The Guest Cat
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A wonderful sui generis novel about a visiting cat who brings joy into a couple’s life in Tokyo
A bestseller in France and winner of Japan’s Kiyama Shohei Literary Award, The Guest Cat, by the acclaimed poet Takashi Hiraide, is a subtly moving and exceptionally beautiful novel about the transient nature of life and idiosyncratic but deeply felt ways of living. A couple in their thirties live in a small rented cottage in a quiet part of Tokyo; they work at home, freelance copy-editing; they no longer have very much to say to one another. But one day a cat invites itself into their small kitchen. It leaves, but the next day comes again, and then again and again. Soon they are buying treats for the cat and enjoying talks about the animal and all its little ways. Life suddenly seems to have more promise for the husband and wife — the days have more light and color. The novel brims with new small joys and many moments of staggering poetic beauty, but then something happens….
As Kenzaburo Oe has remarked, Takashi Hiraide’s work "really shines." His poetry, which is remarkably cross-hatched with beauty, has been acclaimed here for "its seemingly endless string of shape-shifting objects and experiences,whose splintering effect is enacted via a unique combination of speed and minutiae."
Takashi Hiraide
Takashi Hiraide was born in Moji, Kitakyushu in 1950. He has published numerous books of poetry as well as several books of genre-bending essays, including one on poetics and baseball. He currently lives in the west suburbs of Tokyo with a cat and his wife, the poet Michiyo Kawano.
More by Takashi Hiraide
Eric Selland
Translated by
Eric Selland is a a poet, translator, and the author. His translation of The Guest Cat, a novel by Takashi Hiraide, was on the New York Times bestseller list in February 2014. He has also published articles on Japanese modernist poetry and translation theory. He is the author of The Condition of Music, Inventions, and an essay in The Poem Behind the Poem: Translating Asian Poetry. Eric currently lives in Tokyo, where he works as a translator of economic reports.
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