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Article: Alone with the Cat.(learning to appreciate the social aspects of the cat)
- Article from:
- American Scholar
- Article date:
- January 1, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2000 Phi Beta Kappa Society. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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The cat was of no interest to me: I am not now and never was a cat lover. When cat lovers' cats made their advances, I sat in frozen courtesy. But for reasons also of no interest, I had to spend four months with the cat, and I determined, on principle, to make something interesting out of our enforced sojourn. I studied the features of catness that cat lovers go on about with such ardor: the rippling undulations of flesh and fur, the ingenious forays into high and low places, the fabled inscrutabilities. I was impressed. The cat lovers were right about all that. On the other hand, the cat was not aloof, as cat lovers had led me to expect, but affectionate. Like an infant, ...