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Fifty years after its original publication, Catch remains a cornerstone of American literature and one of the funniest—and most celebrated—books of all time. Set in Italy during World War II, this is the story of the incomparable, malingering bombardie Fifty years after its original publication, Catch remains a cornerstone of American literature and one of the funniest—and most celebrated—books of all time.

Set in Italy during World War II, this is the story of the incomparable, malingering bombardier, 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. Here, at last, is the definitive edition of a classic of world literature.

Get A Copy. Paperback , pages. More Details Original Title. National Book Award Finalist for Fiction Other Editions Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Catch , please sign up. Is it any good? Bob G. Catch gets better as you move through it. The book can be viewed as a set of loosely-connected short stories with a large cast of characters.

It ta …more Catch gets better as you move through it. It takes time for the chapters to mesh. Heller will answer your questions at intervals along the way, too. After 50 pages, I was wondering if I might abandon it, but I chose to trust the opinions of older readers.

After pages, I was starting to like it. After pages, I was sold, and I started thinking I might have to re-read the first pages after I finished the book. This is one of my favorites, and I'm glad I found the patience to give it the chance it deserves. Arindam It's probably as mundane as being abducted by aliens in the middle of a long ride into area 51 and then returning home after a brief stint at cleaning …more It's probably as mundane as being abducted by aliens in the middle of a long ride into area 51 and then returning home after a brief stint at cleaning the spaceship but that was the sole reason you were abducted anyway.

I'll implore anyone who loves reading to give it a go if only for its quirky and dark satirical style. See all 36 questions about Catch…. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 3. Rating details. More filters. Sort order.

Start your review of Catch Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch and let out a respectful whistle. The East Coast publishing intelligentsia really embraced the book even though there were doubts if it would ever gain traction with the American public.

It did. I understand the frustration that publishers feel with the American book buying public. They have all been scorched by a book they felt should have sold by the wheelbarrow only to have it crash and burn with the majority of the first printing sold off to a remainder company.

Sometimes a book needs a lightning strike in the form of Oprah or a school banning the book thank-you Strongsville, OH , but for Heller all he needed was the s. Fat novels glorifying the war, some extraordinarily good, were hitting bookstores at a fast clip from the late s on. By the time Catch came out in the world had changed.

A typical reaction was: WTF???? Some thought it was irreverent, but there were a growing group of people who thought it was among the best American novels they had ever read. Both reactions helped juice the novel and sales began to climb. Joseph Heller in uniform. At the tender age of 19 in Joseph Heller joined the U. Army Air Corp. By he found himself on the Italian Front as a B Bombardier.

He flew 60 missions most of which he categorized as milk runs; these were flight missions that encounter no or very little anti-aircraft artillery or enemy fighters. Heller admits that his disillusionment with the war in Korea colored the novel. It gives me the shakes to think how different the novel would be if he had published the book in instead of Little did he know how prophetic his novel would be regarding the Vietnam War.

Yossarian has reached the end of his rope. He has flown the required number of combat missions several times, but each time Colonel Cathcart keeps raising the number of missions required to go home. As he becomes more and more insane sane he becomes more and more qualified to fly combat missions as far as the military is concerned.

He comes up with various ailments to keep him in the hospital. He shows up to receive his war medal naked except for a pair of moccasins. He finally refuses to fly any more missions and begins parading around the camp walking backwards. This does start to foment rebellion among his fellow flyers and drives Colonel Cathcart to distraction.

The country was in peril; he was jeopardizing his traditional rights of freedom and independence by daring to exercise them. He is a good looking kid and could have any woman he wanted, but he falls in love with an Italian prostitute who begrudgingly sleeps with him when he pays for sex with her, but would rather he just disappeared. And the Italian fighting man is probably second to all. In a few years you will be gone, too, and we will still be here.

Italian soldiers are not dying any more. But American and German soldiers are. I call that doing extremely well. A country is a piece of land surrounded on all sides by boundaries, usually unnatural. There are now fifty or sixty countries fighting in this war. Army Corps base. As he learns more and more about how goods are moved around the globe he begins a business of supply and demand war profiteering. He becomes the ultimate capitalist with no allegiance to any country. He trades with the enemy and as part of contract negotiations he also warns the Germans once of an impending attack even to the point of guiding anti-artillery against American planes and in another case bombs his own base to fulfill another contract.

