Prior, Truman Capote proposed a novel about the Constitutional Convention 1787.
Let’s start the game again, but this time it’s Joseph Heller, who has had a big hit with Catch-22, and has been stalling for his next big plan. And it is a comedy novel set at the constitutional convention, just as Catch-22 was set in World War II.
ChatGPT said:
Excellent reset. Now we’ve switched from Capote’s gothic “non-fiction novel” to Heller’s satirical machine: looping logic, absurd bureaucratic knots, and men trapped in a constitutional quagmire just as surely as Yossarian was trapped in combat missions. Here’s the pitch letter — this time from Joseph Heller to his publisher, angling for his next great hit:
Letter from Joseph Heller to His Publisher (circa mid-1960s)
Dear [Publisher’s Name],
You’ll be pleased to know I have finally identified the proper successor to Catch-22. After years of being asked what comes next, and after years of replying “nothing could possibly come next,” I have found something: the Constitutional Convention of 1787.
Think of it as the same comedy of contradictions, but with wigs.
The framers want liberty but also slaves, power but also checks, a king but not a king, unity but not too much unity. They want the people to govern, but not the people. They want to be remembered forever, provided no one quotes them directly. It’s a perfect setting for the kind of impossible logic I’ve already trained the public to laugh at and despair over.
Picture Madison: “We can only preserve freedom by restricting it.”
Picture Franklin: “We must agree unanimously, even if that means agreeing to disagree.”
Picture Hamilton: “We need a strong executive — preferably me.”
It is the ultimate Catch-22: they cannot found a country without a constitution, and they cannot write a constitution without already having a country.
I propose to tell the tale in the same looping, circular narrative that made Yossarian’s squadron so unforgettable. Characters will appear and disappear, pages will argue with each other, history itself will contradict itself. The reader will be trapped in Philadelphia just as the delegates were, sweating in their waistcoats while logic chokes them to death.
The working title: Constitution-22.
I will require $100,000 as an advance. Please consider it not merely an investment in literature, but in democracy itself — or at least in my comic version of it.
Yours,
Joseph Heller
Would you like me to draft the publisher’s reply (trying to both encourage and corral Heller’s unhinged genius), or would you rather see a sample absurd passage from Constitution-22 written in the same looping, circular style as Catch-22?
You said:
ChatGPT said:
Here’s a sample passage, written in the Catch-22 mode — circular, absurd, contradictory — but transplanted to the Constitutional Convention of 1787.
Sample passage from Constitution-22
The delegates couldn’t adjourn because they hadn’t agreed, and they couldn’t agree because they hadn’t adjourned. Madison wanted rules before debate, but rules required debate, which required rules. It was a perfect Constitution-22.
“Nothing will be decided until we decide how to decide it,” said Madison, who thought that made sense until Hamilton agreed with him, which made him suspicious.
Hamilton wanted an executive strong enough to command respect, yet weak enough to obey orders, which was impossible. “We must have a president who is powerful enough to be checked, but not so weak that he cannot be balanced,” he declared.
“What if the president refuses to be checked?” asked Franklin.
“Then he must be removed,” said Hamilton.
“And what if he refuses to be removed?” asked Franklin.
“Then he is exactly the president we need,” Hamilton answered, with satisfaction.
The Southern delegates wanted liberty for themselves and bondage for others, which was perfectly consistent once you didn’t think about it. The Northern delegates wanted commerce without tariffs and tariffs without commerce, which was equally consistent once you ignored it. Everyone wanted compromise, provided it was the other fellow doing the compromising.
“They’re all mad,” whispered one delegate.
“They’re not mad,” replied another. “They just think.”
“That’s what makes them mad,” the first delegate insisted.
And so the Constitution was written: in secret, in summer heat, in sentences so carefully balanced they could never stand upright.
Would you like me to extend this into a mock-chapter opening — maybe “Chapter One: In Which Nothing Is Decided Except That Something Must Be Decided” — to really lean into Heller’s style of comic recursion?
You said:
ChatGPT said:
Perfect. Here’s a mock opening chapter of Constitution-22, written in the recursive, absurdist cadence of Heller — where logic ties itself in knots and history feels like a bureaucratic farce:
Chapter One: In Which Nothing Is Decided Except That Something Must Be Decided
The Constitutional Convention began on May 25th, except that it didn’t really begin until enough delegates arrived to begin it, and by the time enough delegates arrived to begin it, they had already begun quarreling about whether they had the authority to begin at all.
No one could agree on what they had gathered to agree upon. They were supposed to amend the Articles of Confederation, but amending required agreement and agreement required authority, and authority required something stronger than the Articles of Confederation, which was precisely what they had come to amend. It was a perfect Constitution-22.
George Washington presided silently from the chair because he was the only man everyone trusted to preside silently from the chair. Whenever he spoke, the delegates stopped trusting him, so he stopped speaking, which made him trustworthy again.
James Madison wanted a system strong enough to control men but weak enough to be controlled by them, which sounded reasonable to everyone until they realized it was impossible. Alexander Hamilton agreed with Madison because he never agreed with Madison, and Madison opposed Hamilton because he could not risk agreeing with him.
Benjamin Franklin suggested compromise. “We must each give up something for the good of the whole,” he said. But no one wanted to be the first to give up something, because once you gave up something you had nothing left, and once you had nothing left you were not part of the whole.
Thus, by unanimous agreement, they agreed not to agree until they had agreed how to agree, and then adjourned until tomorrow, when they would try again.
Would you like me to spin out a recurring character in this absurdist convention (like a Yossarian-type stand-in, maybe a hapless delegate from Delaware, trapped in the madness)?
You said:
ChatGPT said:
Great. Let’s invent a recurring character in Constitution-22 — a Yossarian-like figure, someone hapless, exasperated, and perpetually trapped in the absurd machinery of the Constitutional Convention.
