who are comically unsympathetic to the interests of their men. Some of these, such as Colonel Cathcart and General Peckem, are careerists who make decisions according to self-interest (or stupidity and self-interest). Others are incompetents, such as Major Major Major Major and General Sheiskopff, whose authority far surpasses their ability. To me, the careerist officers, while satirical, seemed as real as any modern bungling boss, working smugly in the corner office.

Milo Minderbinder, a genius trader and capitalist, is the dominant character in the second narrative. Technically, Milo is the mess officer at Pianosa, where Yossarian is based. But he has parlayed this job into a food supply syndicate and has become a major commercial player throughout the entire war zone. Milo is a profiteer and entrepreneur whose greed distorts, and sometimes overshadows, the war.

With Milo, Heller shows a world of surrealistic capitalism that thrives as the men in the bombers die. But for me, Milo didn't add much. His adventures make twisted sense. Yet they hit only one note and don't really ripen into something more profound. Milo is the least successful part of this superior and complex book.

The third narrative in CATCH-22 shows the men who fly in the bombers. Here, Heller's work is outstanding. There are men who can't shake the presence of death (Yossarian, Dunbar, Hungry Joe, and Dobbs). There are true believers who accept the mission and its risks (Clevinger and Havermeyer). There is a rich kid (Nately), a reckless hotdog (McWatt), and a doomed alcoholic (Chief White Halfoat). And there are the horrible fatalities (Snowden and Kid Sampson), whose deaths are gruesome and arbitrary.

Heller's work with these characters is absolutely first-rate. While they have cartoonish aspects, each is distinct and each has a surprisingly moving story. Heller also writes about their combat missions with you-are-there intensity. Finally, he connects the reader emotionally to the plight of these characters, especially in the final 150 pages, when the power and poignance of his narratives merge and really hit home. Then, you feel the consequences when you learn that, say, Milo has substituted aspirin for morphine in McWatt's plane on the tragic and high-risk mission to Avignon. "There there," murmurs Yossarian. "There there."

CATCH-22 is a long book. There is repetitiveness in its humor. Its iteration of events is occasionally maddening. But keep at it! CATCH 22 deserves its must-read reputation (although seventh place on the ML Best Novels list seems a bit high). Regardless, this is a terrific novel.

I Love This Book
This book has got me through some of my worst days and made the good ones even better. I don't think it's possible to put into words just how special this book is.