Book Review: Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)

Catch-22.  Noun.  A singular term signifying a paradoxical situation that one cannot escape from.  Pretty much the same as "damned if you do and damned if you don't." Catch-22 is also a very bizarre war novel by war veteran Joseph Heller, in which he therapeutically channeled all his experiences and turned it into poignant satire.

To be fair, Catch-22 is quite the funny book at times.  It is loaded with kooky characters, who often speak in funny circles and engage in some totally random shenanigans.  The humor, especially in the form of circular logic, becomes a common thread that weaves through the whole book.  Eventually, it builds up to a rather darker, bleaker portrayal of madness in the time of war.  It doesn't get more bittersweet than this.

Despite its strengths, I personally found the book to be a bit of a chore.  In between the sharp dialogue and humor, there are pages and pages of prose that drone on.  What bothers me the most is that the plot offers little forward momentum - entire chapters go on where little actually seems to happen and characters don't really say anything of relevance.  The matter is further exacerbated by the mixed-up narrative and the way it goes back and forth through time.  After the first few chapters, I felt the book became tiresome, and were it not for providing a more grounded viewpoint through the protagonist, I probably wouldn't have cared for anything that happened.

Joseph Heller's writing can be quite wordy and meaty, but it is pretty easy to digest.  Dialogue shows a lot of character.  Characters are quite uniquely described and detailed (who wouldn't love people like Major Major or Col. Scheisskopf?).  What stands out the best will be the quirky way words are manipulated circularly and paradoxically to coincide with the central concept behind the book's title - it can be rather ingenious.

This book is worth reading for its notoriety alone - it is considered one of the great modern classics, and there is value in the humor and the terror the book portrays.  I just wish it could have been trimmer, more to-the-point, have more to the plot.

3/5