Editing Catch-22 (section)

== Influences ==
Heller wanted to be a writer from an early age. His experiences as a [[bombardier (air force)|bombardier]] during World War II inspired ''Catch-22'';<ref>{{cite magazine | first=DM | last=Craig | title=From Avignon to Catch-22 | magazine=[[War, Literature & the Arts]] |volume=6 | issue=2 | date=1994 | pages=27–54}}</ref> Heller later said that he "never had a bad officer". In a 1977 essay on ''Catch-22'', Heller stated that the "antiwar and antigovernment feelings in the book" were a product of the Korean War and the 1950s rather than World War II itself. Heller's criticisms are not intended for World War II but for the Cold War and [[McCarthyism]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Heller|first=Joseph|title=The Sixties|year=1977|publisher=Random House/Rolling Stone Press|location=New York|editor=Lynda Rosen Obst|pages=50–52|chapter=Reeling in Catch-22}}</ref>

The influence of the 1950s on ''Catch-22'' is evident through Heller's extensive use of [[anachronism]]. Though the novel is ostensibly set in World War II, Heller intentionally included anachronisms like [[loyalty oaths]] and [[computers]] ([[IBM]] machines) to situate the novel in the context of the 1950s.<ref name="Sorkin 1993 150"/>  Many of the characters are based on or connected to individuals from the 1950s:
* Milo Minderbinder's maxim "What's good for M&M Enterprises is good for the country" alludes to the former president of [[General Motors]] [[Charles Erwin Wilson]]'s 1953 statement before the Senate: "What's good for General Motors is good for the country."<ref name="Sorkin 1993 150"/>
* The question of "Who promoted [[Major Major Major Major|Major Major]]?" alludes to [[Joseph McCarthy]]'s questioning of the promotion of [[Irving Peress|Major Peress]], an army dentist who refused to sign loyalty oaths.<ref name="Sorkin 1993 150"/>

Czech writer [[Arnošt Lustig]] recounts in his book ''3x18'' that Joseph Heller told him that he would never have written ''Catch-22'' had he not first read ''[[The Good Soldier Švejk]]'' by [[Jaroslav Hašek]].<ref>{{cite web|first=Zenny |last=Sadlon |url=http://www.zenny.com/Heller.html |title=Personal testimony by Arnošt Lustig |publisher=Zenny.com |access-date=March 11, 2011}}</ref>

In 1998, some critics raised the possibility that Heller's book had questionable similarities to [[Louis Falstein]]'s 1950 novel, ''[[Face of a Hero]]''. Falstein never raised the issue between ''Catch-22''{{'s}} publication and his death in 1995 and Heller claimed never to have been aware of the obscure novel. Heller said that the novel had been influenced by [[Louis-Ferdinand Céline|Céline]], [[Evelyn Waugh|Waugh]] and [[Vladimir Nabokov|Nabokov]]. Many of the similarities have been stated to be attributable to the authors' experiences, both having served as U.S. Army Air Forces aircrew in Italy in World War II. However, their themes and styles are different.<ref>{{cite news |url= https://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/29/books/critic-s-notebook-questioning-the-provenance-of-the-iconic-catch-22.html?pagewanted=all |work=[[The New York Times]] |title= Critic's Notebook; Questioning the Provenance of the Iconic ''Catch-22'' |first= Mel |last= Gussow |author-link=Mel Gussow |date= April 29, 1998 |access-date= April 1, 2010}}</ref>