May 9, 2022
Review of If Cats Disappeared from the World, by Genki Kawamura
I love Japanese literature. Its themes are often focused, intelligent, quirky. I also love cats – indeed, for similar reasons, one may add! Combining the two, we get this review of If Cats Disappeared from the World, by Genki Kawamura.
You might also recall my review of The Travelling Cat Chronicles, by Hiro Arikawa, featuring a very similar theme. There are many similarities between the two novels, and if they weren’t both published in the same year, I’d be willing to ascribe the coincidence to an act of imitation instead.
So, what does a story like If Cats Disappeared from the World tell us?
Review of If Cats Disappeared from the World: Genre, Plot, Narrative
Just like many other Japanese literature works that I’ve enjoyed, If Cats Disappeared from the World revolves around themes found in literary fiction: impossible decisions, unanswerable questions, the little things we take for granted. Ultimately, it all relates to our place in the world, who we are, the meaning of it all.
Still, If Cats Disappeared from the World isn’t quite literary fiction, for a variety of reasons that aren’t too interesting to elaborate on in the context of this review. But it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that the narrative is solid, the existential questions it poses pressing, and finishing it you’re left staring at the trees outside, painted by the sunset tints.
The plot is simple yet peculiar, perfectly sense-making yet bizarre: The protagonist has just heard he’s terminally ill, and all appears lost, until the Devil shows up and offers a deal: For every item our protagonist decides to erase from the world forever, he’ll be granted an extra day to live. Parenthetically, the first part of the sentence might remind of you another Japanese novel.
Sounds easy, but things are about to get complicated.
The “How it Feels”, not the “What It Is”
I’ve often used the text of the subheading as advice on what to do when writing. In other words, drawing on the concept of affect, I often recommend focusing on how something feels, rather than what it is; the impact, not the story; the narrative, not the plot.
The thing is, this also applies to our protagonist’s predicament.
At first, making things like smartphones, movies, or clocks disappear from the world feels like just a minor nuisance. Surely, he tells himself, surviving is worth the inconvenience. And yet, he soon discovers that the mere existence of these things creates meaning in ways too complicated for him to initially realize.
A former lover whom he spent hours talking to. An autistic friend whose entire life has revolved around movies. His father – to whom the protagonist has never spoken to since his mother died – who is a clock repairman.
All these and more come together in this infernal plan of making things disappear, at the same time making the protagonist understand some things about life and death.
Review of If Cats Disappeared from the World: Characters
The characters of Kawamura’s novel are intensely relatable. The protagonist stands out among them, as a lonely young man whose life feels meaningless until – it would appear – is over. He is not evil, yet he is vulnerable; he is not ignorant, yet he is inexperienced. All in all, he is the perfect candidate for the Devil’s little experiment – a wager with God, as he claims.
The character of the Devil is generally well written, offering plenty of humor in what would’ve otherwise been a very grim narrative. Just imagine a guy dressed in Hawaiian shirts and shorts rolling on the floor playing with the protagonist’s cat. Having said that, there are some elements of “lost opportunity” here.
Put simply, the Devil is a little bit caricatured, a little bit too simple. I would’ve loved to see an intellectual, problem-posing Devil, in a Luciferian or Promethean way.
Parenthetically, speaking of the cat, he is an extremely important character in the novel and (minor spoiler), just as in The Travelling Cat Chronicles, the cat decides to talk – literally – some sense into the protagonist. In a novel called If Cats Disappeared from the World, that is not surprising.
Review of If Cats Disappeared from the World: General Impression
There is plenty to like in If Cats Disappeared from the World – and a couple of things that could’ve been better. Besides the somewhat superficial Devil, another area for improvement would be a couple of minor plot holes. I won’t refer to them specifically, because they’re not important – especially in the context of what the novel is. But they’re easy to notice.
Yet overall the novel is very well written, progressing smoothly and naturally. Its narrative journey is somewhat predictable (including the ending), but that isn’t a problem. It’s a story worth reading and reflecting on, and its fairly short length means you can read it in a single day, which I’d recommend. This is one of those works that need to be absorbed all as soon as possible.