Catch-22 + Slaughterhouse-Five=?

[kimpossible]

hello all, i don't have much time so I have to make this short.

I have to write a 4,000 word essay on... well pretty much anything within the sphere of Literature.

I had chosen two novel, Slaughterhouse-5 and Catch-22, to compare or do something with, i really have no idea.

If you would like to give me some ideas, similarities between the books (there are quite a few), or a completey different topic to write about, it would be appreciated.

[Amal]

why dont u try to find out similarities between poems
or is ur assignment only abt novels?

[PeterL]

I don't know whether I would want to write 4000 words on the similarity, but they both point at a disconnect between reality and reality, and a setting in WW2 is also an essential part of both. The relationship between the character is was rumored to be dead and that no one saw him after that and Billy's temporal discontinuity would work well. That would be interesting to write about, but if I had to write 4000 words about anything in literature, I would have chosen something else.

[subterranean]

I have read Catch 22 (two times), however I haven't read Slaughterhouse Five yet. However, from the review I read on Slaughter, I think the similiarites between the 2 are:

-both are the products of the authors' antiwar statement
-question about free will. The things happening to the characters try to give a picture whether there's such thing as free will or is i merely just an illusion. For example, Billy is drafted as soldrier against his will. The soldiers in Catch-22 are instructed to flight endless numbers before they can leave and go home
-I don't know what to call it, but there's same pattern/motif in both book. Like in Catch-22, major and minor conditions happened to the charcaters are the mainly the result of catch-22 type of regulations. No matter what the characters say/do, they're always be the victim. In Slaughterhouse, there's that phrase “So it goes”, that follows every mention of death in the novel, equalizing all of them (natural, accidental, or intentional, onmassive scale or on a very personal one)
-both have movie version...

[kimpossible]

thanks for the feedback, i will most likely choose another topic, but it will probably involve both of those books

also, the essay i'm writing can be less than 4,000, i think that's the max

i'm going to stick with postmodern literature (broad, i know), the last book i read was Pynchon's V and i find this is often mentioned in studies of either heller or vonnegut's works.

P.S., has anyone read any novels by Murakami? one of my favorites, and he's frequently compared to Pynchon

[Wendigo_49]

These might help.

-Catch-22 and Slaughterhouse-five both have fractured discontinued narratives that jump during the timelines of both characters.

-Both characters behavior could be due to repression of memories:Yossarian's from Snowden's death and Pilgrim's from the fire-bombing at Dresden.