Biography

Joseph Heller Biography Born in New York on May 1, 1923, Joseph Heller spent much of his life as a writer, and contributed to the world what is know as one of the "Great American Novels", //Catch-22//. Throughout his life, Heller was involved with writing several different novels, many of which received positive receptions.

Early on in Heller’s life, his father died as a result of a botched operation, which influenced Heller’s incorporation of morality into his stories. “The environment in which he grew up is credited as a major source of the wry humor and irony that was his literary trademark” (“Heller” Literary Map). Heller’s older half-brother took over as Heller’s surrogate father, and when Heller was 11 years old, he “was given a child’s version of Homer’s //Iliad// by a cousin; after reading it he announced that if he ever grew up, he wanted to be a writer” (“Heller” Literary Map). In 1942, Heller enlisted in the Army Air Corps, and during the Second World War, he flew over 60 missions. “While Heller’s most famous novel, //Catch-22//, is about a World War II pilot, it is generally recognized that Heller’s own war experience was very different than that portrayed in his novel” (“Heller” Literary Map). After Heller’s release from the war in 1945, he married Shirley Held, and went back to school under the G.I. Bill, where he attended New York University, Columbia, and Oxford. Heller was then employed to teach at Penn State University, where he got inspiration for a few of the characters in //Catch-22//. The characters “Major Major Major’ came from John Major, an English professor, and “Chaplain Tapman” was based on Allen Tapman, an intercollegiate boxing champ” (“Heller” Literary Map). In 1952, Heller and his wife moved back to New York, and he worked as an advertising copywriter until 1961.

In 1961, Heller published the novel //Catch-22//, a story about a military bombardier serving in the Second World War. In //Catch-22//, Heller established the term “Catch-22”, and “the popularity of Heller’s novel led to the use of “catch-22” in common conversation to describe any impossible bureaucratic dilemma” (“Heller” Literary Map). Another link from Heller’s personal experience to //Catch-22// is the character of Snowden. Heller had a personal encounter with death when during a mission, he found in his plane “a young gunner with a wound in the thigh. Heller treated him with first aid and the entire crew returned alive to the base” (Antiheroic Antinovel 2). In //Catch-22//, the character of Snowden has an identical wound to Heller’s gunner, but Snowden dies during the mission. After the success of his first novel, Heller quit his job, and dedicated his life to writing fiction. 13 years after //Catch-22// was published, Heller wrote and published //Something Happened//, “a story of alienation in the American business world whose protagonist is a careerist with no real friends” (“Heller” Literary Map). Heller’s next novel //Good as Gold// “tells the tale of an idealistic Jewish professor of English who winds up in politics” (“Heller” Literary Map). During Heller’s period of success, during which he wrote several novels, he and his wife divorced in 1984. In 1986, Heller developed Guillain-Barré syndrome, “a nervous system disease that left him paralyzed for several months” (“Heller” Literary Map). Heller recovered with the help of his friend, Speed Vogel, who helped document Heller’s illness through the book //No Laughing Matter//. In 1987, Heller married Valerie Humphries, a nurse who helped him through his period of sickness. In 1994, Heller wrote one of his final books, a sequel to //Catch-22//, //Closing Time//. Heller died in 1999, and his last novel, //Portrait of an Artist, As an Old Man//, was published after his death.

Joseph Heller lived for 76 years, and used his experience of the Second World War to fuel his most successful book, //Catch-22//. After Heller published //Catch-22//, “it immediately assured Heller a place in literary history” (“Heller” Literary Map). “//Catch-22// promises to dominate Heller criticism and the author’s literary reputation for some time to come” (Antiheroic Antinovel 15).