The 306 Greatest Books #173 - Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

The next up on my reading of the 306 greatest books is Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. The book can be found on the Observer and BBC Book Lists.

The phrase "Catch-22" has become transcendent from the original novel from which it was sparked but I never fully understood what a "Catch-22" was or how exactly it originated. I knew that it was something that was impossible because of conflicting events. You couldn't do A unless you did B first, but you couldn't do B unless you did A first. So it ends up being something impossible. However, I have now learned what it means in respect to the novel. Catch-22 is a war novel set during the latter days of World War II. In here a "Catch-22" is something that happens in response to a soldier trying to get discharged from the army because they was felt they were mentally unfit, or in essence "crazy". All one had to do was go to the doctor and tell them you were crazy to get discharged. However, if you were able to tell the doctor that you were crazy, then you had to be sane enough to know that, and so you were not in fact crazy and therefore couldn't be discharged. The story of the novel itself plays out much like a M*A*S*H or an F Troop (if anyone still remembers those shows) which are all satirical military stories. Throughout the novel there constantly are incidents and conversations that are downright laugh out loud funny. But as the novel proceeds, you can tell that the tone shifts from humorous to more serious as many of the main characters start to die or be killed off. It is an interesting take on the genre and one that I was fully invested in. At least, at first. As I proceeded through the novel I noticed that the vast majority of the characters were all male, most of whom were white, which would make sense for the time period and setting it was set in. However, all of the women in the story were either prostitutes or treated as such. All of them barely had any dialogue, if any at all, and most of them were treated in the worst ways possible. Sexual assault was treated as a joke while rape and murder were blown off by the local police because the woman didn't matter. The blatant misogyny was a bit overwhelming, but not only that but the complete disregard for women at all in the novel. They were set pieces to be used or abused as needed and then discarded when their time was over. And so while I can understand why this could be considered a great novel of its time, it has not weathered the test of time very well and I can't recommend that people wade into it unless they really want to.