{"product_id":"book-catland-hardback","title":"Book - Catland Hardback","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e*Shortlisted for the Pol Roger Duff Cooper Prize* A Times and Sunday Times Book of the Year A Wall Street Journal Book of the Year A Spectator Book of the Year A Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year A New Yorker Book of the Year ?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.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003e'Smart, gorgeously written cultural history’ TLS ‘Delightful’ Guardian ‘Excellent’ Spectator ‘Joyous cultural history’ The Times ‘He invented a whole cat world’ declared H. G. Wells of Louis Wain, the Edwardian artist whose anthropomorphic kittens made him a household name.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eHis 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.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eCats 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.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eNo-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. ‘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 ‘Catland is a tour de force of (cat) history: sleek, elegant and razor-sharp when needed’ History Today ‘Excellent … Hughes reveals a fascinating, forgotten aspect of late Victorian and Edwardian Britain: how the British fell in love with felines’ Daily Mail ‘An entertaining and often surprising cultural history … typically delivered in an inviting spirit of delight’ New Yorker\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Harper Collins","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46421971599595,"sku":"BOHARP\/9780008365103","price":22.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0515\/0464\/4247\/files\/Book_CatLandHardback.jpg?v=1747074270","url":"https:\/\/cartoonmuseum.shop\/products\/book-catland-hardback","provider":"The Cartoon Museum","version":"1.0","type":"link"}