Milo Minderbinder
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article may contain original research or unverified claims. Please improve the article by adding references. See the talk page for details. (April 2009) |
 |
This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (April 2009) |
Lieutenant Milo Minderbinder is a fictional character in two of Joseph Heller's novels, Catch-22 and Closing Time. Jon Voight portrayed Milo in the 1970 film adaptation of Catch-22, directed by Mike Nichols.
Contents |
[edit] Character information
Milo is the mess officer at the U.S. Army Air Corps base and he becomes obsessed with expanding mess operations and trading goods for the profits of the syndicate (in which he and everyone else "has a share"). Milo is a satire of the modern businessman, and beyond that is the living representation of capitalism, as he has no allegiance to any country, person or principle unless it pays him.
Milo, unlike most characters in Catch-22, who are only the subject of one chapter, is the subject of three chapters ("Milo the Mayor," "Milo," and "Milo the Militant"). He is one of the main characters in the novel. His most interesting attributes are his complete but unknowing immorality, and his circular logicality in running his Syndicate.
[edit] The Syndicate
Milo's enterprise becomes known as "M & M Enterprises", with the two M's standing for his initials and the "&" added to dispel any idea that the enterprise is a one-man operation. Milo travels across the world, especially around the Mediterranean, trying to buy and sell goods at a profit, primarily through black market channels. Everyone has a "share", a fact which Milo uses to defend his actions, stating that what is good for the company is good for all. For example, he secretly replaces the CO2 cartridges in the emergency life vests with certificates for shares in M & M, on the assumption that the future person who may need that vest will be instantly compensated for its absence.
Milo even begins contracting missions for the Germans, fighting on both sides in the battle at Orvieto, and bombing the squadron at Pianosa. At one point Milo orders his fleet of aircraft to attack the American base where he lives, killing many American officers and enlisted men. He finally gets court-martialed for treason. However, as M&M Enterprises proves to be incredibly profitable, he hires an expensive lawyer who is able to convince the court that it was capitalism which made America great, and is absolved only by disclosing to the congressional committee investigating what the enormous profit he made by dealing with the Germans was. Ironically, his company's phrase, "What's good for M&M enterprises is good for the country" mirrors a phrase Benito Mussolini often used; "What's good for Fiat is good for Italy", or the similar "What's good for General Motors is good for America".
In typical Catch-22 satirical fashion, Milo's business is incredibly profitable, with the single exception of his decision to buy all Egyptian cotton in existence, which he cannot afterward unload (except to other entrepreneurs, who sell the cotton back to him because he simply ordered all Egyptian cotton) and tries to dispose of by coating it with chocolate and serving it in the mess hall. Later Yossarian gives Milo the idea of selling the cotton to the government, since "the business of government is 'business'."
The exact size of Milo's syndicate is never said. At the beginning of the novel, it is merely a system that gets fresh eggs to his mess hall by buying them in Sicily for one cent, selling them to Malta for four and a half cents, buys them back for seven cents, and finally sells them to the mess halls for five cents. But, it soon is revealed, without any evidence of growth, to be a large company, and then becomes an international syndicate, including Milo being the Mayor of Palermo, Assistant Governor-General of Malta, Shah of Oran, Caliph of Baghdad, mayor of Cairo, and the god of corn, rain, and rice in various pagan African countries. Whenever Milo appears in one of his cities, it is declared a holiday, with impromptu parades forming around him everywhere he goes.
[edit] Relationship to Yossarian
Milo is a friend of the novel's protagonist, Yossarian, tending to trust him more than he trusts anyone else. After learning that Yossarian can have all the dried fruit he wants, which he gives to friends in the squadron, Milo decides that he can be trusted because "anyone who would not steal from the country he loved would not steal from anyone." However he continually ignores Yossarian's pleas for help because of his preoccupation with running M & M Enterprises. He ultimately betrays Yossarian by striking a deal with Colonel Cathcart: Yossarian's squadron must fly additional missions, and Milo gets the credit. When Nately's Whore's Kid Sister, a young girl for whom Yossarian comes to care deeply, goes missing, Milo agrees to help him find her, but abandons the attempt in order to smuggle illegal tobacco.
[edit] Sequel
Milo is also featured in Heller's 1994 novel Closing Time, a sequel to Catch-22.
[edit] Trivia
 |
Lists of miscellaneous information should be avoided. Please relocate any relevant information into appropriate sections or articles. (August 2007) |
- In his autobiography Kiss Me Like a Stranger, Gene Wilder wrote that he was offered the part of Milo in Nichols' adaptation of Catch-22, but declined because of "creative differences".
|
||||||||
