Catch 22 Milo Minderbinder Essay Example

Joseph Heller's novel Catch-22 published in 1961 is about a bombardier in World War II named John Yossarian and his quest to evade the ludicrous amount of missions he is being forced to fly. In Catch-22 there are over forty characters that have significant roles excluding Yossarian. Out of all of these characters Milo Minderbinder plays the most significant role in this classic novel. Milo is Yossarian's mess officer who his obsessed with buying and selling for a profit, he also seems to have no allegiance to anyone or anything. In the novel Milo creates a syndicate which spirals out of control leading to several important events critical to the novel. If Milo was eradicated from the text it would considerably take away from the book as a whole. Yossarian first meets Milo when Yossarian receives a letter from Doc Daneeka that entitled him to all the fruits and fruit juices he wants because of his liver condition. Milo becomes fascinated with the letter and he tries to persuade Yossarian to become partners with him so they could sell fruit for profit. Milo tells Yossarian about the organization that he is trying to form "The syndicate I'd like to form someday so that I can give you men the good food you deserve" (Heller 66). Initially Milo does just that with his syndicate he gets permission from Major __ De Coverley to use planes to get fresh eggs from Malta and retrieve other goods for the squadron while making a profit at the same time. In time Milo's small syndicate becomes a major company in the world M & M enterprises. The M & M in M & M enterprises stands for Milo & Minderbinder the & is used to dispel any thought that M & M enterprises is an owned or run by one man. As a result of M & M enterprises Milo becomes a prominent world figure and he claims to be mayor of Palermo, the assistant governor-general of Malta, the vice-shah of Oran, and the caliph of Baghdad. For the good of M & M enterprises Milo starts taking essential items like the CO2 cartridges