Feathers and Black Eyes
Cathcart nightly makes lists of "feathers in his cap" and "black eyes", often finding something in the former category is in fact in the latter one, considering all the possible ways in which his superiors could react to them. In his attempts to please nearly everyone, Cathcart discovers that all the other soldiers hate him. This perception lives largely in his mind, but it affects his relationships with the others and they soon begin to actually dislike and/or avoid him. His paranoia, matched only by his arrogance, worsens throughout the course of the novel.
Read more about this topic: Colonel Cathcart
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