Can anyone here tell me what is the origin of the term “catch-22”? I more or less know the meaning (English is not my natural language), but I’m intrigued about the origins. Thanks!
“What we need is not the will to believe, but the will to find out”.
-Bertrand Russell
This may be too obvious, but doesn’t it come from the book of that name, by Joseph Heller? That book is about pilots in World War II, flying missions over Germany. “Catch 22” refers to the fact that you could leave the service if you were insane, but flying mission was so incredibly dangerous that if you wanted to stop, it proved that you were sane. It’s a great book. I highly recommend it!
That’s the way that it is on this bitch of an earth."
– Pozzo, Waiting For Godot
Thank you Greg!
I have already even visited the “official” website for the Catch22 movie, and looked all over for something that explains more specifically why ‘22’…?
One of the many meanings of the word “catch” according to the Oxford American Dictionary is: “a concealed difficulty or disadvantage”.
So I guess my question refers more to the addition of the number ‘22’ to the word ‘catch’. Any ideas?
And, by the way, I’ll buy the book and read as soon as possible. Looks like a good one.
According to my English professor, 22 was just the number of that particular catch; because military regulations involved a lot of catches, someone numbered them so they’d be easier to keep straight.
I don’t place much faith in this answer, but it’s the only one I’ve heard.
My understanding is that the term was invented by Mr Heller for his famous and wonderful book. He originally called it CATCH-18, but Leon Uris published a book called MILA 18 that same year, and there was concern that readers would be confused, so the number was changed.
A “catch” is indeed a snag, a hook, a con, a sting, a trick. If you hear of an offer that sounds to good to be true, you ask “What’s the catch?”
In the novel, the use of a high number (22) implies that there is some standard list of such snags, which is a nice humourous touch IMHO.
The essence of Catch-22 is that you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t, in a circular way. The examples from the book abound:
… and so on.
One of the initial changes of the title was from Catch-18 to Catch-14, but the publisher though 22 was a funnier number and hence the name we all know today.
“[He] beat his fist down upon the table and hurt his hand and became so
further enraged… that he beat his fist down upon the table even harder and
hurt his hand some more.” – Joseph Heller’s Catch-22
My Webster’s New World Dictionary credits Heller with the origin(1961).
“A paradox in a law, regulation or practice that makes one a victim of its provisions no matter what one does.” - It seems strange that nobody coined a phrase for this bureaucratic by-product before 1961.
Growing up in a beach city I must have seen at least half a dozen boats that were christened “Ketch-22”.
Thanks a lot to all of you guys(and girls)! 
I knew that I could count on you…
There was only one catch, and that was catch 22. Yossarian saw it in all it’s spinning reasonableness. “That’s some catch, that catch 22,” he said. “It’s the best there is,” Doc Daneeka replied.
The best chapter has to be Chapter 8, the one with Clevinger’s trial.
“[He] beat his fist down upon the table and hurt his hand and became so
further enraged… that he beat his fist down upon the table even harder and
hurt his hand some more.” – Joseph Heller’s Catch-22