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Beware the Cat: The First English Novel

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Beware the Cat (written 1553) is the earliest original piece of long prose fiction in English. It has the distinction of being the first English "novel," far surpassing in narrative sophistication such immediate predecessors as Elyot's Image of Governance or Borde's Scoggin's Jests . This edition, besides providing a modernized text of the novel, also identifies the pseudonymous author of Beware the Cat as William Baldwin, better known as editor and principal author of the enormously popular Mirror for Magistrates (1559). The development of early English prose fiction is thoroughly documented in two informative and wide-ranging appendices. William Baldwin's place in this tradition, as well as his innovative narrative art, is discussed in the introduction, which also provides biographical information on the author, historical background to his novel, and insight into the political and religious turmoil of the middle years of the sixteenth century.

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1561

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Displaying 1 - 30 of 33 reviews
Profile Image for Zadignose.
313 reviews181 followers
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June 30, 2025
An excellent work of wit and entertainment about cats that speak, and the superstitions of Catholics. Free for all, to be read here: http://www.presscom.co.uk/halliwell/b...

I ought to read it again, of course, especially as the mid-sixteenth-century English posed some comprehension challenges, but it was also quite fun and exciting to navigate these linguistic waters.

One of the devices employed in the work is the use of marginal notes, squeezed in on both left and right of the main text. These notes sometimes summarize, sometimes comment on, sometimes illustrate the text, but they're basically another kind of playfulness.

A good example of wit in a marginal note comes when a character is seen to light candles before an image of the Virgin Mary before praying. The author comments:

Images cā
not ſee to
hear with
out light.

(That is: "Images cannot see to hear without light".)

A funny punny thing to say, as to see to do something basically means to manage to do so, but here he's conflating seeing with hearing, while facetiously attempting to account for the otherwise incomprehensible lighting of candles before prayer.

If that's the kind of thing that entertains you, or if you like to read of a priest getting his face beshitten, then this is the book for you.

Here we also encounter verbatim the saying which later appeared in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice: "All that glisters is not gold," though I've been informed that this cliche is centuries older than that in somewhat different form.

Without reading this book, I might never have deduced that the modern "willy-nilly" derives from "will he or nill he" (where "nill" is the negative of will, thus whether he wants or not).

And just in case you want a little wit at woman's expense (to go with your Catholic bashing), we also get this gem:

It is as
much pity
to ſee a
woman
weep as to
ſee a goos
go bare-
foot.

However, I hope it's obvious from this that the whole thing's humorous, so I don't perceive any vicious "bashing," except by particularly sensitive modern standards. It's a mostly well-intended farce with the central moral message that one should do nothing that would make one ashamed if it were seen by God, the devil, and all the world.
Profile Image for Ralph Britton.
Author 6 books5 followers
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January 20, 2025
I think calling this the first English novel is an assertion too far, but this is certainly one of the strangest stories I have read. Published in 1570, it is set in the reign of Edward VI and purports to be a lengthy conversation taking place in the room of a courtier who has offered a bed to some of his friends. The discussion turns on whether animals have reason and a tale is told of the death of a fearsome Irish cat venerated by all the cats of England and Ireland. Was this cat, which had the power to talk, a witch or can all cats talk? One can't be sure how much the author is being playful - most people would have believed in witches. One might well beware the cat - it might be a witch, or even worse, a devil.
The narrator tells of lodging near a city gate where the bodies of executed men are displayed. Surprisingly, he is disgusted by the practice and condemns it utterly. A company of cats has gathered to eat scraps of the dead men's flesh, and the narrator longs to understand what seems to be a conference of them, presided over by a huge and imposing Tom. He goes to great length to make a potion which will enable him to understand them. The process is described in repellent detail - it would have done credit to Macbeth's witches. The result is success and the next night he is witness to the trial of female cat for not accepting the advances of a male. She acquits herself easily and tells stories of her life. This is the most entertaining part of the book - the stories are really very funny and are elaborated with some skill. The cat, Mouseslayer, is a lively and convincing character, full of cunning tricks. One of the best is when Mouseslayer, in a rare moral moment, decides to reveal the lover of her mistress to her husband. Surprised by the husband, the lover hides behind a hanging without having time to pull up his hose. Mouseslayer claws his buttocks and legs, but he remains silent. Determined to make him call out, the cat leaps up andlocks her teeth on his genitals. This is too much; the lover screams, is caught and Mouseslayer just escapes being strangled by him.
There is a fair amount of satiric attack on the Catholic Church and its priests, but the main purpose of the book seems to be humorous. It is a great deal more readable than most Elizabethan prose attempts at stories; the cats really come to life. The avowed moral is 'Beware the cat' - it can get everywhere, hear your secrets and betray them if it feels so inclined. You can never be sure whether it is a witch or a devil, but even if it is not you would be wise to treat it with caution. It will surely revenge itself for any slights or indignities you make it suffer.
Profile Image for Stephanie Graves.
321 reviews20 followers
February 3, 2009
This work, probably written in 1552-53 but not published until 1570 after the Protestant Elizabeth I had taken the throne in England, is considered to the be first novel written in English during the Early Modern period. It features reportage as the method of storytelling, and the plot arises out of a discussion about whether animals have reason, leading Master Streamer to orate at great length about his experiences with the language of cats. After compounding an alchemical brew that he drinks, he can understand the language of cats and listens to Mouse-Slayer give her testimony to a feline court.

