Catch-22 is a satirical novel by the American author Joseph Heller. He began writing it in 1953; the novel was first published in 1961. It is frequently cited as one of the greatest literary works of the twentieth century. It uses a distinctive non-chronological third-person omniscient narration, describing events from the points of view of different characters. The separate storylines are out of sequence so that the timeline develops along with the plot.

The novel is set during World War II, from 1942 to 1944. It mainly follows the life of Captain John Yossarian, a U.S. Army Air Forces B-25 bombardier. Most of the events in the book occur while the fictional 256th Squadron is based on the island of Pianosa, in the Mediterranean Sea, west of Italy. The novel looks into the experiences of Yossarian and the other airmen in the camp, who attempt to maintain their sanity while fulfilling their service requirements so that they may return home.

The novel's title refers to a plot device that is repeatedly invoked in the story. Catch-22 starts as a set of paradoxical requirements whereby airmen mentally unfit to fly did not have to do so, but could not actually be excused. By the end of the novel it is invoked as the explanation for many unreasonable restrictions. The phrase "Catch-22" has since entered the English language, referring to a type of unsolvable logic puzzle sometimes called a double bind. According to the novel, people who were crazy were not obliged to fly missions; but anyone who applied to stop flying was showing a rational concern for his safety and, therefore, was sane.

Catch22 is a registered charity in the United Kingdom. Formed in 2008, it has over 1000 employees. Catch22 is a national charity that works with young people (ages 10 through 25) who find themselves in difficult situations, helping them to stay healthy, find opportunities to learn, earn a living, find a safe place to live and to give something back to their community.

Catch22 was formed in 2008 by the merge of UK young people's organisations "Rainer" and "Crime Concern".

Scope

Catch22 work with young people and their families within England and Wales. They provide advice, mentoring, mediation, accommodation, education and employment opportunities to young people. They primarily work in schools, community centres and police stations.

Catch22 helps over 34,000 young people and 1,500 families each year.

Catch22 is a member of the T2A Alliance, which looks at ways of preventing young adults from ending up in jail and refining the way society and specifically policy makers deal with young adults.

A catch-22 is a paradoxical situation from which an individual cannot escape because of contradictory rules. An example would be:

Catch-22s often result from rules, regulations, or procedures that an individual is subject to but has no control over because to fight the rule is to accept it. Another example is a situation in which someone is in need of something that can only be had by not being in need of it. One connotation of the term is that the creators of the "catch-22" have created arbitrary rules in order to justify and conceal their own abuse of power.

Origin and meaning

Joseph Heller coined the term in his 1961 novel Catch-22, which describes absurd bureaucratic constraints on soldiers in World War II. The term is introduced by the character Doc Daneeka, an army psychiatrist who invokes "Catch 22" to explain why any pilot requesting mental evaluation for insanity—hoping to be found not sane enough to fly and thereby escape dangerous missions—demonstrates his own sanity in making the request and thus cannot be declared insane. This phrase also means a dilemma or difficult circumstance from which there is no escape because of mutually conflicting or dependent conditions.