Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats: with illustrations by Rebecca Ashdown: 1 (Faber Children's Classics)

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It always raises a smile when I finally get to read something that has had so much influence and been referenced so many times and yet I had NOT a clue about it. True I knew it was from T S Eliot and that it was written for his younger family member but beyond that it was limited to the hype around the stage show and that was about it. However once you start digging in to it you see so many more connections. Now ironically the copy I stumbled across was connected to the stage show however for me it were the cats which caught my attention. In 1942, John Wilson at John & Edward Bumpus Bookshop sent Eliot a bomb-damaged copy of the book which had narrowly missed being completely flattened by a five hundred pound bomb which fell through the shop during the Blitz. Eliot sent the book on to his brother in America who he thought would “be suitably impressed and exhibit the copy.”

I am not so sure of that, no, no you’ve got to er, you’ve got to put a lot of energy into some of those Cats’. Record sleeve for T. S. Eliot reads Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, recorded under the auspices of the British Council, featuring drawings by Nicholas BentleyEn verso juguetón , irónico, fantasioso, paródico e ingenioso T.S. Eliot traza una descripción de felinos disque domésticos. Dicen que tal vez se referia a ciertos personajes de su tiempo, tal vez a nosotros mismos, y hasta que hacia referencias a las creaciones de Kipling y Conan Doyle. Y , sin duda, que le debe ahora el ser mucho más conocido al musical de Lloyd Weber. Eliot was worried about the poems’ reception, wanting them to be a success in their own right, and wrote to Geoffrey Faber in July 1939, ‘I was so anxious that the Cats should flourish, if at all, on their own merits, and not as a TSE curio, that I would have asked that it be published anonymously had I thought that fair to the publishers; it is intended for a NEW public, but I am afraid cannot dispense with the old one.’ Eliot couldn’t have foreseen the immense success of Cats the musical, but he did see Practical Cats as crucial to his own financial prospects. A month before publication, in September 1939, he confided to John Hayward, ‘My financial future… seems to depend on CATS’.

urn:lcp:oldpossumsbookof00elio:epub:ce750471-10b8-4062-91a6-c4d29e169c5d Extramarc Princeton University Library Foldoutcount 0 Identifier oldpossumsbookof00elio Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t7mp5q81v Isbn 0151686564 Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2010-04-07 15:27:31 Bookplateleaf 0008 Boxid IA116016 Boxid_2 CH129925 Camera Canon EOS 5D Mark II City San Diego Containerid_2 X0008 Donor Two intersecting paths brought me to read T.S. Eliot's whimsical 1939 book of poetry, "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats." First, I have been reading poetry the past few weeks and was browsing the library for a short, unusual work. Second, I adopted a pet cat -- a little calico -- some months ago after more that 15 years without one. I had almost forgotten how companionable a cat could be. The new kitty inspired my reading of a so-so book or two. Then, the poetry and the cat led me to T.S. Eliot. In his book of practical cats, Old Possum, (1888 -- 1965), a great modernist poet, let his hair down. Further named cats include Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer, full of destruction and mischief, Old Deuteronomy, the GREAT RUMPUSCAT, who defuses a dog fight, Mr. Mistoffelees, Macavity, the Mystery Cat,Asparagus, Bustopher Jones, the man about town, and Skimbleshanks, the railway cat. With the possible exception of (Aspara)gus, these names appear to be particular rather than given names of the creatures.public Wi-Fi - this extends to the majority of our public spaces including the Reading Rooms, as well as our study desks and galleries at St Pancras (you won't require a login) The contents of Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, along with the names of the featured cats where appropriate, are: An embroidery made by a young T. S. Eliot hinted at things to come. The embroidery, made in 1894, shows a ribbon-collared cat ready to pounce on a ball of wool. It’s believed Eliot first put pen to paper with his cats in a 1931 letter to his young godson, Tom Faber, who had written to Eliot about his cat. ‘I am glad you have a Cat’ Eliot wrote, ‘but I do not believe it is So remarkable a cat as My cat. My Cat is a Lilliecat Hubvsouly… ITS NAME IS JELLYLORUM’. There followed further letters to Eliot’s godson introducing the Pollicle Dogs and Jellicle Cats, and the Practical Cat who can be seen trying out country life pursuits with Eliot in the drawings illustrating the letter. Between 1936 and 1938, poems were written and sent to friends and their children for comment, before their eventual inclusion in Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats. T. S. Eliot and the Practical Cat ‘go in for COUNTRY LIFE’ in a letter to Tom Faber, 7 May 1931 The Ad-dressing of Cats - '...You now have learned enough to see That cats are much like you and me ...' T.S. Eliot is known for masterworks of poetry like The Waste Land, but somehow also the author of this delightful collection of cat poems. The full book consists of 15 very short poems, most of which describe a distinct personality of cat. There's the cat who can never be pleased, for example, the thieving cat, the old wise cat. Each cat has a creative name which mirrors their personality.