The Theme Of Madness In Joseph Heller's Catch-22

Catch-22 is a satirical novel written by Joseph Heller that deals with the undeniable horrors of war, both being the violent aspect and the overall madness of it all. When you begin to read and dissect the pages between the covers you realize how a lack of communication, violence, lack of proper justice, and misdirected priorities can add up to create utter and complete madness. However, madness is not always “mental delusion” or “the eccentric behavior that arises from it” that we grew up believing it was. As Emily Dickinson once wrote: “Much madness is divinest Sense- To a discerning Eye- “. By saying this, she is stating how the craziest people tend to be the smartest and how they are just ahead of their time. This is the case for the entire

With war and violence, you have to imagine how killing another man is the right choice, and after a while you start to wonder if any decision you make is the right choice, or if there even is a “right” within all the madness. In order to make certain choices people will tend to dehumanize you, or anyone who is committing a violent act. Heller, however, does not rationalize the soldiers to be savages, but instead shows how death and violence occur in daily life. This type of anti-blood lust violence makes it so it cannot be easily condemned or dismissed. In short, the soldiers in this novel and war time period feel little emotion, even when tragedy strikes. Characters such as Aarfy, who raped and murdered a girl, proves the fact that many of the men do not care about anything, let alone the brutality and violence of the war itself. However, for one character the level of desensitization that Aarfy, as well as many of the other men, have reached is too much to bear. Yossarian is one of the only characters who has not grown accustomed to the violence immersing him, leaving him to be considered mad by the other men in his squadron as well as everyone else in the