Yossarian

The surname of the protagonist of Joseph Heller’s satirical World War II novel Catch 22 and its sequel Closing Time, by which he is exclusively called by the narrator and other characters. It is described in the novel as "an odious, alien, distasteful name… not at all like such clean, crisp, honest, American names as Cathcart, Peckem and Dreedle." Heller took the name from one of his own colleagues in the Air Force, an Assyrian called Yohannan.

Pronounced yo-SAIR-ee-un.