I am a Cat

I Am a Cat (吾輩は猫である, Wagahai wa Neko de Aru) is a satirical novel by Natsume Sōseki, serialized in ten installments in the literary journal Hototogisu (1905–1906). The narrator is an unnamed house cat who lives with Mr. Sneaze (Kushami), a middle-class teacher, and his family. The cat uses the formal pronoun wagahai—usually reserved for nobles—which gives the story its ironic tone. He observes Sneaze, his talkative friend Waverhouse (Meitei), the scholar Avalon Coldmoon (Kangetsu) and his courtship of Opula Goldfield, and other middle-class characters in Meiji-era Tokyo. The cat comments on human vanity, pretension, and hypocrisy, noting that humans are “good for nothing, except for the strenuous employment of their mouths” and that “all humans are puffed up by self satisfaction.” The novel satirizes the mix of Western culture and Japanese tradition in Meiji Japan, academic life, and bourgeois society. Sōseki originally planned a single short story; editor Takahama Kyoshi encouraged him to continue, and the work grew into a serial. Most chapters can be read on their own. The narrator’s style has influenced later Japanese fiction, and wagahai is still used for pompous animal characters.