As Daniel R. White writes in Nietzsche at the Altar: Situating the Devotee, “To laugh at the literal behavior of other characters in the social drama is to change the truth value of what those characters do so much as to undermine his seriousness, his claim to truthfulness, to authority, and thus call him into question." According to White, once we are able to laugh at something, we disarm it and become free to question its authority and reject it. The effect of laughter described by White is the effect that Joseph Heller and Stanley Kubrick intended to evoke in their respective satires, Catch-22 and Dr. Strangelove. The war context in each of these works has led many critics to classify it in the war genre. This classification, however, is wrong because the worlds depicted by Heller and Kubrick are not horrible because of war, but rather because individuals are subject to the arbitrary authority of an impersonal, omnipotent bureaucracy that neither understands nor cares about them. In Catch-22, Heller portrays the bureaucracy through the eyes of his protagonist, Yossarian, who realizes that the control that the bureaucracy, represented by his ambitious and impersonal superior officers, exerts over his life is arbitrary. In Doctor Strangelove, the bureaucracy is represented by General Ripper, who orders a massive nuclear attack that, if successful, will trigger the Soviet Doomsday Device and create a nuclear holocaust, and by General Turgidson, who urges President Muffley to fully commit to nuclear power. war. The individual fighting against the bureaucracy is Mandrake, who challenges Ripper's authority and works to avert the impending nuclear disaster. That bureaucracy is the subject of scrutiny and criticism in each novel is further highlighted by an evaluation of the satirical techniques employed. Through the depiction of a bureaucratic system in which individuals are completely subject to the arbitrary authority of their detached superiors and their satirical techniques, Kubrick and Heller make individuals recognize the horror and laugh at the absurdities, not of war, but of bureaucracy. system that they want to “question”. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay While many critics have classified Catch-22 and Dr. Strangelove as war genre works, this categorization is fundamentally flawed because neither work contains the salient attributes of works that fall into this classification. In War and the Novelist: Appraising the American War Novel, Peter G. Jones observes: “Collectively the [war] books emphasize individual reconciliation with the ordeal of combat and adaptation to the general pressures of war, registering immediate responses and variety of accommodations. "(Jones 4). Based on this definition, derived from analysis of the most widely recognized war genre works, the thematic similarity is their focus on the psychological effects of combat on the individual and the means by which the individual copes such stress. The absence of vivid descriptions of combat indicates that neither Catch-22 nor Doctor Strangelove is about “individual reconciliation with the ordeal of combat.” Instead, both Heller and Kubrick focus on the portrayal of the characters who make up the bureaucracy .As Heller himself said, “'I wasn't interested in war in Catch-22. I was interested in personal relationships in bureaucratic authority'” (Merill 16). by war, but by the fact that individuals are completely subject to the arbitrary authority of oneimpersonal, omnipotent and inaccessible bureaucracy. In Doctor Strangelove, individuals are subject to the authority of impersonal and arbitrary bureaucrats whose isolation from the realities of war leaves them unable to understand the implications of their actions. In Doctor Strangelove, General Ripper and General Turgidson are able to support nuclear war because of their detachment from warfare. General Turgidson's reliance on the Big Board, a computerized screen in the war room, to evaluate progress highlights his isolation from the emotional realities of war. As Randy Rasmussen observes, "General Turgidson's beloved Big Board is a glorified movie screen that provides him with a simplified, abstract, and manageable impression of nuclear war very different from the messy realities we encounter outside its confines" (Rasmussen 3 ). For Turgidson, war is nothing more than a game and soldiers are not human lives, but numbers. Turgidson's inability to understand the realities of war becomes apparent when he and the other advisors rejoice after the Big Board shows the bombers responding to the recall code. Indeed, the celebration is premature because the Big Board does not reflect the reality experienced by Major Kong and his crew aboard a slightly damaged, but still flying, B-52 bomber that did not receive the recall code. Turgidson's detachment from the reality of war allows him to sustain total commitment: “'I'm not saying we don't mess up our hair. But I say no more than ten or twenty million people killed, at most, depending on the pauses'” (Maland 708). Turgidson is willing to sacrifice a few