Quotes by Joseph Heller

“I want to keep my dreams, even bad ones, because without them, I might have nothing all night long.”

“Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.”

“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy...”

“Why are they going to disappear him?'I don't know.'It doesn't make sense. It isn't even good grammar.”

“Four times during the first six days they were assembled and briefed and then sent back. Once, they took off and were flying in formation when the control tower summoned them down. The more it rain...”

“It takes brains not to make money, Colonel Cargill wrote in one of the homiletic memoranda he regularly prepared for circulation over General Peckems signature. Any fool can make money these days a...”

“The enemy is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he is on.”

“It doesn't make a damned bit of difference who wins the war to someone who's dead.”

“History did not demand Yossarian's premature demise, justice could be satisfied without it, progress did not hinge upon it, victory did not depend on it. That men would die was a matter of necessit...”

“So many things were testing his faith. There was the Bible, of course, but the Bible was a book, and so were Bleak House, Treasure Island, Ethan Frome and The Last of the Mohicans. Did it then seem...”

“The enemy," retorted Yossarian with weighted precision, "is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he's on, and that includes Colonel Cathcart. And don't you forget that, becau...”

“Major Major never sees anyone in his office while he's in his office.”

“-You have no respect for excessive authority or obsolete traditions. You're dangerous and depraved, and you ought to be taken outside and shot!”

“They couldn't keep Death out, but while she was in she had to act like a lady.”

“Just about all he could find in its favor was that it paid well and liberated children from the pernicious influence of their parents.”

“He had decided to live forever or die in the attempt...”

“Nately had a bad start. He came from a good family.”

“The captain was a good chess player, and the games were always interesting. Yossarian had stopped playing chess with him because the games were so interesting they were foolish.”

“But Yossarian knew he was right, because, as he explained to Clevinger, to the best of his knowledge he had never been wrong.”

“Colonel Cathcart is our commanding officer and we must obey him. Why don't you fly four more missions and see what happens?""I don't want to.""Suppose we let you pick your missions and fly milk run...”