- Paperback: 220 pages
- Publisher: Tuttle Publishing (April 1972)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0804816212
- ISBN-13: 978-0804816212
- Product Dimensions: 18 x 10.9 x 1.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,256,224 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Visit the Amazon.co.uk Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Synopsis
Cat lovers will delight in the thoughts of a cat whose particular joy in life is commenting on the folly of human beings. Based on a nameless cat's observations of upper-middle-class Japanese society of the Meiji era, the essence of I AM A CAT is its humour and sardonic truths. Written over the course of 1904-06, this book is full of acerbic wit as it follows the whimsical adventures of a world-weary stray kitten.
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
First Sentence
I AM A CAT. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
I AM A CAT. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
There is nothing else like this book - and don't trust the narrator!,
By Greshon (UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: I am a Cat (Tuttle classics) (Paperback)
There is nothing else like this book. The only other book I can say this for is Life of Pi. This novel is huge, but it's so enjoyable to read that you will just breeze through it. Whilst reading it you start to feel like you belong to the family, and the neighborhood, in which it is set. The episodic plot is not much more than a loosely strung together collection of occurrences. Like many Japanese books, mood is all important, and things happen primarily to create or modify mood rather than to further the action. The narrator, who is a cat, is a very tricky character indeed, and I suspect whole essays could be written on him. Don't trust him.
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The best a cat can get,
By Madly Bobbington-Blythe "MadBob" (Cardiff) - See all my reviews
This review is from: I am a Cat (Tuttle classics) (Paperback)
When Natsume Soseki, student of both the east and west, first wrote "I am a Cat", it was intended as a short series of satirical articles. When its run was completed, such was the clamour for more that Soseki was moved to write further chapters. And it is obvious from reading them that as the collection advances, the cat, our nameless and defiant narrator, loses more feline qualities and acquires pronounced human sensibilities, as a result. However, to say that this in any way decreases the inherent humour, intelligence and acerbic observations made would be a falsehood. This is an immensely entertaining work, astute and acute, and deserves far more widespread acclaim than it at present commands. Any student of Japanese history or literature should add this high up their reading list.
15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A smug kitten takes on Japanese society,
By A Customer
This review is from: I am a Cat (Tuttle classics) (Paperback)
In Soseki Natsume's "I Am a Cat", a nameless feline narrator satirises Japanese society in the time of the Meiji Emperor, the era when the country re-opened contact with the outside world. Much of the subject matter concerns the period's uneasy mix between new Western ideas and traditional Japanese sensibilities. The novel lacks any particularly strong plot as such, reading more like a set of short stories; indeed it first appeared as a series of installments in a literary magazine. However, "I Am a Cat" is frequently very funny and the modernity of the writing is striking given the book appeared in the early years of the 20th century. It was an interesting and amusing read, although I feel it might have been more rewarding if I'd had a better knowledge of society it describes.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews |
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
