"The Cats of Ulthar" is a
short story
A short story is a piece of prose fiction. It can typically be read in a single sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the old ...
written by American
weird fiction author
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft (, ; August 20, 1890 – March 15, 1937) was an American writer of Weird fiction, weird, Science fiction, science, fantasy, and horror fiction. He is best known for his creation of the Cthulhu Mythos.
Born in Provi ...
in June 1920. In the tale, an unnamed narrator relates the story of how a law forbidding the killing of cats came to be in a town called Ulthar. As the narrative goes, the city is home to an old couple who enjoy capturing and killing the townspeople's cats. When a caravan of wanderers passes through the city, the kitten of an orphan (Menes) traveling with the band disappears. Upon hearing of the couple's violent acts towards cats, Menes invokes a prayer before leaving town that causes the local felines to swarm the cat-killers' house and devour them. Upon witnessing the result, the local politicians pass a law forbidding the killing of cats.
Influenced by
Lord Dunsany
Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany (; 24 July 1878 – 25 October 1957), commonly known as Lord Dunsany, was an Anglo-Irish writer and dramatist. He published more than 90 books during his lifetime, and his output consist ...
, the tale was a personal favorite of Lovecraft's and has remained popular since his death. Considered one of the best short stories of Lovecraft's early period, aspects of "The Cats of Ulthar" would be referenced again in the author's works ''
The Other Gods'' and ''
The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath
''The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath'' is a Horror fiction, horror novella by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. Begun probably in the autumn of 1926, the draft was completed on January 22, 1927 in literature, 1927, and it remained unrevised and u ...
''. It was first published in the literary journal ''
Tryout'' in November 1920 and now resides in the public domain.
Synopsis
An unnamed narrator, while gazing upon his pet
cat
The cat (''Felis catus''), also referred to as the domestic cat or house cat, is a small domesticated carnivorous mammal. It is the only domesticated species of the family Felidae. Advances in archaeology and genetics have shown that the ...
, begins to reminisce about a law in the town of Ulthar which forbids the killing of cats and relates the story of how this law came to be. The tale begins with the introduction of an old
cotter and his wife, who delight in trapping and violently killing any cats who venture onto their property. The people of the town are too afraid of the couple to speak against these acts, so they instead focus their efforts on keeping their felines from approaching the cotter's house. One night, a
caravan
Caravan or caravans may refer to:
Transport and travel
*Campervan, a type of vehicle also known as a motor caravan
*Caravan (travellers), a group of travellers journeying together
**Caravanserai, a place where a caravan could stop
*Caravan (trail ...
of travelers from a distant land arrives and passes through the village. They bring with them an
orphan
An orphan is a child whose parents have died, are unknown, or have permanently abandoned them. It can also refer to a child who has lost only one parent, as the Hebrew language, Hebrew translation, for example, is "fatherless". In some languages ...
named Menes who, having lost his family to a
plague, has only a small, black kitten to keep him company. After being unable to find his kitten on the third day of his stay, Menes hears the stories of the old cotter and his wife, and decides to take action.
Menes spends time meditating prior to unleashing a
prayer
File:Prayers-collage.png, 300px, alt=Collage of various religionists praying – Clickable Image, Collage of various religionists praying ''(Clickable image – use cursor to identify.)''
rect 0 0 1000 1000 Shinto festivalgoer praying in front ...
that affects the shapes and movements of the clouds in the sky, granting all the cats of Ulthar
sentience
Sentience is the ability to experience feelings and sensations. It may not necessarily imply higher cognitive functions such as awareness, reasoning, or complex thought processes. Some writers define sentience exclusively as the capacity for ''v ...
. The caravan leaves Ulthar that night, shortly before the townspeople notice that all of their cats have gone missing. The townspeople suspect both the old couple and the wanderers, but the innkeeper's son Atal witnesses the felines circling the property of the cotter. The next morning, the cats have returned to their owners well-fed, but the cotter and his wife have vanished. When the townspeople explore their abandoned house, they discover nothing more than two skeletons that have been picked clean. The local
burgesses, after reviewing the evidence and stories of the townspeople, decide to pass a law that forbids the killing of cats in Ulthar.
Background
Lovecraft outlined the plot to his friend
Rheinhart Kleiner in May 1920 and wrote "The Cats of Ulthar" on June 15, 1920, five months after completing his previous tale, ''
The Terrible Old Man''.
Conceived during the author's early period, Lovecraft was influenced by the writing of Anglo-Irish writer
Lord Dunsany
Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany (; 24 July 1878 – 25 October 1957), commonly known as Lord Dunsany, was an Anglo-Irish writer and dramatist. He published more than 90 books during his lifetime, and his output consist ...
and attempted to mimic his style. Among the literary aspects that Lovecraft borrows are the "vengeance motif" and the "ponderous tone" of Dunsany.
