John Yossarian

"That’s some catch, that Catch-22."

- John Yossarian

Capt. John Yossarian, better known as Yossarian or Yo-Yo, is the main protagonist of Joseph Heller's satirical novel Catch-22 and its sequel Closing Time. He is a 28-year-old captain in the 256th squadron of the Army Air Forces where he serves as a B-25 bombardier stationed on the small island of Pianosa off the Italian mainland during World War II.

Although he flies and lives with the men in his squadron, Yossarian is marked as an outsider by the fact that many of the men think he is insane. He believes that everyone is trying to kill him, either directly (by attacking his plane) or indirectly (by forcing him to fly missions), and he goes to great lengths to stay alive.

Air cadet
"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 necessity; which men would die, though, was a matter of circumstance, and Yossarian was willing to be the victim of anything but circumstance. But that was war."

- Catch-22, Ch. 8, pg. 75

Yossarian’s group commander in boot-camp was Lieutenant Scheisskopf, an ignorant man obsessed with parades, whose wife slept with most of the men on base. Scheisskopf also had an intense hatred of Yossarian's friend and fellow cadet, Clevinger. Scheisskopf's greatest victory in parade competition was teaching his men to march without swinging their hands. Yossarian eventually fell in love with Dori Duz, who Yossarian only slept with once, but wished he could do so again. Yossarian loved her, but as he never got another opportunity to sleep with her, as she found him only "fair", he instead slept with Mrs Scheisskopf to revenge himself on her husband for the way he treated Clevinger.

During this time, Yossarian attempted to get out of physical exercise, he checked into the hospital for an appendix ailment; they had to keep him under observation for five days. In that time nothing could be proved wrong with him. Scheisskopf’s wife comes to visit him in the hospital over Thanksgiving. Mrs Scheisskopf and Yossarian laid in bed debating the existence of God. While both claimed to be atheists, Mrs Scheisskopf insisted that the God she does not believe in is benevolent, and she is distressed at Yossarian's characterizing the God he does not believe in as sadistic or stupid.

While in the hospital, Yossarian finds a soldier who declared he sees everything twice, and decided to imitate that man’s ailment. When Yossarian made his own declaration, the nurses and doctors snapped to attention. Meanwhile, the Soldier Who Sees Everything Twice actually dies, and his family were coming to visit him. The doctors ask Yossarian to stand in for the dying soldier, to make his family feel better for having visited. They wrapped Yossarian in bandages, to make him unrecognizable, and bring in the family—a mother, father, and brother. Yossarian insisted that his name is Yossarian, and the father seemed almost to accept that his son’s name was actually Yossarian and not Giuseppe. But ultimately the parents decided that Yossarian must be delirious. His “family members” gave Yossarian advice, since they believed he will die. They told him to be strong in heaven, not to be pushed around by others there for his Italian heritage. His mother told him to dress warm for his trip to the afterlife.

Arrival in Pianosa
Yossarian is in the hospital in Pianosa, Italy, with liver pain. The pain is serious but not so serious as to be jaundice, and his temperature stays at a moderate 101 degrees. The doctors and nurses are frustrated that his condition neither improves nor worsens. The faker prolongs his hospital stay because the quiet, untroubled ward is safer and more comfortable than the hazardous B-25 bombing missions he must otherwise fly. Yossarian is assigned to censoring duty while in the hospital. He is supposed to black out military and strategic details from letters written home by American soldiers, but, to pass the time, he ends up creatively blocking out large portions of the letters. He signs one letter “A. T. Tappman, Chaplain,” and signs his own name as “Washington Irving” or “Irving Washington.” Yossarian is in the hospital with Dunbar, another officer in the Army Air Force, who is attempting to lengthen his life by “cultivating boredom” and thereby make time pass more slowly. A new wounded officer, a happy and personable Texan, is brought in, and no one else in the ward can stand his good cheer. Another officer, known only as “The Soldier in White,” is in the ward—he is wrapped completely in bandages and has a small hole for his mouth. Fluids drip into and out of him. When it is discovered that the Soldier in White is actually dead, Yossarian jokes that the Texan must have killed him.

Personality
Yossarian does not have the traits of a typical hero. He does not risk his life to save others; in fact, his primary goal is to avoid risking his life whenever possible. But the system of values around Yossarian is so skewed that this approach seems to be the only truly moral stance he can take, if only because it is so logical. Yossarian seizes hold of one true, logical idea—that he should try to preserve his own life. Unlike a conventional hero, however, Yossarian does not generalize this idea to mean that he should risk his own life in attempts to save everybody else’s. In a world where life itself is so undervalued and so casually lost, it is possible to redefine heroism as simple self-preservation.

This insistence on self-preservation creates a conflict for Yossarian. Even though he is determined to save his own life at all costs, he nonetheless cares deeply for the other members of his squadron and is traumatized by their deaths. His ongoing horror at Snowden’s death stems both from his pity for Snowden and from his horrified realization that his own body is just as destructible as Snowden’s. In the end, when offered a choice between his own safety and the safety of the entire squadron, Yossarian is unable to choose himself over others. This concern for others complicates the simple logic of self-preservation, and creates its own Catch-22: life is not worth living without a moral concern for the well-being of others, but a moral concern for the well-being of others endangers one’s life. Yossarian ultimately escapes this conundrum by literally walking away from the war—an action that refuses both the possibility of becoming an officer who avoids danger at the expense of his troops and that of remaining a soldier who risks his life for meaningless reasons.

Chaplain Tappman
"Chaplain, insanity is contagious. Everybody is crazy except for us. You and I have to be careful. We may be the only sane people in the entire world. We're bullied and insulted and harassed and shoved around all day long by insane people. And we do our duty, mission after mission, 35, 40, then we're told it's not good enough. And when we object, people like Cathcart tell us any true patriot would be proud to fly as many missions as they're forcing us to fly. If you look at it that way, I don't know if this bomb line guy really did the wrong thing."

- Yossarian to Chaplain Tappman

Trivia

 * In Mike Nichols' 1970 film adaptation of the novel Yossarian was played by Alan Arkin, while in the 2019 miniseries he was played by Christopher Abbott.
 * Yossarian's first name appears to be "John", since late in Catch-22 Colonel Korn says to him "Call me Blackie, John. We're pals now". Catch-22 introduces Yossarian as an American soldier in World War II with Assyrian heritage, although Closing Time clarifies this to be a joke and that his heritage and surname are in fact Armenian.


 * Yossarian's exploits have previously been thought to be based on the experiences of the author. Heller was also a bombardier in the Army Air Corps, stationed on an island off the coast of Italy during World War II. Heller later documented in his autobiography "Now & Then" the elements of Yossarian which were driven by his own experiences (specifically the episodes where Yossarian attends to Snowden during the Avignon mission).
 * Heller noted that he derived the name Yossarian from a wartime friend and fellow bombardier, Francis Yohannan.
 * Yohannan made the military his career, continuing to serve through the Vietnam War, placing him at odds with Yossarian's feelings towards the military, and as noted in his obituary "(Yohannan) turned aside calls from reporters who asked if he was the real-life Yossarian".
 * A more likely source for Yossarian's narrative adventure and efforts to be relieved of his combat duties is Lt. Julius Fish, another bombardier and wartime friend to both Francis Yohannan and Joseph Heller.