Just One Catch (79 page)

“That should have steeled me against unkind critiques”
: Heller,
Now and Then,
p. 212.

“long[s] for people who were real”
;
“Darling, something terrible has happened”
: Joseph Heller, “The Death of a Dying Swan,” in
Catch as Catch Can
, ed. Bruccoli and Bucker, pp. 213, 214.

“I was [always] taking too long to begin”
: Heller,
Now and Then,
p. 209.

“thinking and writing in terms of peace”
:
The Atlantic Monthly,
March 1948, p. 52.

In later years, he would claim his best work was generated
: See, for example, Ruas,
Conversations with American Writers,
p. 155.

“My Uncle David was a sober man”
: This and all other quotes from “Castle of Snow” are from
The Atlantic Monthly,
March 1948, pp. 52–55.

“vanguard of the much-heralded and long awaited ‘post-war generation'
”: Martha Foley, foreword,
Best American Short Stories 1949 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1949), p. vii.

7. NAKED

“inept and immature”
;
“[a] tome, [a] masterwork”; “book with tremendous brea1dth”
: Charles Ruas,
Conversations with American Writers
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1985), p. 150.

“We were about the same age”
: George Plimpton, “Joseph Heller,”
The Paris Review
15 (1974); reprinted in Adam J. Sorkin, ed.,
Conversations with Joseph Heller
(Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1993), p. 116.

“War novels were coming into vogue”
: Ruas,
Conversations with American Writers
, p. 150.

“Mailer was very good as an illusionist”
: ibid.

He took a course taught by Lionel Trilling
: The course was titled American Literature Since 1870.

Trilling had become the first Jew to get tenure
: Several faculty members opposed Trilling's appointment on the grounds that his Jewish upbringing would hamper his ability to understand fully English literature's Anglo-Saxon roots. See Norman Podhoretz,
Breaking Ranks: A Political Memoir
(New York: Harper & Row, 1979), p. 11.

“literature is the human activity”
: Louis Menand, “Regrets Only: Lionel Trilling and His Discontents,” posted at
newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2008/09/80929crat_atlarge_menand?

“in large part … Jewish middle-class”
: ibid.

“never
possible
for a Jew”
: ibid.

a “horror”; “[T]here was just nobody there”
: Adam Kirsch, “Lionel Trilling and Allen Ginsberg: Liberal Father, Radical Son,” posted at
vqronline.org/articles/2009/summer/kirsch-trilling-ginsberg
.

“panic-stricken kids in blue jeans”
: ibid.

“Most of the students were veterans”
: Untitled article,
The Owl: The Alumni Newsletter of the School of General Studies
(Columbia University), Fall/Winter 2006, p. 24.

“acquire … standards”
: Joseph Heller,
Now and Then: From Coney Island to Here
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), p. 211.

“We can scarcely understand postwar fiction”
: Morris Dickstein,
Leopards in the Temple: The Transformation of American Fiction, 1945–1970
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2002) p. 25.

“were the diminished heirs”
: ibid., p. 26.

“[F]rom the fate of a people”; “civilization rent asunder”
: Joseph Freeman, introduction,
Proletarian Literature in the United States
(New York: International Publishers, 1935), p. 8.

“something that has never been done before in this country”
: John Tebbel and Mary Ellen Zuckerman,
The Magazine in America, 1741–1990
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 343.

“Running parallel to many combat/war novels”
: Frederick R. Karl,
American Fictions, 1940–1980
(New York: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 95.

“[I]n the 1930s … the pulp fiction world”
: “World War II Writers Symposium” at the University of South Carolina, April 12–14, 1995, in
Dictionary of Literary Biography Yearbook 1995,
ed. Matthew Bruccoli (Farmington Hills, MI: Thompson Gale, 1996), p. 189.

“that type of writing was going to go out of style”
: Sorkin, ed.,
Conversations with Joseph Heller,
p. 160.

“popular novelist of today”
: This and all subsequent Evans quotes are from Bergen Evans, “This Thing Called Love,”
The Atlantic Monthly,
February 1948, pp. 26–29.

“[Americans] have [now] been told”
: Tebbel and Zuckerman,
The Magazine in America, 1741–1990,
p. 252.

“[I]f Rockwell drew cliché situations”
: ibid., p. 175.

“It was fortunate … [he] did not live”
: ibid., p. 176.

“transact our necessary business”
: “The Atlantic Report
on the World Today,
”
The Atlantic Monthly,
February 1948, p. 20.

“Not for one hundred years”
: Martha Foley, foreword,
Best American Short Stories 1948 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1948), p. vii.

“an original contribution of nothing new”
: Joseph Heller, manuscript of
Catch-22,
chapter 8; unpaginated: Joseph Heller Collection, Brandeis University Libraries, Robert D. Farber University Archives and Special Collections Department, Waltham, Massachusetts.

“I'm surprised [it] was approved”
: Chet Flippo, “Checking in with Joseph Heller,” in
Rolling Stone,
April 16, 1981; reprinted in Sorkin, ed.,
Conversations with Joseph Heller,
p. 234.

“I'm not sure that my motivations”
: ibid., p. 234.

“[H]er parents found delight in watching me eat”
: Heller,
Now and Then,
p. 205.

“gushed in praise”
: ibid., p. 204.

“Superheroes allowed adolescents”; “It had been a long, nerve-wearing run”
: Gerard Jones,
Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters and the Birth of the Comic Book
(New York: Basic Books, 2004), p. 232.