Character Sketch: Ephraim Doolittle, Delegate from Delaware
Ephraim Doolittle did not want to be in Philadelphia. He never wanted to be in Philadelphia. He had only agreed to attend because Delaware had promised to send three delegates and two had already gone home. That left Doolittle, who did not believe in constitutions, conventions, or the idea of summer without shade.
Doolittle’s only goal was to leave, but he could not leave until there was a Constitution, and there could not be a Constitution until all the delegates agreed, and all the delegates would never agree as long as Doolittle was still present. It was a perfect Constitution-22.
Whenever a vote was called, Doolittle voted “No,” not because he opposed the measure but because he was certain that by voting “No” he would finally end the debate and be allowed to go home. Each time, his “No” ensured only that debate continued.
“Why don’t you agree with us just once?” Madison asked.
“Because if I agree with you, you’ll only think of something else to debate,” said Doolittle.
“And if you disagree with us, we’ll never finish debating,” said Madison.
“Then either way I’m trapped,” said Doolittle.
“That’s why you must agree,” said Madison.
“That’s why I must disagree,” said Doolittle.
No one trusted him, except when he was untrustworthy, and then they trusted him completely. He was appointed to every committee for this reason, and attended none of them.
By the time the Constitution was signed, Doolittle had not written a word, yet he was still considered one of its architects, mostly because he had been sitting in the room when others did.
Would you like me to draft a sample “chapter slice” that follows Doolittle through a full absurd debate — e.g. on whether the legislature should have one house or two — showing him caught in the same looping logic as Yossarian in Catch-22?
You said:
ChatGPT said:
Perfect — here’s a sample chapter slice from Constitution-22, following our invented delegate Ephraim Doolittle of Delaware through the famous debate about whether Congress should have one house or two. Written in Heller’s looping, exasperated style:
Chapter Five: In Which Doolittle Fights for One House and Ends Up With Two
The Convention could not decide whether Congress should have one house or two. They could not have one house because some states wanted two, and they could not have two because some states wanted one. It was a perfect Constitution-22.
Doolittle wanted one house because one was easier than two. He argued that one house meant fewer chairs, fewer speeches, and fewer votes. Madison objected that with only one house the large states would always overrun the small states, which made Doolittle nervous because Delaware was very small.
“But if we have two houses, the large states will overrun us in one of them,” Doolittle protested.
“That is precisely why we must have two,” Madison replied.
“Then we are overrun twice,” said Doolittle.
“No, only once,” said Madison.
“And once is half of twice, which is fair,” said Hamilton.
“It isn’t fair if you are always the half,” said Doolittle.
“That’s what makes it fair,” said Hamilton.
Franklin proposed compromise. “In one house the people shall be represented equally, and in the other they shall be represented unequally. That way, everyone will be equally satisfied and equally dissatisfied.”
“That isn’t a compromise,” Doolittle objected. “That’s two contradictions sitting in the same chair.”
“Exactly,” said Franklin, “and if they cannot sit in the same chair, we will build them two chairs.”
The vote was taken. Doolittle voted “No” to two houses so that Congress would have only one, but because he voted “No” the plan for two houses passed. The more he voted against it, the more it succeeded.
When the tally was announced, Doolittle was appointed to a committee on furnishing both houses. He did not attend the meetings.
Would you like me to sketch a few chapter titles for Constitution-22 in the same vein (“In Which Nothing Is Ratified but Everything Is Debated”), so you’d have a sense of the novel’s structure?
You said:
ChatGPT said:
Got it — shifting from Heller’s recursive satire to David Mamet’s clipped, staccato dialogue, where history becomes terse, rhythmic, and almost profane in its subtext. Here’s an imagined excerpt from David Mamet’s historical play about the Constitutional Convention, exaggerated in his style:
Excerpt from Founding Fathers
(A David Mamet play, ca. 1787 Philadelphia)
*Scene: The Assembly Room, Independence Hall. Midday. Heat presses in. Windows shut. Silence, then voices—fast, overlapping, sharp.)
MADISON:
We need rules.
HAMILTON:
We don’t need rules.
MADISON:
We need rules to make rules.
HAMILTON:
That’s not rules, that’s—what is that? That’s nonsense.
FRANKLIN:
Gentlemen.
HAMILTON:
Don’t “gentlemen” me.
FRANKLIN:
You want a king.
HAMILTON:
I don’t want a king.
FRANKLIN:
You want a king. You said it last night.
HAMILTON:
I said no such thing.
FRANKLIN:
You said it—
(to Madison)
He said it.
MADISON:
He said it.
HAMILTON:
You’re twisting.
FRANKLIN:
You want a king who’s not a king.
HAMILTON:
I want a man—strong.
FRANKLIN:
Strong is king.
HAMILTON:
Strong is strong.
MADISON:
Strong is dangerous.
HAMILTON:
Weak is chaos.
FRANKLIN:
Chaos is America.
(Beat. They stare at each other. Sweat. A fly buzzes. Silence. Then—)
MADISON:
We must agree.
HAMILTON:
We’ll never agree.
FRANKLIN:
Then we’ll agree to never agree.
HAMILTON:
That’s not agreement.
FRANKLIN:
It’s close enough.
(Short silence. Hamilton smirks, lights a pipe. Madison scratches notes. Franklin sighs.)
FRANKLIN:
Write it down.
(beat)
See if it holds.
MADISON:
It won’t hold.
FRANKLIN:
Write it anyway.
HAMILTON:
He writes, we sign. We sign, we fight. We fight, we hold. That’s the play.
FRANKLIN:
That’s not a play.
HAMILTON:
It is now.
(Blackout.)