The framework of storytelling is complex and masterful--Baldwin tells the story, relating Streamer's oration. Streamer also includes stories others have told him in his tale, so it's a thrice-removed narration where the question of reliability comes up. It is also a satirical skewering of the Catholic Church, wherein the Pope is considered a gluttonous devil and the Church is portrayed as superstitious and in a way is aligned with paganism, a common argument of the time since Protestants had issues with the idea of transubstantiation and with the Catholic worship of the holy trinity while still calling themselves monotheistic.

Overall, it's a fine tale, really--clever and funny and very enjoyable. I would recommend it not only as a cultural artifact, but as a good read.
Profile Image for Isaac Simin.
33 reviews
February 2, 2025
the first and best novel of all time no competition

the cats are icons
Profile Image for Micha.
737 reviews11 followers
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January 27, 2016
I'm not interested in rating a book I read simply because it a) has the presumable honour of being the first English novel and b) is about cats. It's like. You don't read this kind of shit because you enjoy the story or the characters or whatever. Maybe for the context, if anti-Popishness is your thing. I have obviously been out of school for too long and probably belong there if I'm reading this kind of stuff on my own time. What is wrong with me.

This has been a review.
Profile Image for Gabi Leoncini.
718 reviews3 followers
September 17, 2021
2.5 stars.

As someone raised Catholic it's always fun to read early modern texts which try to absolutely annihilate the Catholic church; it should definitely be renamed 'Beware the Cat[holic]'. Some of it is harsh but fair, and some of it is just harsh. This is a very weird text but super interesting to see how the English novel itself was born.
Profile Image for Alexei López.
70 reviews4 followers
January 4, 2023
Cat-ish...

More complex than most pieces from the times, this incredible volume is accompanied by a scholarly review on the development of the English novel - it attempts to give "Beware the Cat- its pre-eminent place there.

This little piece of creativity and imagination and stands out because of the craft that the writer employed to" weave" many stories within stories, which makes it ahead of the narrative tempo being developed then.

The fact that it deals mainly with the point of view of cats makes it a close relative of fables, even though the reader cannot contrasts man's behaviours with the animals' in question: the reader has access to intimate actions that spring his/her very eyes out of a report from the pets.

At times sharp and critical towards the closure in the mind embodied by Catholics, this book represents a fine piece of fantasy that problematizes precisely the irrational conduct of the believers vis à vis the reformists.
Profile Image for Emma Anderson.
52 reviews
October 19, 2022
Very outrageous satire. Couldn’t stop thinking about the musical ‘Cats’, and while I know nothing about the musical, I was disappointed to learn that it wasn’t inspired by this book at all. Not that I’d want to watch a broadway show about this book, but the concept is interesting that I think it COULD be a broadway show (coming from someone who also knows nothing about broadway).
Profile Image for belisa.
1,473 reviews43 followers
December 20, 2022
değişik bir metin, ne desem bilemedim...
Profile Image for ellie.
235 reviews2 followers
November 25, 2022
Beware the Cat by William Baldwin

Book 47/52

I like the vibes. I didn't get the satire element. I am stupid
Profile Image for Sajaa.
34 reviews1 follower
March 16, 2025
Interesting text when yk the historical context nd view it in the lens of colonialism specifically.
Profile Image for Bruce.
1,596 reviews23 followers
September 2, 2022
This is not the edition I read. I was unable to obtain it from any library to which I had access, and yes, you can buy it on Amazon or some other used bookseller, if you have an extra several hundred dollars, but my book budget isn’t big enough for that, especially for a pig in a poke that I haven’t read yet.