The absurdity of his position is that he is too important to the American high command to get in trouble for any of these acts of treason. He tries to explain one of his more successful schemes to Yossarian. You lose two cents an egg. And everybody has a share. Is that right? Hungry Joe keeps meeting the flight standards time and time again only to have his paperwork take too long to process before the flight standards have been raised again.

He packs and then he unpacks. He is a fat, pervert who convinces women to take their clothes off to be photographed by telling them that he works for Life Magazine and will put them on the cover.

Unfortunately the photographs never turn out. Ironically he did work as a photographer for Life Magazine before the war. Women do play a role in this book mostly as objects of lust. Heller has these wonderful, creative descriptions of them. She was a real find. She paid for her own drinks, and she had an automobile, an apartment and a salmon-colored cameo ring that drove Hungry Joe clean out of his senses with its exquisitely carved figures of a naked boy and girl on a rock.

He drank her in insatiably from head to painted toenail. He never wanted to lose her. You will probably need to google the next one. Joseph Heller looking handsome and ugly. This book is hilarious, I laughed out loud at several points. His behavior becomes more and more erratic.

The absurd traps him time and time again. There are a whole host of reasons why everyone should read this novel. It impacted our culture, added words to our language, and gave voice to a generation of people dissatisfied with the war aims of this country. View all comments. I have attempted to read this book on two separate occasions and I couldn't get beyond pages either time.

I do believe that this has more to do with me than the book and I plan on making a third attempt at some point in the future. Currently it sits on my bookshelf and sometimes when I have a few too many beers we have a talk. Me: Hi. Catch Oh, hi. Me: How are you feeling?

Catch I've been better. Me: Don't be upset. It's not you. It's me. Catch I know that. Me: My friends tell me I'm I have attempted to read this book on two separate occasions and I couldn't get beyond pages either time. Me: My friends tell me I'm an idiot for ending our relationship.

Catch I agree. Me: I'm sure the reason I don't laugh or enjoy myself when I'm with you has more to do with my own flaws than with yours. Catch Of course. I'm flawless. Me: I don't know if I would go that far. Catch Well, you've already admitted that it's your fault so I don't know if you're the best person to be judging whether or not I'm flawed.

Me: Hey, now! I didn't laugh once when I was with you. Catch I've been forced to sit on this bookshelf for years while you plop in front of the TV to laugh at Will Ferrell movies.

I'll give you Anchorman but Step Brothers? Don't talk to me about what is or isn't funny. Me: The sleepwalking scene in that movie is pure genius! Catch I rest my case. Me: Ok, ok.

You're right. I promise you that one day I'll be mature and enlightened enough to appreciate you and when that day comes, you and I will have some fun together. Catch I won't hold my breath. Sep 11, Lori rated it did not like it Shelves: books-i-just-couldnt-finish , lost-lit. I suffered through about 60 pages, and finally put it down.

I very rarely ever leave a book unfinished. The author narrates and introduces us to Yossarian, who does not want to fly in the war. I get that. I get the whole catch 22 scenerio You have to be insane to fly the plane. If you can get a dr to say you are insane, you wont have to fly. But in order to tell a dr that you are insane, this actually means you are sane. So you must continue to fly Wh I suffered through about 60 pages, and finally put it down.

What I couldnt get past was the author's constant bouts of Attention Deficet Disorder He went off on tangents, introducing a new character seemingly every paragraph, and seemed to lose his train of thought only to regain it 2 pages later.

I couldnt take all the jumping around, and was completely lost the whole time Am I the only one on this planet who is asking myself what heck everyone was smoking when they read this book and actually enjoyed it? Aug 29, Stephen rated it it was amazing Shelves: humor-and-satire , literature , audiobook , classics-americas , world-war-the-sequel , easton-press , , love-those-words , all-time-favorites , 6-star-books.

A shiny new batch of awesome for my " all time favorite " shelf. What a sublime, literary feast. To prepare: 1. Start with a surrealistic, Kafkaesque worldview basted in chaos; 2. Knead in a plot reminiscent of Pynchon , taking particular care that the bizarre, placidly disjointed surface fully camouflages the A shiny new batch of awesome for my " all time favorite " shelf. Knead in a plot reminiscent of Pynchon , taking particular care that the bizarre, placidly disjointed surface fully camouflages the powerfully nuanced, and deceptively focused central message; 3.

Marinate the whole thing in a dark, hilarious satire that would have made Vonnegut beam like a proud papa. Bake at , season with zesty prose , and serve. This novel was so much more than I was expecting. Rather, Heller's insight is geared to showing us the illogic of war, the out-of-control nihilism, and the chaotic, existential absurdity of it.

