Surprisingly apropos:
5 Likes
If they’re anything like cats in the real world, they wouldn’t dream of taking a job. They’ll find somebody to sponge off and, crucially, the person supporting them will somehow end up thinking they’re doing the cat a favour.
5 Likes
No, no. Somehow they’ll think the cat is doing them a favor!
6 Likes
Duh… sorry, I haven’t had my morning coffee yet!
2 Likes
And then the stranger comes to town and finds that most of the upper classes are living in lean-tos, and waiting on the cats living in what used to be their houses…
4 Likes
I think it was in Robert Anton Wilson’s Illuminatus! trilogy that gorillas could speak, but pretended to be unable to so that they couldn’t be put to work. You can’t impose a condition (of paying rent, for instance) on someone if you can’t communicate with them.
4 Likes
Jim Butcher’s Cinder Spires series involves an interesting cat society. One fun bit was when two high ranking members of different clans met, in order to establish who was superior, they had a sort of duel which consisted of who could be more unimpressed by the other, essentially lazing about ignoring the other nonchalantly.
5 Likes
The cats blew this early on in their history in the city. Their historians say they just couldn’t resist seeing what humans would do when a cat told them what was on their mind.
Cats can’t do much as servants (see lack of thumbs) but they make very good managers of servants. They can answer the door and say “I’ll see if they’re in.”
3 Likes
And promptly go lay down for a nap.
3 Likes
Right next to you. And if you ask ‘Who was it?’, they’ll just look at you as if to say ‘How the hell should I know?’
5 Likes
In Diane Duane’s Feline Wizard books, the cats - both magical and not - play a game that has analogies to chess, using physical space. The winning cat is the one who can sit where they can see all other cats, but cannot be seen by them. Games often go on for days as they subtly jockey for position, with outside observers almost entirely unable to perceive the game or understand its subtleties.
So test cricket, basically.
4 Likes
ISTR Terry Pratchett also wrote about Cat Chess (in The Unadulterated Cat, probably).
3 Likes
You’re entirely correct.