In January of this year I read Slaughterhouse-Five for the first time and immediately fell in love with Kurt Vonnegut as an author. When I came here to gush about it, one of the first comments was, "Now you have to read Catch-22." I took the recommendation seriously and bought the book not long after, but it took a while for me to plow through my existing TBR before I could get to it. Last night I finished my first read of Catch-22.
Joseph Heller's style is more verbose than Kurt Vonnegut's, but not unapproachably-so. Both authors use a highly direct (if not intentionally cyclical and redundant) form of prose and dialog, Kurt's just felt slightly more, well, curt. Both authors utilize a non-linear timeline which often shifts several years forward and backward in the blink of an eye. It's not uncommon to get halfway through a paragraph and realize you're several years behind the previous paragraph. This creates a hectic reading headspace which serves as its own literary device, instilling a sense of structured chaos into each chapter.
Where Slaughterhouse-Five largely follows the story of one single character, Billy Pilgrim, Catch-22 is closer to the story of an entire squadron, with Yossarian as its center of gravity. For me, this made Catch-22 a little harder to follow in the opening half of the book. But that's not to say that I wasn't enjoying myself! Quite the contrary, that confusion, in both books, actually added to the experience for me rather than detracted from it. This felt paradoxical for a while, but as each book came to a close, I had this inkling that it couldn't have been executed any other way.
The copious character perspective shifts in Catch-22 gave the story something of a Saturday Night Live effect. I often felt that I was reading a Leslie Nielsen movie, which I'm sure is no accident! As the child of baby boomer parents, I get the impression that Catch-22 was a critical source of comedic inspiration for countless movies and other media with which my parents grew up, especially my dad. And I have no doubt it inspired Slaughterhouse-Five as well, especially knowing that Heller and Vonnegut grew to be good friends over the years.
Slaughterhouse-Five had me flopping between laughing my ass off and highly depressed all throughout the book, often within the same chapters. Catch-22 (for me) felt more comedy first, depression later. There were of course parts to be depressed about sprinkled in throughout the first 2/3 of the book, but it didn't really come crashing down upon me until that scene with Kid Sampson and McWatt. From that point until the start of the final chapter, I was suffocated by this fever dream of panic and manic depression.
In contrast, almost all of Slaughterhouse-Five felt like a fever dream of manic depression, and for my own personal reading tastes, that landed with just a smidge more impact. Though I'll fully acknowledge that unleashing it in more of a whirlwind latter-stage style the way Heller did with Catch-22 certainly left a stronger impression on me than I was expecting, and the final scene with Snowden left me positively gutted.
Both authors display an incredible understanding of the human psyche on both an individual level and a group/societal level. Despite the absurd yet hyperbolically simple characterization, I felt that I've known people just like nearly every single character encountered in both books. Both authors also showed off a sense of humor that had me absolutely rolling with laughter, something not easily accomplished through text.
In conclusion, I've not been shy about expressing my opinion that Slaughterhouse-Five is a 10/10 novel, and I absolutely still feel that way now. Catch-22 still FULLY lived up to the hype, and for me ends with an incredibly strong 9.5/10. I think where Catch-22 ended up losing points was simply the length. It felt slightly more sloggy in pacing with just a LITTLE too little plot progression, and I didn't quite find myself as magnetically-drawn to picking the book up when it wasn't in my hands the same way that I was with Slaughterhouse-Five.
Don't get me wrong, I'm aware plot progression was not the primary goal of Heller's masterpiece. 9.5/10 is still a phenomenal score, and one of the best novels I've ever read for my money. I just preferred the length of Slaughterhouse-Five a touch more.
Tl;dr – I think if you prefer a slightly more realistic and down-to-earth reading experience, Catch-22 would probably work better for you. If you tend to gravitate towards more fantastical and abstract reading experiences that still FEEL rooted in humanity, you'd probably lean more towards Slaughterhouse-Five like me.
by PsyferRL
1 Comment
It’s weird: I read both of them (10+ years ago), but I remember Catch-22 so much more, and it remains as one of my favorite books. I think the narrative meandering and the surreal/sci-fi happenings of Slaughterhouse made it difficult for me to latch onto what’s actually going on. And even though you said the plot progression of Catch-22 isn’t exactly the point, I still feel like it has more plot progression than Slaughterhouse.
I also recall Slaughterhouse being kinda funny (almost in a Hitchhiker’s Guide kind of way), but Catch-22 is just full of stuff that makes me out-loud-laugh on nearly every page. That’s probably just a subjective humor thing, but also a testament to the SNL-ness of it that you pointed out.
Both definitely have scenes that stuck with me. The tralfamadorians for sure do. But the scene in Catch-22 that I think about often is the lecherous Italian man lecturing the squad about the value in losing wars. It’s absolutely brilliant and forever poignant.
Either way I enjoyed your write-up.