BY ANNE CROWLEY
WHAT THE EXPERTS SAID
“Set in Italy during World War II, this is the story of … Yossarian, a hero who is furious because thousands of people he has never met are trying to kill him. But his real problem is not the enemy – it is his own army, which keeps increasing the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempt to excuse himself from the perilous missions he’s assigned, he’ll be in violation of Catch-22, a hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule: a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but if he makes a formal request to be removed from duty, he is proven sane and therefore ineligible to be relieved.” Source: Good Reads.
MY THOUGHTS
Themes of rampant capitalism, bureaucracy gone mad, corruption, hypocrisy, self-serving ambition, abuse of power, incompetence, and a chilling indifference to how all this affects those with less power, surround several versions of the Catch-22. Absurd and surreal – often humourous, but really not funny – the recurring question is: what is crazy?
The wordplay and descriptive precision are a big part of the enjoyment, for example: ‘Milo’s moustache was unfortunate because the separated halves never matched. They were like Milo’s disunited eyes, which never looked at the same thing at the same time. Milo could see more things than most people, but he could see none of them too distinctly.’
The book moves in circles, with each return to its many characters adding depth and new perspectives, until key pieces finally fall into place – many tragically, one spectacularly. It is worth persevering through the length and apparently disjointed detail.
I first read Catch-22 in the early 1980s when I was a student nurse, and I found the black humour hilarious. I still remembered ‘the soldier in white’, completely bandaged in hospital, with one bottle dripping clear fluid into a vein and another draining clear fluid from his groin; when the first was empty and the second full, they simply swapped them.
Another favourite was Yossarian’s censoring soldiers’ letters while avoiding bombing runs by feigning illness. To relieve the boredom, he invents rules: in some letters he deletes all personal pronouns; in others, everything between ‘Dear Mary’ and ‘Love, John’. Required to initial his work, he signs W.I. (Washington Irving) and, for a change, I.W. (Irving Washington) to avoid identification. That inspired me during my nursing training stint in Central Sterilising where I had to assemble and initial packs of surgical instruments. I told a fellow student, ‘I’m not stupid – instead of signing my name, I’ve been signing WI and IW.’ She replied, ‘I’m not stupid either – I’ve been signing your initials.’ We’ve been firm friends ever since!
Through my career in various bureaucracies, I have encountered several Major Majors – ‘Come and see me when I’m not here’ – leaders absent literally and/or figuratively when they should have been present. I have also experienced the dark side of people in power, nailed by Heller. That is one reason the novel still feels uncomfortably relevant.
On this second reading, while I still enjoyed much of the humour, I was shocked by the misogyny and treatment of women, which I’d failed to recall, as were my book club mates. We concluded that such attitudes had seemed ‘normal’ when we were young, which is unsettling in itself.
Two book club members reading Catch-22 for the first time really enjoyed it. Most of us who re-read it did too, but felt its darkness more keenly now.
