A SPECTATOR AND TLS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2024

'Smart, gorgeously written cultural history’ TLS

‘Joyous cultural history’ The Times

‘Delightful’ Guardian

Some called it a craze. To others it was a cult. Join prize-winning historian Kathryn Hughes to discover how Britain fell in love with cats and ushered in a new era.

‘He invented a whole cat world’ declared H. G. Wells of Louis Wain, the Edwardian artist whose anthropomorphic kittens made him a household name. His drawings were irresistible but Catland was more than the creation of one eccentric imagination. It was an attitude – a way of being in society while discreetly refusing to follow its rules.

As cat capitalism boomed in the spectacular Edwardian age, prized animals changed hands for hundreds of pounds and a new industry sprung up to cater for their every need. Cats were no longer basement-dwelling pest-controllers, but stylish cultural subversives, more likely to flaunt a magnificent ruff and a pedigree from Persia. Wherever you found old conventions breaking down, there was a cat at the centre of the storm.

Whether they were flying aeroplanes, sipping champagne or arguing about politics, Wain’s feline cast offered a sly take on the restless and risky culture of the post-Victorian world. No-one experienced these uncertainties more acutely than Wain himself, confined to a mental asylum while creating his most iconic work. Catland is a fascinating and fabulous unravelling of our obsession with cats, and the man dedicated to chronicling them.

‘Kathryn Hughes is one of our best loved and most incisively witty social historians … brilliantly researched and unforgettable' Miranda Seymour

‘On Victorian and Edwardian terrain, Hughes is near-omniscient … Through humour, elegance and sheer knowledge, Hughes builds something remarkable’ Literary Review

‘If a Louis Wain cat were reading this book, he would raise his topper in tribute’ The Times

‘An entertaining and often surprising cultural history … typically delivered in an inviting spirit of delight’ New Yorker

‘Hughes combines ingenuity, insight, and immense literary charm … A perfect gift for cat lovers, art lovers, and readers of all persuasions’ Elaine Showalter