Previous
Symbols
When the American wife spots a cat stuck in the rain across the street from her hotel, it strikes a chord in her. This suggests that the creature’s pathetic state encapsulates her own feelings of loneliness and vulnerability. When the wife tells her husband, George, that “It isn’t any fun to be a poor kitty out in the rain,” it echoes her view that her own life is lacking in “fun” and happiness. She feels lonely and vulnerable, something suggested in the long list of unfulfilled desires and wishes she shares with the unsympathetic George. As such, the cat’s plight seems to mirror her own emotions. The wife’s desire for the animal also embodies her desire for close contact and connection. When she returns upstairs to her room, disappointed after failing to find the animal under the café table, she tells George that she wants a cat to sit on her lap and purr while she strokes it. This fantasy of close physical contact and connection with the creature points to the wife’s longing for emotionally intimate bonds, bonds which seem lacking in her marriage to George.
The Cat Quotes in Cat in the Rain
The Cat in the Rain quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Cat. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Cat in the Rain Quotes
The American wife stood at the window looking out. Outside right under their window a cat was crouched under one of the dripping green tables. The cat was trying to make herself so compact that she would not be dripped on.
“I’m going down and get that kitty,” the American wife said… “The poor kitty out trying to keep dry under a table.”
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
At the beginning of the story, the American wife is depicted looking out of the window of her hotel room in Italy. Her husband George sits in the room with her, and yet the first image the reader gets of her is one that shows her turned away from him. Her positioning in relation to George alludes to the gulf that exists between husband and wife. The American wife does not feel connected to George, and this is reflected in her posture, which faces away from him. The cat’s plight strikes a chord in the American wife. She seems to Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliq
With the maid holding the umbrella over her, she walked along the gravel path until she was under their window. The table was there, washed bright green in the rain, but the cat was gone. She was suddenly disappointed.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
The American wife’s feelings of disappointment upon failing to find the cat after venturing out in search of it point to her deeper dissatisfactions. Instead of being happy that the cat might have found shelter elsewhere, for instance, the wife’s disappointment suggests that she herself hoped to gain something from the animal. Her disappointment also implicitly alludes to the ways in which people’s aspirations—both large and small—are often frustrated. What one wants is often just beyond one’s reach, just as the cat—whom the wife had spotted moments earlier from her hotel window—disappears just as her desire for it takes hold.
“Ha perduto qualche cosa, Signora?”
“There was a cat,” said the American girl.
“A cat?”
“Sì, il gatto.”
“A cat?” the maid laughed. “A cat in the rain?”
“Yes,” she said, “under the table.” Then, “Oh, I wanted it so much. I wanted a kitty.”
When she talked English the maid’s face tightened.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
The use of Italian dialogue in the text, as reflected in the maid’s first question to the American wife, as well as the wife’s response, suggests not only a linguistic, but also a cultural and emotional gulf between the maid and the wife. Presumably, many of the story’s English readers do not understand Italian. As such, Hemingway’s use of Italian alienates the reader in such a way so as to call attention to that gulf that exists between the American characters (as well as the English-speaking readers of the story) and the Italian characters. In the quotation above, this gulf Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a deserunt. Sint aperiam consequatur. Minima porro perferendis. Sit neque odit. Tenetur qui dignissimos. Qui et ut. Voluptate labore corporis. Hic tempore laborum. Nisi quia ea. Quia soluta itaque. Deleniti nisi e
As the American girl passed the office, the padrone bowed from his desk. Something felt very small and tight inside the girl. The padrone made her feel very small and at the same time really important.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
The American wife’s confused feelings as she passes by the office of the hotel-keeper after failing to find the cat underscore the emotional upheaval that the loss of the cat occasions in her. Her sense of being “very small” highlights her own vulnerability and powerlessness, feelings, perhaps, that she had projected onto the “kitty” she had glimpsed from the hotel window earlier. The contradictory feeling of importance serves to highlight her confusion and emotional disturbance. In losing the cat, she also seems to lose a sense of her own identity—she is no longer certain whether she is in fact “small” Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Op
“I want to pull my hair back tight and smooth and make a big knot at the back that I can feel,” she said. “I want to have a kitty to sit on my lap and purr when I stroke her.”
“Yeah?” George said from the bed.
“And I want to eat at a table with my own silver and I want candles. And I want it to be spring and I want to brush my hair out in from of a mirror and I want a kitty and I want some new clothes.”
“Oh, shut up and get something to read,” George said.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
The list of desires that the American wife expresses—though seemingly trivial—point to a deep dissatisfaction that pervades her life. She wants many things to change, including things over which she has no control, such as the weather. Her desire to touch a cat that sits purring on her lap suggests a yearning for close contact and connection, something that is clearly lacking in her relationship to George, whose cruel response, “Oh, shut up and get something to read,” confirms his estrangement from his wife, particularly his inability to respond to her needs. The other things that the wife wants—such as Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus t
In the doorway stood the maid. She held a big tortoise-shell cat pressed tight against her and swung down against her body.
“Excuse me,” she said, “the padrone asked me to bring this for the Signora.”
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
The cat that the maid presents to the American wife at the end of the story—a gift from the hotel-keeper—may or may not be the same cat that the wife had spotted earlier from her hotel window. The narrator never clarifies this point, and thus the story ends on a note of ambiguity. However, there are in fact indications that this may not be the same cat. The narrator describes the animal that the maid presents as “big,” and yet the American wife had referred to the cat she had seen from the window as a “kitty,” which suggests that Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut
Get the entire Cat in the Rain LitChart as a printable PDF.
"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
The Cat Symbol Timeline in Cat in the Rain
The timeline below shows where the symbol The Cat appears in Cat in the Rain. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Cat in the Rain
...window and looking out, the American wife takes in the rainy scene. She notices a cat under a café table, trying to shelter from the rain, and tells her husband George,...
(full context)
...head. When she arrives under their hotel window, however, she sees the table, but the cat has disappeared. She is disappointed. The maid asks her in Italian if she has lost...
(full context)
...He puts down his book and asks her if she has managed to get the cat. She informs him that it is gone, and he wonders aloud where it has gone...
(full context)
The American wife sits down on the bed, and tells George that she wants the cat so much, though she doesn’t quite know why. She broods over the poor kitty’s fate,...
(full context)
...big knot at the back of her head that she can feel. She wants a cat on her lap, one that purrs when she strokes her. Encouraged, perhaps, by George’s “Yeah?”...
(full context)
...of the window. It’s dark outside but still raining. She repeats that she wants a cat now, especially if she can’t have long hair or any fun. George, who is absorbed...
(full context)
...George invites them to enter. The maid stands in the doorway, holding a large tortoise-shell cat in her hands. She politely states that the “padrone” (the hotel-keeper) has sent her up...
(full context)
