4). In deciding to just leave rather than become a puppet in the ongoing justification of war, Yossarian's own perspective conveys, "'I'm not running away from my responsibilities. I'm running to them. There's nothing negative about running away to save my life...'" (461). Yossarian is aware of what is wrong, but he can do nothing. Yossarian's role as hero is ultimately opposed by his role of withdrawal from the heroic scene after much change in values and perspectives. Chapter 39 is the scene for the emotional evolution of a man and the downfall of Yossarian's "sheltered" world. The world around him portrays a fallen paradise. The landmarks demolished symbolize the familiarity of his world crashing down."Rome was in ruins, he saw, when the plane was down. The airdrome had been bombed eight months before, and knobby slabs of white stone rubble had been bulldozed into flat-topped heaps on both sides of the entrance through the wire fence surrounding the field. the Colosseum was a dalapidated shell, and the Arch of Constantine had fallen. (416)Yossarian also witnesses the city's moral decline. He sees the irony in the police brutality- those that are hired to keep violence off the streets are responsible for it. The streets are in shambles, cluttered with continuous streaks of violence, as Yossarian has a sense of deja vu. Heller uses surrealism- taking real ideas and distorting them to irrational means- to exaggerate Yossarian's coming to terms with himself. He has a reality check, and for the first time, realizes the world doesn't revolve around him; there is suffering worse than is own. He changes from inaction- hiding, running, cowardice, to action- dealing with and accepting responsibility, and doing something about it. He feels liberated because he now feels in control of his actions and fate. He feels helpless when he realizes he's been running from his problems and not taking action, for example, s he walks by the woman being r...
