By Joseph Heller.
Begun 12 Aug 2008; unfinished.
For the Author A-Z challenge.
Review originally written 18 Dec 2008.
Upon reaching Chapter 2 of Catch-22, I thought to myself, “Reading to the second chapter took a herculean effort. Now I have to read 40 more chapters of the same kind of stuff??” I managed to struggle to Chapter 4 before giving up. So my attempt of Joseph Heller’s landmark novel for the Author A-Z challenge was short-lived.
Well, nothing really happened in the first few chapters. I was aware, after reading The Sound and the Fury, that I have trouble with stream-of-consciousness novels, which Catch-22 seems to be one of. Nothing happened in those chapters; even the character sketches of Yossarian and his army compatriots weren’t faintly interesting. It seemed all very banal and dull. (In other words, why should I bother to keep reading?)
Perhaps that’s how Catch-22 is a landmark book: a specimen of post-modern writing, where nothing is sacred or worth upholding, and thus even the banal can be elevated into something of significance (whatever that may be). The idea I get, from those first few chapters and the meaning of “catch-22″, is that Yossarian can’t escape the war, and if he feigns insanity even that may not guarantee his escape, so his existence is meaningless. And if so, he should not take it too seriously — which may drive him mad anyway… and so on.
Well, I have no patience to read all of the book when I have more-or-less picked up its significance from the first few chapters, so I doubt I’d ever attempt Catch-22 again. I just don’t have a stomach for books of this post-modern flavour.
I was later told by a parent that the minimum reading of Catch-22 is the first five chapters and the last chapter — so if you want to read this novel but are unwilling (or unable) to get through all of it, why not do that.