Catch-22

by Joseph Heller

Men went mad and were rewarded with medals.

There were many principles in which Clinger believed passionately. He was crazy.

Doc Kokanee was Yossarian’s friend and would do just about nothing in his power to help him.

Yossarian was a lead bombardier who had been demoted because he no longer gave a damn whether he missed or not. He had decided to live forever or die in the attempt, and his only mission each time he went up was to come down alive.

Under Colonel Koran's rule, the only people permitted to ask questions were those who never did.

it was neither possible nor necessary to educate people who never questioned anything.

These were two disappointments to which he had resigned himself: he would never be a skeet shooter, and he would never make money.

Shooting skeet eight hours a month was excellent training for them. It trained them to shoot skeet.

“You’re inches away from death every time you go on a mission. How much older can you be at your age?

The beauty parlors were good for two or three abortions a week.

We were human divining rods.

Racial prejudice is a terrible thing, Yossarian. It really is. It’s a terrible thing to treat a decent, loyal Indian like a nigger, kike, wop, or spic.”

“Sure there’s a catch,” Doc Kokanee replied. “Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn’t really crazy.” There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one’s own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind.

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.

There was nobody else he knew who was as big a coward.

Tuple was a light sleeper, but claimed he never heard Hungry Joe scream. Hungry Joe was sick.

It made sense to cry out in pain every night.

Instead of being liked, he was dead,

“Why?” Captain Flume managed to croak finally. “Why not?” was Chief White Half oat's answer.

The whites of his moony eyes grew large and misty as his mouth struggled yearningly and lost against the familiar, impregnable loneliness drifting in around him again like suffocating fog.

“If you’re going to be shot, whose side do you expect me to be on?” ex-P. C Wintergreen retorted.