million people because he has no personal connection to them and is incapable of imagining them as human beings. This incident allows Kubrick to successfully show the inherent problem of bureaucracy, which is that because its members are detached and have no personal connection to the individuals whose lives they influence, they fail to conceive of the implications of their defenses. Like Turgidson, General Ripper advocates nuclear war because he is isolated from the reality of war. In Doctor Strangelove, Kubrick uses a variety of camera techniques to emphasize that General Ripper is a typical bureaucrat who controls businesses and individuals from a distance. Before introducing Ripper for the first time, Kubrick films Captain Mandrake toiling in a crowded room with other people. Kubrick then cuts to Ripper, who is framed sitting alone behind a desk. The series of cuts between Ripper and Mandrake that follows serve to contrast Mandrake, who experiences the war rather directly, and Ripper, who is distant and isolated. By closing the shutters of his office window, Ripper symbolically severs his last connection to the outside world. As Rasmussen notes, “protected by…windows darkened by the ordeal of his troops, he is able to sustain his illusion of a justified nuclear war” (Rasmussen 25, 26). While the troops experience the war on a personal level because they are the ones who are engaged in combat and risk their lives, Ripper experiences the war from behind his desk. The Ripper is not personally affected by the war and, therefore, cannot understand the "ordeal of his troops". It is Ripper's lack of understanding of the effects of his actions and his detachment that allow him to order, support, and justify the nuclear attack. The predicament in Doctor Strangelove, then, is not the war itself, but rather the bureaucratic system that permits the detachment. , impersonal individuals who exercise absolute authority over the lives of their subordinates with whom they cannot relate. The extent of Ripper's authority over base personnelof Burpleson's Air Force becomes apparent when Ripper confiscates all privately owned radios. By confiscating the radios, Ripper severs their connection to the outside world and the chain of command above him. Kubrick thus creates a microcosm of bureaucratic society in which individuals report only to their direct superiors and are denied access to the chain of command above their superiors. Because Ripper's power is uncontrolled, he is able to control and shape the perceptions of his subordinates. As Rasmussen observes, “From inside his ivory tower, General Ripper imposes his imaginary vision of the outside world on everyone through the mechanism of an intercom. His voice rings divine through Burpleson as subordinates carry out his orders” (Rasmussen 14). Ripper announces that the Soviets have launched a nuclear attack that has paralyzed Washington and orders Burpleson's security troops to isolate the base. Ripper's control is so extensive that even when the troops see that the advancing army is wearing American uniforms, the security troops accept Ripper's word as truth and determine that the uniforms must be stolen. The damage of bureaucracy is evident as Burpleson's security troops are forced to suppress their thoughts and senses to obey the orders of their superior officer. Thus, Kubrick shows how the bureaucratic system causes individuals to lose control of their lives and become subject to the whims of their aloof superiors. The harmful effects of the hierarchical structure of the bureaucracy and the extent to which individuals are rendered powerless are further evident in Mandrake's experiences. Mandrake finds that the Ripper has exceeded his authority, but he has no power to do anything because it is unacceptable for a subordinate to challenge a superior. Even when Ripper admits to Mandrake that the Soviets did not attack, Mandrake must “maintain a formal appearance of respect for the general” (Rasmussen 16). Kubrick depicts the power imbalance in the relationship by filming Ripper in an extremely low close-up which makes him appear larger and more powerful. Mandrake's helplessness becomes apparent when Ripper discovers his gun, thus asserting his power and authority to restore the pecking order. Even when Ripper committed suicide and Mandrake cracked the recall code, Mandrake cannot avoid disaster because he meets Colonel "Bat" Guano of the US Army. When Mandrake explains the situation to him, Guano "finds...inconceivable that an individual...of such modest military rank would be dealing with the highest government authority" (39). In the bureaucratic system of which Guano is part, it is unthinkable that a subordinate, like Mandrake, could have access to the president. Although Mandrake ultimately manages to contact the president, his trials highlight the futility of the protest, as well as the inaccessibility of the bureaucratic structure. The expectation of obedience leaves disaffected individuals like Mandrake with no recourse. Therefore, the problem in the world described by Kubrick is not the war itself, but