So, I snooped around the Internet and found three online versions: on in the original language and two versions in modern English and read them instead. I therefore, have no opinion on what Ringer and Flachmann might have to say about the book.

The versions I read made me a bit curious as to why it is considered a novel. It is admittedly a sustained bit of prose fiction, but it reminded me more of bits of the Arabian Nights, The Decameron, or The Canterbury tales than of Le Morte d'Arthur, which predated it by over a century.

I’ll grant that while Malory’s work is a much longer piece of fiction, he cribbed it all out of French sources, so Arthur’s story is really, a translation and adaption. The subject and the language are English, but the book is really reworked French literature. In contrast, Beware the cat draws on English and Irish folklore and English feelings about Catholicism after the Church of England had parted company with Rome and the Pope.

It's a story about storytellers telling stories, much like the works I referred to above. Some of the tales told are gruesome, and some are humorous, and most are mixture of both. The main argument is that animals can converse with each other in the same way that humans can. The main storyteller tells a whopper about how by making some brew out of cat scat, boiled hedgehog, and several other disgusting ingredients is able to understand the language of animals and eavesdrops on a parliament of cats sitting in court one night near where he’s sleeping. He awakes and reports back to his audience and the readers of his book what he’s heard.

The book is interesting, but wouldn’t win any literary prizes, nor would it appear on any bestseller lists when such things came into being. After all, the edition that goodreads cites is almost as rare as hen’s teeth.
Profile Image for Zara.
290 reviews51 followers
January 23, 2019
The narrative was so confusing, I didn't know if a cat was speaking or if a human was.
I'm 100% sure that the person who wrote this was high because there is no way in hell a sober person wrote the scene where the priest fell on a naked boys ass who then proceeded to shit himself on his face.

It was very weird and really funny.
3/5 stars.
Profile Image for connie.
1,567 reviews101 followers
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January 23, 2019
read this for my early modern fantasies and fears module

this is actually so funny it's literally just a bunch of weird stories about talking cats, the last story is literally from the POV of a cat
Profile Image for E.M. Welsh.
130 reviews19 followers
October 11, 2014
Anything so complex and intriguing is worthy of this rating. Though this is not to imply I understood well what was going on.
Profile Image for Kimba Wisotsky.
100 reviews
April 4, 2023
So goofy! Very raunchy and ribald. I love cats so this was a delight but I would not recommend it to my mother! Makes me wonder if T. S. Eliot was thinking of this when writing some of his cat poems.
very anti feminist conversation :( also a man roasts a cat alive and gets away with it, the narrator prevents other cats from tearing him apart. With all the feminine pronouns regarding cats, sometimes the prose switches from misogynist to empowering, but mostly misogynist. Kind of “cool girl” syndrome (Mouseslayer is a “cool girl cat” I think, she’s just one of the guys, she’s chill, etc)
32 reviews
March 28, 2025
The irresistible title pulled me in while I was looking for editions of Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy in the 16th century English literature stacks at the library.

Part anti-Catholic tall tale, part exercise in bravura POV shifting, part scatological jokery, part spooky cat adventures.

I only wish that this edition preserved the spellings as originally printed—it would have heightened the charm of the many delightful neologisms (gargaristical, baggagical, like-nightical) that Baldwin scatters through his slim but fascinating book.
263 reviews
November 11, 2022
Did I understand everything I read? Certainly not! But it was fun to pick through the early modern English and read about a guy who makes a magical elixir in order to listen to a group of cats. The moral: Beware the cat. Cats see and hear what you do, and tell other cats about it. Live your life honorably, so the cats (both real and demonic) have nothing bad to say about you.
Profile Image for nez.
108 reviews1 follower
November 22, 2024
silly fun and very enjoyable to write about. was surprised that i wasn't aware of the First English Novel but to be honest the definition of novel is pretty loose here. still, i expected it to be obscure and dull seeing as it isn't better known, but it's literally a story about talking cats glossed by a fictional editor/narrator/author who shits on the catholic church in the margins. bizarre.
Profile Image for Deon Loke.
37 reviews3 followers
February 26, 2025
literally crazy… ive read my fare share of early modern books and i had to actually read OUT LOUD to understand a few parts but well i laughed out loud a few times bc it was funny . TLDR (spoiler ish maybe) nobody is afraid of cats they are afraid of the devil and of transgressive private spaces being exposed
Profile Image for Abby Omlor.
570 reviews1 follower
February 13, 2024
2.5 out of 5 Stars

