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Many literary works have a sense of supreme authority or identity loss in them, which is precisely why this makes them akin to colonialist literature, even when at first glance the books seem to have nothing to do with (post) colonialist literary theory. In Catch 22, we see these elements and more of Postcolonialism through representations of oppressors, non-oppressors (or the immoral “other”), a role of language that supports this power dynamic between the two, and an evident identity loss for the characters oppressed by institutional authority. All these (post)colonialist concepts contribute to the idea that our Yossarian is nothing more than an entangled fly in the almighty and often paradoxical web of institutionalized bureaucracy and authority which is Catch-22.
Upon (re)reading Catch-22 through the (post)colonialist lens, we firstly see clear distinctions between the visible oppressor, defined as “good, logical and just”, and the contrasted oppressed, defined as the obedient, efficient and disposable. We observe the contrast when Yossarian is in the army in his younger years, he is in an environment that severely limits people’s authenticity and individuality, going even further for those who completely lose that and end up having the status of a mere “unknown soldier”, having even worse fates. Yossarian, through the machinery of war, becomes nothing more than a rat in a bucket of paradoxical bureaucracy, who, if he will not act, will surely die for his country’s “cause”. Authoritarian figures such as Colonel Cathcart are those who can decide his fate, but decides not to, why? It is because he uses his soldiers for making him look impressive in the eyes of the other authoritarian figures, which speaks to the defined “soldiers” that are being used as means, not as ends, furtherly reemphasizing the unimportance of the soldier as an individual and the utility of an army of puppets.
Secondly, we see language having a role in supporting the oppressive power dynamic.
We often use language to tell people a certain something that we would like them to know, it is the way we communicate. In Catch 22, this fundamental premise is skewed through ubiquitous miscommunication, unleashing unrelenting confusion for both the world of the book and the reader.
Colonel Cathcart is keen to impress his superiors, and he shows this by using language to his advantage while he sends out letters of grief to the family and relatives of deceased soldiers in the later parts of the book, expressing in excess how well he knew these individuals when he really did not. Alas, through the means of formal euphemisms and suppression, we eventually lose what actually happened, and the communication becomes miscommunication. Chaplain hates this “formal communication” and sees it as any sane outsider would, namely that language has no internal value, and that its prime function is to be bent to the rule of authority, which is again illustrated in Cathcart’s personal use of the language to bend it to his will, he is nevertheless the supreme being.
Lastly, the colonialist concept of a struggle to keep personal identity within an often complex and abstract system runs throughout Catch-22. We observe that Catch-22 presents a conflict between the individual liberty of Yossarian, and “that” institution from which he wants to escape from so dearly. In the army base hospital, the “soldier in white” is present, lying on a bed wrapped in bandages, an unmistakable personification of identity loss within the almighty system, for what is genuinely left of the man that once was underneath all that gauze? Yossarian, a keen example of someone who would seem most pessimistic about individual identity, actually does regain his in the end. He rejects Colonel Korn’s offer to return home, contradictory to his earlier presented will to return home. Although it would be the most logical choice, He chooses not to, because he then would be losing himself to the institutional and bureaucratic loophole which he suffered from during the entire book. If he instead wants to regain himself, he must declare individuality and flee.
All in all, it is clear that Catch-22 belongs to the list of literary works having clear signs of oppressive (post)colonialism, and it is through that lens that we have thoroughly examined the book, and discovered elements of power dynamics between oppressors and non-oppressors, how language gives power to those oppressors, and finally, how the identity is lost in the sea of conformed soldiers that primarily make up the book Catch-22. Many symbolistic elements make up Catch-22, I am sure that if I reread the book, I would discover even more elements that attribute to postcolonialist literary theory.
Alas, we have just truly begun.
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