the extent to which the bureaucratic system makes the individual unable to control his or her life or make changes. Similar to Mandrake, Yossarian's predicament in Catch-22 stems from the distant past. and the impersonal nature of the bureaucracy that conducts war. In Catch-22, the bureaucrats waging war experience war through aerial photographs, an impersonal medium. When talking about an upcoming mission, Colonel Korn explains, "'We don't care about the checkpoint...Colonel Cathcart wants to come out of this mission with a good, clean aerial photograph that he won't be ashamed to send across thechannels" (Heller 338). Korn's statements highlight the disconnect between the reality experienced by soldiers and the officers at the top of the bureaucracy. Unlike soldiers, who experience the horrors of war on an emotional and physical level, officers experience war on an impersonal and aesthetic level through photographs and aerial forms that do not always give officers an accurate conception of reality. This becomes evident when Doctor Daneeka is declared dead because his name appears on the flight log of a crashed plane were actually on the plane and therefore alive, "he realizes that, for all intents and purposes, he is really dead" (Heller 355) because the shapes say he is dead and the shapes model reality. It doesn't matter that he is biologically alive because in the bureaucratic society Heller paints forms and bureaucratic practices determine the existence of individuals and "one dying boy is as good as another" (Heller 192). It is because of this indifference that Colonel Cathcart sees the death of twelve soldiers as an opportunity to send twelve more letters and get closer to having his name appear in the Saturday Evening Post (Heller 292). The problem with bureaucracy is that it is made up of individuals who are too detached and impersonal to understand the effects of their actions on the individuals under their command. As in Doctor Strangelove, the detachment of the bureaucracy in Catch-22 is problematic due to the extent to which individuals in the bureaucratic society must yield to their all-powerful superiors who make up the bureaucracy. Jones notes, “in bureaucratic society…people are trained to surrender their human prerogatives to processes and situations” (Jones 51). In Catch-22, bureaucracy seeks to dominate the lives of individuals by hindering individual thinking. To ensure their dominance, the group's headquarters institutes rules that prohibit soldiers from questioning official policy (Heller 44). These rules allow the group's headquarters to force young people "to give up their lives for the ideals, aspirations, and idiosyncrasies of the old men [who make up the bureaucracy]" (Heller 227). The bureaucracy must impede individual thought and induce mass conformity to ensure that its authority is not challenged. The success of bureaucracy in suppressing individual thought is evident when Dobbs seeks Yossarian's approval for his plan to kill Colonel Cathcart: “'You don't have to tell me to go ahead. Just tell me it's a good idea. All right? Is this a good idea?'” (Heller 237). The bureaucracy has stripped Dobbs of his autonomy and capacity for individual thought, making him docile to the point that he can no longer act independently. Bureaucratic society not only controls the mental processes of its members, but also their physical being. This is evident when Chaplain Tappman is arrested by Captain Black and taken to the group's headquarters, where he is falsely accused of insubordination. While being interrogated, Chaplain Tappman realizes the power of the bureaucracy, “they could do anything they want to them, he realised; these brutal men could beat him to death right there in the basement and no one would step in to save him” (Heller 391). When Tappman realizes that there is no one who can "step in to save him," it is a recognition of the horror of an uncontrolled society that deprives individuals of their autonomy and subjects them to the authority of detached superiors who have little concern for their well-being. -to be. The extent to which bureaucratic authority is arbitrary and inaccessible to the individuals subject to it is further illustrated in Yossarian's experiences. After the death ofSnowden, Yossarian begins to reflect on his situation and realizes that "strangers he [doesn't] know shoot [him] with cannons every time he [flies] through the air to drop bombs on them" (Heller 26). As Yossarian reflects on his situation, he realizes that he is only fighting in the war because he was ordered to do so. Yossarian is not willing to risk his life for no reason, so he decides not to submit to arbitrary orders. He wants the bureaucracy to offer justification for his seemingly arbitrary demands, but when he attends information sessions and begins asking questions, the questions are not accepted (Heller 44). As Colonel Cathcart continues to arbitrarily increase the number of missions, Yossarian becomes increasingly fed up with the bureaucratic system and tries to speak directly to Major Major, but Major Major avoids