Browse a rack of translated Japanese literature these days and you¡¯re likely to spot a certain motif among the book covers: cats.
Often recognized as an atmospheric trope or plot device in the fiction of Haruki Murakami, cats feature prominently in a range of other translated Japanese books. A significant number of books published in the past decade have the word ¡°cat¡± in their very titles.
You could simply chalk it up to humanity¡¯s soft spot for fuzzy felines. But with more titles on the horizon, it¡¯s evident that this literary cat craze may also be indicative of something else: a yearning for comfort and consolation against the existential dread of the present.
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