GRODGE-CAT AND THE WINDOW CLEANER

by John Symonds ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 1965

Grodge-Cat seems to be a rather weak satire of some of the weakest adult books out of England. These are the sort of autobiographies by faintly declasse ex-flappers who emerged from the manor houses to youths that flamed as poorly as the average English coal fire and usually ended in a defiantly unsuitable marriage. They write of their Edwardian childhoods with varying degrees of nostalgia or spite and pad out their books with photographs from the family album. The publisher lists this at Grades 5-7 and supplies jacket copy to the effect that boys and girls will laugh it up. Why they should escapes us at this or any future moment. It starts with a collection of guyed family snaps. Eleanor, a human, is the narrator. She had had a cat for a governess, Miss Woods, who used to take her to see a family of cats named Quince. They had a trying daughter named Grodge-Cat who had fallen in love with a cat who was a window cleaner. She pursued him into the sewers where he was a failure at rat catching... This sort of parody has been done to death at the adult level and it doesn't seem to be up the juvenile alley at all.

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1965

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Pantheon

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1965

Categories: FICTION