Yossarian by sneaking out the window (Heller 112). This scene and Major Major's subsequent decision not to see anyone while in his office (Heller 117) depict the inaccessibility of bureaucracy. The Harms of BureaucracyThe system is clear in that it exercises arbitrary authority over the lives of individuals, but is inaccessible to these individuals and therefore immune to protest or questioning. No longer willing to meekly submit to the all-powerful bureaucracy, Yossarian resists by remaining in the hospital for long periods, refusing to wear his uniform, dropping his bombs at random, refusing to fly other missions, and ultimately running away. When Major Danby tries to force Yossarian back into the system by telling him that running away is not a good way to solve his problems, "Yossarian patiently explains to Major Danby that the tax evaders, the real tax evaders, are those who allow the evil bureaucracy to run their lives; the strong man chooses to live on his own terms” (Jones 47). Therefore, Yossarian's predicament and the problem Heller describes in Catch-22 is not war, but the impersonal and inaccessible bureaucracy it exercises. excessive control over the lives of individuals and deprives them of their independence, refusing to justify his seemingly arbitrary authority. Escaping therefore is the means used by Yossarian to escape the all-encompassing bureaucracy and regain control of his own life and the all-powerful bureaucracy, rather that war, is supported by an analysis of the structure and stylistic techniques employed in each novel Joseph J. Waldmeir notes the structure of Catch-22: “Plotless, the book is unified by the pattern of absurdity established at the beginning. .. Faced with a chaotic structure and the endless repetition of episodes that individually are often quite funny… one begins to feel that [the novel] would have been better if it had been better made” (Waldmeir 163). The disjointed structure, however, is not accidental and Catch-22 would not be better off with a more unified plot because, by obscuring the plot, Heller directs the reader's attention to the satirical aspect of the book, which is just as important as the plot. In both Catch-22 and Doctor Strangelove, the plot depicts bureaucratic society and satire is used to deconstruct and criticize it. As Leo Braudy explains “satire constantly asks the viewer to compare what is happening with a recognizable reality” (Braudy 59). Therefore, while satire consists of hyperbolic exaggeration, the object of satire is represented through the plot and therefore there is a recognizable reality to which the analyst can refer. Thus, with satire, Heller and Kubrick systematically describe the ridiculous absurdities of bureaucratic society and deconstruct the system. In Doctor Strangelove, Kubrick uses a variety of techniques to make the viewer laugh and rejectbureaucracy. Although Doctor Strangelove was originally intended to be a film based on the serious book Red Alert, while Kubrick was writing the screenplay, he realized that he had to leave out things "'that were absurd or paradoxical to keep it from being funny". ,'” (Philips 89) so he decided to write “an absurd black comedy and allegorical satire, peopled with caricatures rather than fully developed characters” (Philips 15). Kubrick's deliberate decision to make the film satirical is important because it indicates that the satire conveys meanings that are essential to deciphering the film's message. The film's humor is evident from the beginning. In the opening scene, refueling a bomber denotes a sexual act, and the refueling rod becomes a phallic symbol as the camera pans back and forth. Humor also comes through in the names Kubrick gives to General Jack D. Ripper and General "Buck" Turgidson, as well as Burpleson Air Force Base. When the viewer laughs at Kubrick's satire, he recognizes the absurdities of bureaucratic society and laughs at that society, symbolically rejecting it. As Bakhtin explains, laughter constitutes a refusal because “'Laughter demolishes fear and pity before us as an object, before a world, making it an object of familiar contact and thus opening the ground for an absolutely free investigation of it.' ” (Craig 76-77). Therefore, satire increases the criticism of bureaucratic society that Kubrick expresses in the plot. Throughout Dr. Strangelove, Kubrick not only satirizes the world he depicts in general, but often employs satire when describing Ripper and Turgidson because Kubrick wants the reader to laugh at these characters who embody the bureaucratic system. As Ripper tells Mandrake about Plan R, Kubrick uses an extremely low close-up to emphasize the phallic cigar protruding between Ripper's lips (Falsetto 29). When Ripper speaks with this phallic cigar sticking out of his mouth, the viewer can't help but laugh at him. The satire that Kubrick uses to portray Ripper prevents the viewer from taking Ripper or the values ​​he represents seriously. This phallic image is not arbitrary because it refers to Ripper's justification for ordering the execution of Plan R, namely that "his diminished