It's brilliant. The novel follows the exploits of the fictional th fighter squadron, stationed on the fictional island of Pianosa, during the height of WWII. With a large cast of characters and a non-chronological narrative that switches viewpoints constantly, Heller creates a delicious cauldron of madness and bureaucratic ineptitude that is just heaven to follow. Despite his often less than moral shenanigans, Yossarian acts as the conscience of the story and helps to keep the rampant lunacy and chaos in context.

His is the voice of indignity and righteous anger against the war and the cold, faceless bureaucracy that perpetrates it. Even against the God that allows it such horrors to exist in the first place. He's not working at all. He's playing. Or else He's forgotten all about us.

That's the kind of God you people talk about - a country bumpkin, a clumsy, bungling, brainless, conceited, uncouth hayseed. Good God, how much reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who finds it necessary to include such phenomena as phlegm and tooth decay in His divine system of creation?

What in the world was running through that warped, evil, scatological mind of His when He robbed old people of the power to control their bowel movements? Why in the world did He ever create pain? Pain is a warning to us of bodily dangers. The writing is brilliant, the characters are unique, engaging and memorable, and the story will scar you with wonder and awe.

Justice is a knee in the gut from the floor on the chin at night sneaky with a knife brought up down on the magazine of a battleship sandbagged underhanded in the dark without a word of warning. He was a self-made man who owed his lack of success to nobody. And a personal favorite all leading up to the very last line : The chaplain had mastered, in a moment of divine intuition, the handy technique of protective rationalization, and he was exhilarated by his discovery.

It was miraculous. It was almost no trick at all, he saw, to turn vice into virtue and slander into truth, impotence into abstinence, arrogance into humility, plunder into philanthropy, thievery into honor, blasphemy into wisdom, brutality into patriotism, and sadism into justice.

Anybody could do it; it required no brains at all. It merely required no character. Finally, I wanted to share one last piece of awesome with you. The following is the contents of the letter sent by the base commander to the wife of one of the main characters. Dear Mrs. And Mrs. View all 73 comments. Jun 06, Jennifer rated it liked it. The following is an example of how many conversations in this book took place.

Jen: I didn't like this book. Nigel: Why didn't you like the book? Jen: I did like the book. Nigel: You just said you didn't like the book. Jen: No I didn't. Nigel: You're lying.

Jen: I don't believe in lying. Nigel: So you never lie? Jen: Oh yes, I lie all the time. Nigel: You just said you don't believe in it.

Jen: I don't believe in it, Jen said as she ate a chocolate covered cotton ball. Nigel: Well I liked the book. Jen: Fabu The following is an example of how many conversations in this book took place. Jen: Fabulous! I liked it too! Nigel: What did you like about it? Jen: Oh, I hated it. I think Heller was showing how war is chaotic by not writing in a chronological order. You really have no idea in what order events are taking place.

I think he was showing how war is ridiculous by writing conversations like the one above. I'm not sure if any of his goals were to annoy the living hell out of his readers, but he annoyed me. Most of the characters were very one-dimensional. I could only distinguish between people by their names. Most of the good guys all had the same personalities and the bad guys all had the same personalities except one character ate peanut brittle and another put crab apples in his cheeks.

Other than that - same personalities. Maybe his goal was only to distinguish between the good, everyday guys and the evil, power-hungry men in charge. If so, he succeeded.

I just wasn't thrilled after page or so. There is some funny stuff in there. The chocolate-covered cotton balls will crack me up for life. There's some really sad stuff too. It's weird because every time someone died, I cared, even though I knew nothing about them, except what they ate or who their favorite whore was. I'm not sure how Heller pulled that off. Anyway, I would recommend it.

It's just that the ridiculousness of it gets to the point where it's just, well, ridiculous, and beyond my personal tolerance level. I still appreciated it though. View all 27 comments. Hmm, where to start with a book like this one. A book that is a third Kafka, a third Vonnegut, a third Pynchon and completely insane?

Then, when the flak starts flying and the blood is splattered everywhere it is intense right up until the end Hmm, where to start with a book like this one.

Then, when the flak starts flying and the blood is splattered everywhere it is intense right up until the end. A few examples: Major Major Major Major: "He was a proud and independent man who was opposed to unemployment insurance and never hesitated to whine, whimper, wheedle, and extort for as much as he could get from whoever he could. He was a devout man whose pulpit was everywhere.

