Catch 22 is a book written by Joseph Heller. This book describes a plane squadron in World War two who are trying to retire from the war. The book also shows the brutality of the higher ups such as Colonel Cathhart who forced the squad to fly mission after mission. These poor choices of the higher ups caused many of Yossarian’s friends to die. In the book, Yossiarian faces conflict after conflict and many people he knows die. Yossarian himself however, is obsessed with staying alive, he fakes being wounded to go live in a hospital and watches his friends die in front of him.
Yossarian’s friends happen to die a lot. This is one of the conflicts he faces during the war. A traumatic incident that Yossarian had to face was the death of Snowden. Snowden is a member of Yossarian’s crew. This death was extremely detrimental to Yossarian’s mental state as he had to witness his friend die and when he tried to treat him, there was no medicine in the medicine box which is also an example of the higher ups brutality.Another example of a death was Nately’s death. Nately’s death caused Yossiarian not wanting to fly anymore. Therefore Yossiarian just wandered the streets of Rome to witness all types of war crimes .These deaths rocked Yossiarian and will probably traumatize him for the rest of his life.
Yossarian witnesses a lot of things that can be very frightening. This makes him want to drop out and leave. This however is impossible due to the evil higher-ups who want constant praise from the generals. In the story, you have to fly a certain amount of missions to retire. However once you got to that point they would just change it into a higher number. This will make retiring impossible as whenever you get close to finishing they just raise the limit. An example of this is Havermeyer. Havermeyer loves to fight but he is very annoyed that the higher ups keep raising the bar again and again. Yossarian finds out that you can leave the army if you are declared insane. This however is impossible. This is the logic of “catch 22” If he wants to prove that he is insane, he has to say that he is insane, but if he says he is insane then he is sane. This forces him to stay in the air force adding to his conflicts.
The final conflict Yossarian faces is when he was arrested in Rome without a pass.His officer offered him a choice to either face court martial or approve of the policy of making the men fly over eighty missions. This is extremely unfair and is an obvious sign that the officers are abusing their power. They make him have the difficult choice to either approve of the wrongdoing that is happening in order to please the generals or they can just send him to trial and probably get him jailed for a long time. Despite all the fighting going on, Colonel Cathcart is the real enemy the whole time. He has not only caused many deaths of Yossiarian’s friends, but now he is also bribing Yossiairan to support his policy. Yossiarian however knows that he cannot choose either offer and escapes to Sweden which I think is the best option.
Catch 22 is a story written by Joseph Heller. The book describes the brutality of war not only by fighting, but by other means such as the higher ups abusing the recruits. The story’s main character, Yossarian has been through a lot throughout the story. Most of his friends die due to the higher ups abusing their power and not providing adequate supplies for the soldiers. Then he wants to escape the army but finds out about the logic trick the officers use to keep soldiers from escaping. And finally the greedy Colonel Cathcart offers Yossarian a deal to support the lengthy process of retirement and please the higher ups or to get sent to court martial and eventually sent to prison.
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