sexual potency... [stems from] an international communist conspiracy to poison drinking water" ( Philip xix). In this scene, Ripper undermines the validity of his justification for the war and the seriousness of his own character because his theory is patently absurd and ridiculous and highlights his folly. Phallic imagery and bureaucracy are intertwined and jointly satirized later, when the Ripper pulls a phallic gun from a golf bag to defend himself from approaching troops. The phallic nature of the gun reminds the viewer of Ripper's absurd theory and the golf bag reminds the viewer of Ripper's connection to the bureaucracy. Kubrick is making fun of the fact that for bureaucrats, like Ripper, war, like golf, is nothing more than a game because it is their subordinates, and not them, who are personally affected. Turgidson embodies the bureaucratic system in the same way as Ripper, so he is also an object of satire. The well-depicted phallic cigar that prevents Ripper from being taken seriously when he speaks is replaced in Turgidson by slapstick facial contortions, which Kubrick carefully underlines. camera shots. Even when Turgidson does not speak, he cannot be taken seriously as his behavior parallels that of an immature boy: he chews gum obnoxiously, pouts when President Muffley rejects his plan, instigates a wrestling match with the Russian ambassador and gesticulates wildly whilehe gleefully describes how the remaining bomber can survive and trigger the Doomsday Device. By causing the reader to laugh at Ripper and Turgidson, Kubrick “changes the truth value of what those characters [represent] so as to undermine [their] seriousness, [their] claim to… authority, and so call them into question ” (White). Thus, by satirizing Ripper and Turgidson, Kubrick undermines their seriousness and authority and therefore the seriousness and authority of the bureaucratic system they represent. The laughter that Kubrick's satire induces is therefore a form of refusal because it signifies a recognition of the absurdities of the bureaucratic system. In Catch-22, the narrative techniques employed by Heller are equally essential to his critique of bureaucratic society. In Catch-22, the chaotic structure is not accidental, but is an intentional mechanism designed to force the reader to look beyond the plot. Heller doesn't want the reader to simply analyze the plot; he wants the reader to analyze the satirical techniques that make the book unique. Heller's satire appears most frequently in his descriptions of the officers who make up the top brass of the bureaucracy or the policies of the bureaucracy. Heller mocks the inefficiency of bureaucratic society through his satirical depiction of the Glorious Crusade of the Pledge of Allegiance, a campaign initiated by Captain Black to get revenge on Major Major for stealing his promotion. Heller writes: “The Glorious Crusade of the Pledge of Allegiance was a glorious pain in the ass, as it complicated their task of organizing crews for each combat mission. Men were tied up throughout the squadron signing, pledging and chanting, and missions took hours to begin. Effective emergency action became impossible, but... Captain Black... scrupulously applied the doctrine of 'Continuous Reaffirmation'..., a doctrine designed to trap all those men who had become disloyal since they last signed an oath of allegiance the day before" (Heller 124). The Glorious Crusade of the Pledge of Allegiance and the Continuous Reaffirmation are intended to serve as microcosms for the inefficient and useless policies of the bureaucracy. While Black is trying to make the Major Major by not allowing him to sign an oath of allegiance, and thus making him seem disloyal, ironically, is Black who is allowing his petty squabbles to hinder the war effort. The satire is evident because the policies are self-destructive to the extent that they are intended to help the war effort by ensuring loyalty, but actually harm it by preventing the organization of crews. Furthermore, the reader cannot help but laugh at the Continuous Reaffirmation because it is absurd to think that it can actually eliminate disloyal soldiers and that the soldiers become disloyal overnight. Although the example itself is extreme and absurd, Heller's satire is effective because the reader recognizes that this example serves as a microcosm and references the reality of bureaucracy's inefficiency. By causing the reader to laugh, Heller directs the reader's attention to this flaw and causes the reader to recognize the absurdity of the bureaucratic system. In Catch-22, Heller also uses satire to mock officers who espouse the values ​​of the bureaucratic system. As Craig notes, “his objects of satire are portrayed as fools and knaves” (Craig 27). By making officers say things that when you think about them are absurd, Heller makes the officers look like fools. During a rousing speech, Colonel Cargill tells the men: “You are American officers. Officers of no other army in the world can make such a statement. Think about it.” This statement is funny because Cargill asks men to think.