Dunsany's influence is evident on the surface of the text as well: wanderers, similar to the ones portrayed in "The Cats of Ulthar", appear in Dunsany's earlier tale ''
Idle Days on the Yann''.
Lovecraft's character of Menes shares his name with
Menes
Menes ( ; ; , probably pronounced *; and Μήν) was a pharaoh of the Early Dynastic Period of ancient Egypt, credited by classical tradition with having united Upper and Lower Egypt, and as the founder of the First Dynasty.
The identity of M ...
, the semi-mythical founder of the ancient city of
Memphis, Egypt
Memphis (, ; Bohairic ; ), or Men-nefer, was the ancient capital of Inebu-hedj, the first Nome (Egypt), nome of Lower Egypt that was known as ''mḥw'' ("North"). Its ruins are located in the vicinity of the present-day village of Mit Rahina () ...
. The ancient Egyptians were admirers of cats who made it a crime to kill or export felines.
Prior to "The Cats of Ulthar", Lovecraft had penned several tales in the style of Lord Dunsany, including ''
The White Ship'', ''
The Street'', ''
The Doom that Came to Sarnath'', ''The Terrible Old Man'', and ''The Tree''. His next Dunsanian tale, ''
Celephaïs'', was considered by Lovecraft scholar
S. T. Joshi to be "one of his best and most significant".
"The Cats of Ulthar" was first published in the literary journal ''
Tryout'' in November 1920,
and later appeared in ''
Weird Tales
''Weird Tales'' is an American fantasy and horror fiction pulp magazine founded by J. C. Henneberger and J. M. Lansinger in late 1922. The first issue, dated March 1923, appeared on newsstands February 18. The first editor, Edwin Baird, printe ...
'' in February 1926 and 1933, as well as being privately reprinted in a forty two-copy run in December 1935.
Reception and legacy
"The Cats of Ulthar" was a personal favorite of Lovecraft's, who was an ardent cat lover.
A number of contemporary critics, as well as Lovecraft himself,
consider the story to be the best of all his Dunsanian tales.
Other critics have noted that the story is one of Lovecraft's most famous tales that fits both the Dunsanian and the "weird fantasy" style.
Literary critic
Darrell Schweitzer
Darrell Charles Schweitzer (born August 27, 1952) is an American writer, editor, and critic in the field of speculative fiction. Much of his focus has been on dark fantasy and horror, although he does also work in science fiction and fantasy. ...
, however, comments that "The Cats of Ulthar" resembles Dunsany in "mood and execution" only and that "
thas no obvious parallels in any Dunsany story".
Schweitzer refers to the prose as "restrained",
and notes that, unlike Lovecraft, Dunsany preferred dogs and would have been unlikely to have written such an enthusiastic tribute.
Lovecraft scholar S. T. Joshi disagrees, claiming that "
is tale owes more to Dunsany than many of his other 'Dunsanian' fantasies".
The character of Atal, the innkeeper's son who witnesses the cats of Ulthar circling the antagonists' cottage, would later appear in Lovecraft's ''
The Other Gods''. In this short story, written in August 1921 and first published in November 1933, Atal, now an adult, becomes an apprentice to Barzai the Wise and travels with him to seek out the tale's eponymous deities.
Barzai even mentions the law against killing cats in Ulthar, further cementing the connection. Atal also appears as a priest in the long ''
The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath
''The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath'' is a Horror fiction, horror novella by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. Begun probably in the autumn of 1926, the draft was completed on January 22, 1927 in literature, 1927, and it remained unrevised and u ...
'' — written in 1927 but not published until 1943 — when protagonist
Randolph Carter visits the city 300 years after the events in "The Cats of Ulthar", when the town is still heavily populated by felines. Carter is later able to summon the cats of Ulthar to his aid.
Cats would be used in what scholar Katharine M. Rogers calls "a more original way"
in Lovecraft's 1923 work ''
The Rats in the Walls''. Here, as in others of Lovecraft's later tales, cats embody the attraction to horror while, unlike the human protagonists, "never pursuing horror to the point of becoming horrible themselves".
The text of "The Cats of Ulthar", like many of Lovecraft's works, has fallen into the public domain and can be accessed in several compilations of the author's work as well as on the Internet.
References
External links
*
The Cats of Ulthar (Full Text)*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cats of Ulthar, The
1920 short stories
Short stories about cats
Fantasy short stories
Horror short stories
Short stories by H. P. Lovecraft
Works originally published in Tryout