Colonel Cathart: "a slick, successful, slipshod, unhappy man of thirty-six who lumbered while we walked and wanted to be a general He could measure his own progress only in relationship to others, and his idea of excellence was to do something at least as well as all the men his same age who were doing the same thing even better.

Also, the ill-fated young Nately and the equally ill-fated old man debating whether America was winning the war or whether Italy was since Italy has already survived more than two millennia more than the US even existed: "This sordid, vulturous, diabolical old man reminded [him] of his father because the two were nothing at all alike.

Perhaps the insane Captain decorated for making a second bombing pass that killed Kraft being the sanest person on the island of Pianosa despite being haunted by Snowden, the soldier in white, the dead man in his tent, persecuted and nearly killed by Nately's whore and all the death and absurdity around him. Yossarian is an everyman who is justifiably paranoid, but just a cog in the system and the only person that retains a sense of outrage at the senseless violence all around him.

This is the most anti-war book I believe I have ever read. Kid Simpson's slaughter was perhaps the most gruesome of them all, but the the scenes of terror and anarchy that Yossarian sees in Rome before being arrested for being there without a pass leaving the murderous Aarfy smiling and careless as always were chilling.

Do not come here seeking logic or sanity because in war, neither has any place - not in Catch and I suppose in real life either. It reminded me of a cab driver I had once in New Orleans true story who was bragging to me about burying Iraquis in their trenches by rolling over them with tanks and bulldozers during the first Gulf War.

When I mentioned that it was against the Geneva Convention to bury men alive, he shrugged in the rearview mirror and said "They told us that those rules didn't apply to us since this was just a conflict and not a war and besides, we were the US Army and not bound by some stupid European rules. I would give it 5 stars, but the first pages are really torture to get through, so for lack of being able to give a 4. Regardless, I can clearly see, however, why this classic is held in such high esteem.

May we never go through another war like this again. Every bit as brutal and chaotic as Heller portrayed it - particularly the brutal inch-by-inch campaign up from Salerno to Rome! Anzio was particularly horrendous. Highly recommended as a piece of essential anti-war black humor. Did anyone watch Clooney's adaptation on Hulu? Is it worthwhile? View all 92 comments. He began writing it in ; the novel was first published in Often cited as one of the most significant novels of the twentieth century, it uses a distinctive non-chronological third-person omniscient narration, describing events from the points of view of different characters.

The separate story lines are out of sequence so the timeline develops along with the plot. View all 9 comments. I originally read this about 15 years ago.

When I joined Goodreads and added the books I had previously read I remembered it as a 3 star book. I am not sure if it is being 15 years older or the fact that I did the audiobook this time, but it was easily 5 stars now! Always touted as a show about nothing, this book was kind of about nothing. It is series of smaller anecdotes, usually somewhat silly, that I originally read this about 15 years ago.

It is a satire about war, red tape, chain of command, etc. While war and the tragedy that goes with it are usually not considered amusing, this feels like a therapeutic, tongue-in-cheek poke that needed to be made to maintain sanity. There are a plethora of characters — some of which are more caricatures — that may get your head spinning at first. Luckily, Heller gives them all memorable names which helps keep them organized easily.

Maybe that was not his intention, but when you need to remember if it was Milo Minderbender or Major Major Major Major yes, that is his name — my spell check did not like me repeating a word four times! I mentioned that there is not necessarily an overall story, but there are definitely themes. One is doing what is best for you no matter who gets stepped on in the process.

Another is twisting the facts to make sure the ultimate outcome is what works best for you. And, of course, the BIG idea that has become a common colloquialism I know I use it just about every day is the situation of Catch Early in the book, the first example of Catch is that if you say you want to fly bombing missions, you must be crazy so they will take you off the missions — only someone crazy would want to fly missions. But, if you are not on the missions, your sanity is no longer in question so they will make you fly them.

Basically, no matter how you feel about flying missions, you will end up flying them anyway! Situations like this are repeated throughout the book where there is no good answer to the situation at hand — often with hilarious and frustrating results.

Now, I mention that the book is humorous satire, but it does have many dark moments as well. This kind of goes back to my mention of the discourse within the novel being therapeutic. War is crazy and what can happen is brutal. So, should you read this book? Well, I think that question is a Catch in itself. Where the Catch is that I think any person has the capability to be in either category depending on where their mindset is right now.

