Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats
by T. S. Eliot
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Book Summary Information
Author: T. S. EliotIllustrator: Edward Gorey
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1982-08-30
ISBN: 0151686564
Number of pages: 56
Publisher: Harcourt, Brace & Co.
Book Reviews of Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats
Book Review: The very well known secret live of 'Cats'
Summary: 5 Stars
`Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats' by T. S. Eliot is probably known to every literate speaker of English over the age of 18 as the source for most of the material in the very long running Andrew Lloyd Webber stage musical, `Cats'. I believe the long dead Eliot even received a posthumous Tony award for his having done the lyrics for most of the songs in `Cats'.
The book `...Practical Cats' is a part of a very distinguished tradition of animal fantasy works. The most famous contributors to this genre which come to my mind are Lewis Carroll, especially for `Jabberwocky' and the poem of the walrus and the carpenter, and Don Marquis, author of a series of stories collected as `archie and mehitibal', where archie is a cockroach and mehitibal is a rather disreputable cat who would be right at home sharing an alley with Mungojerrie and Rumpelteaser. These are all some of the more distinguished precursors to modern comic strips such as `Garfield', `Heathcliff', `Cats with Hands', `Marmaduke' and `Mutts', not to mention frequent guest appearances in `Ziggy' and that most famous of beagles, Snoopy.
What is so amazing about this collection of poems is that it comes from the pen of the very proper and immensely precocious Professor Eliot. T. S. Eliot is best known for some of the most famously pessimistic poems of the 20th century, `The Hollow Men' and `The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock'. By reputation, he is so prissy, he couldn't stand to be a part of our Babbitish American culture and beat a path to English residence and citizenship.
One of my most cherished memories of T. S. Eliot is a story I heard first hand from the distinguished Johns Hopkins historian of ideas, George Boas who told the story of Eliot's staying with Boas in Baltimore and requesting an introduction to and visit with that most famous Baltimorean, H. L. Menchen. Boas had Menchen over after dinner and Menchen and Eliot sat down together in armchairs by the fire and Eliot said to Menchen `I understand you know something of American politics'. At this point, Menchen slipped into his best newspaper reporter barroom persona with stories of backroom dealings while Eliot slipped more and more firmly into his Oxford donnish persona. While I have no reason to doubt Boas memory, I was delighted to have the story verified in one of Menchen's many posthumously published autobiographical works.
So what is this priggish don doing writing animal fantasy? I'm afraid I can't answer this. All I can say is that T. S. Eliot certainly deserved his Tony and a lot more for this little collection of poems. Eliot's little book contains fifteen (15) poems. Twelve (12) of these became songs in `Cats', although the `Cats' show stopper, `Memories' is not among these twelve. Also, the character who sings this song, Grizabella, is not the subject of any of the poems, although there are some similarities between Grizabella and Growltiger, the subject of one of the three poems not included.
While I have no wish to diminish Eliot's accomplishment with these poems, he certainly knew a good thing when he realized that the animal fantasy genre offers great resources for inventing words and names to facilitate the crafting of great rhymes. Just think about the first verse of `Jabberwocky' and you will know what I mean.
I cannot fail to mention the great Edward Gorey illustrations that come along with this edition. They make the truly tiny price for this little volume more than worth the money. For anyone on the lookout for intelligent things to read to your young'ens, you should add this to your copies of `Winnie the Pooh', `The Hobbit', the stories of Narnia, and `Alice in Wonderland'.
Summary of Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats
Eliot?s famous collection of nonsense verse about cats-the inspiration for the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Cats. This edition features pen-and-ink drolleries by Edward Gorey throughout.
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