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Nick Bradley, The Cat and the City, Atlantic Books, 2020. 304 pgs.
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Nick Bradleyโs The Cat and the City is a patchwork of short stories and vignettes of people living in Tokyo who are all connected by the appearance of a calico cat that weaves in and out of their lives, staying for either a minute or a very long time.
We encounter characters such as a homeless man squatting in an abandoned capsule hotel, an American translator who dedicates most of her time to trying to translate a famous Japanese novel, a tattoo artist who receives an unusual commission, and a hermit who develops an unlikely friendship with a young boy as they bond over the cat. All the characters in these stories are lonely and in search of something, be it companionship, family, love, or acceptance. As the book goes on, characters from earlier stories make appearances in later ones, connecting all these seemingly disparate episodes in fun ways.
On paper, The Cat and the City has all the ingredients of an intriguing book, making you feel like you are wandering around the streets of Tokyo like the cat. The result is more uneven, however, and the middle section of the book drags.
In large sections of the book, the eponymous catโs absence felt striking, to the point where one might begin to wonder why it was mentioned in the bookโs title in the first place.
I also found it significant that two of the most prominent characters are white: Flo, the American translator who embodies the โgoing nativeโ trope and baulks at being described as a โJapanophileโ preferring to be called a โJapanologistโ. And George, an English teacher from the UK, who is in a relationship with a Japanese woman, Mari, and who criticises every Japanese person for not speaking English well.
While most of the characters are Tokyo residents, the author relies heavily on two-dimensional tropes about Japanese people, Japanese women in particular. Most of the Japanese women in this book have concerns that usually revolve around their love lives, and their wants and desires are oversimplified. They are also often sexualised. One example of this is Mari, whose entire narrative centres on being Georgeโs girlfriend. And when we get a proper introduction to her character, it is through a violent sex scene. She also brags about having a white boyfriend because dating a white man is a status symbol.
The trope of Asian women dating white men is based on some truth and the topic is deserving of exploration from many angles. But the bookโs structure of fleeting stories means that Bradley never really delves deeply into the issue, or touches on the more problematic aspects of it. This is the case for many of the issues on which the book briefly touches. The clearance of homeless people ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, gang culture and prevalence of sexual assault also deserve more in-depth exploration than the book provides.
Sexual assault and violence are prominent themes in the book, and a lot of the female characters are victims of it. When one female character is groped on a train (another facet of Japanese city life, chikan), it happens briefly, and the bookโs treatment of the incident is so matter-of-fact that it feels jarring.
Where the book is particularly strong are the sections where the unnamed calico is a strong presence.
One story in the book focuses on a hermit, Naoya, and 11-year-old Kensuke, who forge an unlikely friendship after the pair decide to nurse the injured cat back to health. A section of the story is retold as a manga drawn by Kensuke, retelling the story of their friendship and how this friendship forces Naoya to venture out of his apartment.
Bradley also at one point plays about with form and genre in the book, inserting a heart-breaking science fiction story about a scientist developing a robot cat.
Bradley deserves praise for not shying away from some of the more difficult and troubling facets of life in Tokyo in The Cat and the City, and also for writing about how isolating city life there can be. Yet the result is a book that is only really good in parts, and which is let down by stale tropes and oversimplifications in others.
How to cite: Wong, Vicky. โTroubling Facets of Life in Tokyo: Nick Bradleyโs The Cat and the City.โ Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, 21 Mar. 2024, chajournal.blog/2024/03/21/cat-city.
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Vicky Wong is a British-born Hongkonger and journalist based in London. She previously worked at RTHK as a producer, presenter, and newsreader for its English-language station and was the associate editor for Coconuts Hong Kong.