The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. 2002.
Catch-22
(1961) A war novel by the American author Joseph Heller. “Catch-22” is a provision in army regulations; it stipulates that a soldier’s request to be relieved from active duty can be accepted only if he is mentally unfit to fight. Any soldier, however, who has the sense to ask to be spared the horrors of war is obviously mentally sound, and therefore must stay to fight.
‡ Figuratively, a “catch-22” is any absurd arrangement that puts a person in a double bind: for example, a person can’t get a job without experience, but can’t get experience without a job.
