To Mrs Reynolds' Cat
To Mrs Reynolds' Cat - context Summary
Written at Reynolds' Household
Composed in 1818 while Keats stayed with John Hamilton Reynolds, this playful sonnet addresses the Reynolds family cat. Keats teases the aging animal about past fights, nicked tail, asthma and mouse-catching prowess, balancing affection with gentle mockery. Published posthumously in 1838, the poem functions as a domestic, humorous portrait rather than a philosophical statement, reflecting Keats’s social life and intimacy with friends.
Read Complete AnalysesCat! who hast pass’d thy grand climacteric, How many mice and rats hast in thy days Destroy’d? How many tit bits stolen? Gaze With those bright languid segments green, and prick Those velvet ears - but pr’ythee do not stick Thy latent talons in me - and upraise Thy gentle mew - and tell me all thy frays, Of fish and mice, and rats and tender chick. Nay, look not down, nor lick thy dainty wrists - For all thy wheezy asthma - and for all Thy tail’s tip is nick’d off - and though the fists Of many a maid have given thee many a maul, Still is that fur as soft, as when the lists In youth thou enter’dest on glass bottled wall.
Good poem but which book was this published in?