This actually had some parts that I didn't mind, but was largely entirely too rambly.
Profile Image for James.
Author 60 books38 followers
November 30, 2023
"There was, not seven yeres past, a Kern of John Butlers dwelling in the Fassock of Bantry called Patrik Apore, who minding to make apray in the night upon Cayer Makart his maisters enemy: got him with his boy, (for so they call their horse keepers be they never so olde knaves) into his Cuntrie, & in the night time entred into a town of two howses and brake in and slue the people, and then took such cattel as they found which was a Cow and a sheep and departed therwith homeward, but douting they should be pursued : (the Curre dogs made such a shril barking) he got bin in to a church, thinking to lurk ther til midnight was past, for there he was suer that no man would respect or seek him, for the wild Irish men had Churches in such reverence, til our men taught them the contrary, that they neither would nor durst either rob ought thence, or hurt any man that took the church yard for sanctuary, no though he had killed his father , and while this Kern was in the Church: he thought it best to dine for he had eaten litle that day, wherfore he made his boy go gather sticks and strake fire with his feres, and made a fire in the Churche and killed the Sheep, and after the Irish fashion layd it there upon and rosted it, but when it was ready and that he thought to eat it there came in a cat and set her by him, and said in Irish , Shane foel, which is give mee some meat, he amazed at this, gave her the quarter that was in his hand, whiche immediatly she did eat up, and asked more til she had consumed all the sheep, and like a cormorant not satisfied therwith asked stil for more, wherfore they supposed it were the Devil, and therefore thinking it wisdome to please him killed the Cow which they had stolen, and when they had flaid it : gave the Cat a quarter which she immediatlye devoured, then they gave her two other quarters, and in the mean while after the cuntrie fashion they did cut a peece of the hide and pricked it upon fower stakes which they set about the fire, and therin they set a peece of the Cow for them selves, and with the rest of the hide, they made eche of them laps to were about their feet like broges, bothe to keep theire feet from hurt all the next day : and also to serve for meat the next night if they could get none other, by broyling them upon coles By this time the Cat had eaten three quarters and called for more, wherfor they gave her that which was a seething, and douting lest when she had eaten that, she would eat them to because they had no more for her: they got them out of the Church and the Kern tooke his horse and a way he rode as fast as he could hie. When he was a mile or two from the Church : the moone began to shine, and his boy espied the cat upon his maisters horse behinde him, tolde him, wherupon the kern took his Dart and turning his face toward her flang it, and stroke her thorough with it but immediatly there came to her such a sight of Cats, that after long fight with them : his boy was killed and eaten up, and he him self, as good and as swift as his horse was had much to doo to scape. When he was come home and had put of his harnes (which was a Corslet of maile made like a Shirt, and his Seul covered over with gilt lether and crested with Ottersain ) all weary and hungry set him down by his wife and tolde her his adventure, which when a Kitling which his wife kept scarce half a yeere had heard: up she started and said, hast thou killed Grimmalkin? & therwith she plunged in his face, and with her teeth took him by the throte, & ere that shee could be taken away : she had strangled him."
2,844 reviews
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November 23, 2015
(from Wikipedia) There are multiple candidates for first novel in English partly because of ignorance of earlier works, but largely because the term novel can be defined so as to exclude earlier candidates:

Some critics require a novel to be wholly original and so exclude retellings like Le Morte d'Arthur.
Most critics distinguish between an anthology of stories with different protagonists, even if joined by common themes and milieus, and the novel (which forms a connected narrative), and so also exclude Le Morte d'Arthur.
Some critics distinguish between the romance (which has fantastic elements) and the novel (which is wholly realistic) and so yet again exclude Le Morte d'Arthur.
Some critics distinguish between the allegory (in which characters and events have political, religious or other meanings) and the novel (in which characters and events stand only for themselves) and so exclude The Pilgrim's Progress and A Tale of a Tub.
Some critics require a novel to have a certain length, and so exclude Oroonoko, defining it instead as a novella.
Some critics distinguish between the picaresque (which has a loosely connected sequence of episodes) and the novel (which has unity of structure) and so exclude The Unfortunate Traveller.

Due to the influence of Ian Watt's seminal study in literary sociology, The Rise of the Novel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson and Fielding (1957), Watt's candidate, Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719), gained wide acceptance.
Profile Image for Michael Moody.
1 review
January 8, 2016
This took forever to find. Hardbacks are listed at $1500 US. it's not in British or American English it's in Middle English from the time of Cromwell and Geoffrey Chaucer. Some of it's intended to dig at the Catholics of the day and it is amazingly fun so far.
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