Everyone needs to post a question that you had while reading the novel. Anyone wishing to respond to the questions posted may, but these will not count as one of your posts as it will be used as an activity with your journals in the first couple of days of school.
What exactly does the word "disappear" mean? I ask this because in Chapter 34: Thanksgiving, Nurse Duckett says to Yossarian that Dunbar will be "disappeared" as a punishment. Dunbar does not appear throughout the rest of the book. Does this mean he was killed or simply vanished?
ReplyDeleteon pg. 345, it talks about how the men "punch" Nurse Duckett and tell her to "stop playing around" and "shut up", are they kidding?
ReplyDeleteon page 275 general dreedle ordered major danby to be taken outside and shot. and his son tells him he cant shoot people on page 276 and general dreedle was surprised by this fact. what on earth gave him the idea that you would be able to shoot whoever you wanted to?
ReplyDeleteOn page 339 McWatt crashes his plane after he accidentally kills Kid Sampson. Doc Daneeka was signed down as a passenger. He pleads and tries to tell everyone that he wasn't on the plane and he was, in fact, right in front of them in plain sight. My question is this: why do they ignore his existence once the plane crashes? Why don't they acknowledge him and his presence in the squadron? Couldn't they have punished him directly and assertively instead of denying him everything and giving his wife all the money?
ReplyDeleteIn chapter one on page fifteen it states,"It was love at first sight. The first time Yossarian saw the chaplin he fell madly in love with him." Why did the author start the novel off with this statement? The rest of the novel never mentions anything else about this statement.
ReplyDeleteWhat ever happened to Major --- de Coverly? The last we heard from him (on page 141) he had gone to Florence under the misconception that the allies had captured it, not to be heard from again. Was he killed or captured? Or, maybe, was he "disappeared", like Dunbar? He did make the rest of the officers, especially Cathcart, nervous. Or did he plan it all and go AWOL, like Orr?
ReplyDeleteTo Tessa:: I think that Heller uses this statement at the beginning of the novel to show how miserable Yossarian was in the war. When he sees the chaplain, he believes he is rescued from the war. In a way, this foreshadows because at the end of the novel Chaplain Tappman sort of helps Yossarian realize that he must run away.
ReplyDeleteIn chapter 36; The Cellar on page 383, they ask the Chaplain what religion he is. He responds that he is an Anabaptist. Why do the men say it's suspicious and start to question his religion?
ReplyDeleteThroughout the entire novel Joseph Heller uses the way the characters fail to communicate efficiently as a major source of humor. However, these miscommunications tend to result in serious, if not fatal, mistakes. Why would he does he do this? There isn't really anything humorous about the deaths that result from the mistakes.
ReplyDeletewhy does heller just seem to develop one character in a chapter? am i missing something or is it just Yossarian and one or two other characters in each chapter? im very confused
ReplyDeleteWhy is it that Yossarian seems to fall 'in love' with every woman that he wants? Is it just that he knows that he cannot have them? or is it that they do not want him? Or maybe he just wants to be loved so badly that he imagines that he loves these women.
ReplyDeleteWhy does Catch-22 make crazy pilots ask to be grounded? It seems to me that psychological evaluations would have been done in a war to prevent crazy pilots from flying and potentially harming friendly units, but catch-22 keeps those units trapped in the force.
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ReplyDeleteWhat becomes of the investigation of the chaplain? He was found guilty, but was he ever punished?
ReplyDeleteWhy are there so many short stories, or anecdotes (literary term :) haaha!), just jumbled together? Is Mr. Joe Heller just trying to make our lives miserable by jumping all around chronologically?
ReplyDeleteHow did the Catch-22 come around, in the story? Did a high ranking general make it up? What else does Catch-22 state?
ReplyDeleteIt seems that throughout the book, everyone is a bit crazy. Is Heller trying to say something about war (and how it can take a toll on a person), or is everyone simply mental?
ReplyDeleteWhy does everything in this book always seem to be repeated? And everything always connects back to Yossarian. I know he is the main character, but it just seems like every little situation Yossarian is brought up in for one reason or another.
ReplyDeleteIve gotten lost a few times, some of the chapters are supposed to be flashbacks right?
ReplyDeleteDoes Yossarian really have multiple personalities? Because in chapter 27, it mentions something about Yossarian being Dunbar and Washington Irving. Am I lost or is there really something going on with his mental state of mind?
ReplyDeleteWhy does General Dreedle hate his son-in-law? Aren't you supposed to love your family members?
ReplyDeleteIn this novel prostitution is such a reoccurring theme. At first I thought that it might be significant later on in the story but looking back I can't find any clear reason why it was necessary. What was the significance? Was it simply to characterize and show culture?
ReplyDeleteWhen Yossarian finds Aarfy after he raped and killed a girl, the police arrested Yossarian for being AWOL. Why didn't they have any interest in what Aarfy had done?
ReplyDeleteOn Pg. 267 Why does Milo bomb his own squadron, when just earlier in the book he had said that they were brothers - in - arms?
ReplyDeleteHeller's style seems to be very choppy. When you read a chapter title, it usually consists of a characters name or a place of importance. Yet you read the first pages if the chapter and the main story is of another person completely then connnects to the title. Why does the author use this style of writing?
ReplyDeleteEvery main character introduced eventually gets their own little chapter where they have a piece of their lives or past shared with the reader. Dunbar was one of the first characters introduced, along with Yossarian, but when it came time for his chapter, for his story to be told, why doesn't it focus mainly on him? Why don't we learn more about him?
ReplyDeleteIn Chapter 16, after Luciana tells Yossarian that she got her scar from an injury during one of the American air raids over Italy, Heller writes that Yossarian's "heart cracked, and he fell in love." Why would Yossarian fall in love right at that moment? I would think that he would react with sadness or guilt at hearing this news, since he is a soldier for the American Army himself.
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