If I recommend it to you now you may hate me, or you may thank me profusely. In 10 years is would be visa versa! I do think the audiobook helped me appreciate it more and it is now in my favorites. Will that happen for you?

I definitely cannot be the one to decide that! View all 50 comments. I have had Catch on my bookshelf for years. It was one of those novels that I've said, "oh I'll get around to that in ". It didn't happen. And so on until just a couple of days ago. I've got to stop putting books off. Rarely has a piece of literature ticked so many of my boxes.

Satire, farce, gallows humour, irreverence, it's as if this book were written entirely for me. I loved every word on every page of this book. I cannot find a single miniscule fault anywhere with I have had Catch on my bookshelf for years. I cannot find a single miniscule fault anywhere within the narrative or the prose or the characterisation or the flow or the humour. I can say without any hesitation that Catch is a perfect novel.

It was love at first sight. View all 10 comments. Jun 25, Lisa rated it it was amazing Shelves: books-to-read-before-you-die , so-good-it-hurts , monster-mash-of-a-mess , favorites , havanas-en-masse. When I first shared Yossarian's frustration over the perfect catch, I did so in a quite abstract way, enjoying the intellectual game the novel kept me engaged in.

Now I find myself frequently thinking of his pain as something I experience myself, every day, reading news and listening to the authorities that are in charge to rule the world "Insanity is contagious. Now I find myself frequently thinking of his pain as something I experience myself, every day, reading news and listening to the authorities that are in charge to rule the world. If you want to succeed against the insanity of populist ruthlessness and to restore liberal values and democratic processes, you have to adopt the insane leaders' weapons, and turn yourself into a demagogue playing to the stupidity and insanity of the indoctrinated, thoughtless masses.

But then, of course, you do not represent liberal values and democratic processes anymore, you turn into the monster you fight.

When Yossarian realised that he could only escape the threat to his life the active participation in the war if he was declared insane, and that expressing the wish to escape the threat to his life showed he was in fact sane, he knew he was in the clutches of insane authorities which ironically therefore were safe from dying in the war for which they were responsible! They were keeping their numbing power over him as long as he was sane enough to resist, and human enough to have a character: "It was miraculous.

If all insane leaders of the world read this book, they would understand the meaninglessness of their destructive power play, and they would change their ways and the world would finally be a safe place.

The catch is that they have to be sane to read it. So, read it if you are sane enough to understand it. It will drive you crazy though. View all 37 comments. A man came to the gate of the Law, but a watchman was guarding the way. The man sat by the door and waited to be admitted. He waited for a long time.

The man gave up all his belongings, all in vain. Time went by. The man kept waiting. He grew old and frail, too weak to move. On his dying breath, the gatekeeper finally addressed him: this door was meant for him, but since he never made up his mind to walk in, he would then shut the gate, forever. Air Force, stationed on a small island off the coast of Italy in He too is waiting, waiting to be discharged and sent back home.

The more combat missions Yossarian completes, the more missions his C. Time goes by; men die; Yossarian is getting hopeless and weak. The Law is absurd, paradoxical, arbitrary, impenetrable, deadly. Radoslav Hozza is currently reading it Jan 12, Barbora marked it as to-read Feb 01, Dominika Hornakova added it Jun 17, Alica Hodur marked it as to-read Jul 17, Dominika Lepesova marked it as to-read Oct 24, Cordelia added it Oct 26, Radovan Jurek added it Dec 25, There are no discussion topics on this book yet.

Be the first to start one ». Readers also enjoyed. About Joseph Heller. Joseph Heller. Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. Joseph Heller was the son of poor Jewish parents from Russia.

Even as a child, he loved to write; at the age of eleven, he wrote a story about the Russian invasion of Finland. He sent it to New York Daily News, which rejected it. After graduating from Abraham Lincoln High School in , Heller spent the next year working as a blacksmith's apprentice, a messenger boy, and a filing clerk.

In , at age 19, he joined the U. Army Air Corps. Two years later he was sent to Italy, where he flew 60 combat missions as a B bombardier. Heller later remembered the war as "fun in the beginning You got the feeling that there was something glorious about it. People think it quite remarkable that I was in combat in an airplane and I flew sixty missions even though I tell them that the missions were largely milk runs. Books by Joseph Heller. Related Articles.

Say what you will about George R. Martin's long-awaited fantasy installment, Winds of Winter. Some of the sequels in our roundup below have Read more No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now ». Welcome back. Just a moment while we sign you in to your Goodreads account.