As a 19-year-old soldier in Vietnam, circa 1968, I did a lot of reading. There wasn't a lot else to do when we got off guard duty or field duty or mess duty and after we had filled our quota of sandbags (used to build bunkers, which became targets for Viet Cong rockets, though they usually hit the outhouses instead).
So, with our free time, we would play cards with bent, soft decks that had seen a bit too much duty; we wrote letters home, on paper that quickly became damp with sweat from the hand doing the writing; and we read. We read a lot.In fact, one of the unsung side effects of the Vietnam War was that it helped raise a generation of readers. What we read wasn't always scholarly work, but if it was words on paper, we read it.
And every mail call seemed to bring someone a package from home that had a book or two of one kind or another, and they would be passed around from soldier to soldier. As we all went through dozens and dozens of paperbacks -- good, bad and indifferent -- it wasn't long before the covers were torn and the pages smudged and dog-eared. But we didn't care. They provided diversion.
One book in particular caught my fancy. It was a novel published in 1961, which didn't make much of a splash at the time but which would, some years later, become a clarion call for a generation.
The book was "Catch-22," by Joseph Heller. And when I heard on the radio Tuesday that Heller had died over the weekend of a heart attack at age 76, memories of his famous novel and that time in my life came rushing back.
In a strict sense, Heller was not a one-hit wonder -- he wrote five subsequent books that did pretty well (though they came late and far apart from each other). But none came close to capturing the collective public imagination the way "Catch-22" did, as it began to build an audience (primarily of college students) when it came out in paperback later in the '60s.
The book even spawned a catch phrase that became part of our common language -- "Catch-22" describes a paradoxical rule that creates a no-win situation.
The story is based on Heller's own World War II experiences as a bombardier (he flew 60 combat missions in the Mediterranean), but it's more far-reaching than that. Like "M*A*S*H" (Richard Hooker's book, the movie and the TV series), which was ostensibly about the Korean War, "Catch-22" spoke to the madness of war in general and seemed particularly to presage the general public's concerns about the Vietnam War. But the book's sensibilities can also be applied to politics, business, even family -- in fact, just about any human situation where one's life is dependent upon the whims of others.
The first time I read "Catch-22," I automatically applied all the characters to people who surrounded me in Vietnam. We had a colonel who didn't like making decisions and who would try to avoid meeting anyone face to face; he was a genuine Major Major. There was a con artist who was always coming up with some scheme to make money, which often included commandeering Army surplus; he was Milo Minderbinder. There was a sympathetic doctor who wished he could send all of us young kids home; he was our Doc Daneeka. And as the book traded hands, everyone else seemed to see it the same way.
And, of course, each of us thought of himself as Yossarian, the hapless bombardier who tries to convince everyone he's crazy so he won't have to keep flying combat missions.
The book's most famous dialogue exchange comes when Doc Daneeka explains to Yossarian that he can't ground him because he's asking to be grounded. When Yossarian protests that his pal Orr, who is clearly insane, hasn't been grounded either, Doc Daneeka explains that it's because Orr hasn't asked to be grounded. And he can't ground Yossarian because he has asked to be grounded.
"You mean there's a catch?" Yossarian asks. "Sure there's a catch," Doc Daneeka says. "Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn't really crazy." Heller goes on to explains in the narrative: "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 has some kind of bewildered respect for the simplicity of the military logic involved here and says, with admiration: "That's some catch, that Catch-22." Doc Daneeka replies, "It's the best there is."
Heller was probably a bit bewildered that nothing he ever wrote after "Catch-22" was considered even in the same league. But then, not everyone can come up with a book that can be considered a true American classic.
To paraphrase Doc Daneeka, "Catch-22" is the best there is.
Entertainment editor Chris Hicks may be reached by e-mail at hicks@desnews.com