English Language and Literature Studies; Vol. 11, No. 2; 2021 ISSN 1925-4768 E-ISSN 1925-4776 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education Feline Affinities Between E.T.A. Hoffmann’s The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr and Natsume Sōseki’s I Am a Cat Val Scullion1 & Marion Treby2 1 Independent scholar, Buckden, United Kingdom 2 Independent scholar, Newmarket, United Kingdom Correspondence: Val Scullion, 51, Park Road, Buckden, St Neots, Cambs, PE19 5SL, United Kingdom. E-mail:
[email protected] Received: January 25, 2021 Accepted: March 15, 2021 Online Published: March 23, 2021 doi:10.5539/ells.v11n2p1 URL: https://doi.org/10.5539/ells.v11n2p1 Abstract Natsume Sōseki (1867−1916) was an eclectic writer and voracious reader during a historical period when western literary influence flourished in Japan. This article hypothesizes that the German novel, The Life and Opinions of Tomcat Murr (1819−1821), by E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776−1822), is as strong a formative influence in terms of structure and satirical perspective on Sōseki’s novel, I Am a Cat (1905−1907), as other satiric contenders. It pursues this argument by examining correlations between these two polyphonic novels which mix many registers and discourses in a similar way. Biographical, historical and literary analysis underpins this comparison. Keywords: Hoffmann, Sōseki, satiric, grotesque, Tomcat Murr, cat-narrator 1. Introduction There are many affinities between the German novel, The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr (Lebensansichten des Katers Murr, 1819−1821) by E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776−1822), and the Japanese novel, I Am a Cat (Wagahai wa Neko de Aru, 1905−1907) by Natsume Sōseki (1867−1916).