“All the guys think I'll make a million dollars”
: George Mandel's story is recounted in Mario Puzo,
The Godfather Papers and Other Confessions
(Greenwich, CT: Fawcett, 1972), pp. 30–31.

“You're not going to England”
: Heller,
Now and Then,
p. 192.

“I didn't even wait to see if my master's thesis”
: Jonathan Sale, “Passed/Failed: Joseph Heller,”
The Independent,
March 11, 1999; posted at
independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/passedfailed_joseph_heller_1079745.html
.

“cut corners”
: Heller,
Now and Then,
p. 192.

“When I had the Fulbright”
;
“war mentality”
: Sorkin, ed.,
Conversations with Joseph Heller,
pp. 56–57.

“very good progress”
;
“was impressed by the place”
: David Seed,
The Fiction of Joseph Heller: Against the Grain
(New York: St. Martin's Press, 1989), p. 12.

“I [always] had a distinct sense of the strength of this guy”
: Sorkin, ed.,
Conversations with Joseph Heller,
p. 190.

“I have had no previous teaching experience”
: letter from Joseph Heller to Theodore J. Gates, January 31, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University, College Park, Pennsylvania.

“I believe I should not encourage you to apply”
: letter from Theodore J. Gates to Joseph Heller, February 17, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“Although I should prefer to finish the year at Oxford”
: letter from Joseph Heller to Theodore J. Gates, March 4, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“detailed information on his personality”
: letter from Theodore J. Gates to the Director of Placement, Columbia University, March 14, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“a very fine appearing young man”
: letter from Margaret Morgan to Theodore J. Gates, March 24, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

Follow-up letters of recommendation
: All quotes excerpted by the Columbia University Placement Bureau and included in Joseph Heller's confidential placement file, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“I am twenty-seven years old and married”
: letter from Joseph Heller to Theodore J. Gates, January 31, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“scheduled to arrive in New York”
: letter from Joseph Heller to Theodore J. Gates, May 9, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“In other words”
: letter from Theodore J. Gates to Joseph Heller, May 16, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

“I am not in the reserves”
: letter from Joseph Heller to Theodore J. Gates, July 31, 1950, Special Collections Library, University Libraries, Pennsylvania State University.

8. TEA AND SYMPATHY

“In those days, [Penn State] was more of an agricultural school”
: Unless otherwise indicated, this and subsequent comments by Frederick Karl are taken from his remarks made at “Joseph Heller: A Celebration,” a memorial service held at the New York Society for Ethical Culture on June 13, 2000. Transcribed by the author from a video recording (courtesy of Erica Heller).

“Come have lunch”
: Dolores Karl in conversation with the author, April 24, 2009.

“walking on the street”
: Erica Heller in an e-mail to the author, May 13, 2009.

“malfeasance”
;
“compelled … to show mercy”
: Joseph Heller,
Now and Then: From Coney Island
to Here
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), pp. 162–163.

“What happened on
this
spot?”
: This anecdote was related to the author by Bob Mason in a conversation on November 3, 2009.

a World War II drama that never went anywhere
: According to David Seed, Twentieth Century–Fox asked Heller if he would like to work on movie scripts; at the time, he was teaching at Penn State. Heller worked with Bernard Oldsey on a script entitled
The Trieste Manuscripts,
described by Oldsey as a “hundred-page stripped-down novel functioning as an adaptation script for a movie.” The project came to a halt when
Night Train to Trieste
and
Diplomatic Courier
were released; both movies dealt with spies in Trieste near the end of World War II, the subject of Heller and Oldsey's script in progress. See David Seed,
The Fiction of Joseph Heller: Against the Grain
(New York: St. Martin's Press, 1989), p. 91.

“wanted to be honest”
;
“When you needed him”
: Bob and Abby Mason in conversation with the author, November 3, 2009.

“Top [Nittany] Lion Boxer”
: “Al Tapman Receives Goodman Trophy as Year's Top Lion Boxer,”
Penn State Collegian,
May 5, 1939.

“plucky”
;
“gentlemanly”
;
“magnificent physical condition”
: “Boxing Intercollegiates' Last Weekend,”
Penn State Collegian,
March 12, 1939.

The “old lion in [him]
: Charlie O' Connor, letter in
Penn State Collegian,
March 17, 1939.

“You look at the number of Jewish comedy writers”
: Norman Barasch in conversation with the author, April 29, 2009.

“the idea of being charged with something”
: Dale Gold, “Portrait of a Man Reading,”
Washington Post Book World,
July 20, 1969, p. 2.

“persons who are disloyal to the United States”
: “Communists in Government Service, McCarthy Says,” posted at
senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Communists_In_Government_Service.htm
. See also Robert Griffith,
The Politics of Fear: Joseph R. McCarthy and the Senate
(Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1970), p. 49.

“structure”
;
epic feeling
: Gold, “Potrait of a Man Reading,” p. 2.

“slangy use of prose”
;
“flippant approach to situations”
: “The Heller Cult,”
Newsweek,
October 1, 1962, pp. 82–83.

“blending of the comic and tragic”
: W. J. Weatherby, “The Joy Catcher,”
The Guardian,
November 20, 1962.

“restores our theater to an art again”
: Bruce Weber, “Robert Anderson, Author of ‘Tea and Sympathy,' Dies at 91,”
New York Times,
February 10, 2009; posted at
nytimes.com/2009/02/10/theater/10anderson.html
.