These 11 Famous Authors Loved Cats Perhaps Just a Bit Too Much

Mark Twain was a huge cat lover, to the point that he took out an ad in the New York American offering a reward of 5 dollars if anyone was able to find his missing black cat Bambino.

Hemingway first fell in love with cats when he was living in Cuba. He was given a six-toed cat as a gift, which he named Snowball. When he moved to his home in Key West in 1931, he allowed Snowball to roam free, which eventually led to a small colony of cats. About 40-50 of the descendants still live in the area, many of them with six toes, just like Snowball.

While Burroughs is most well known for drug-induced writing, the author had plenty of love for his feline friends as well. He wrote an autobiography novella titled The Cat Inside that was all about all the cats he owned in his lifetime. Before he died, he wrote a journal entry that was about his love for his cats.

Johnson loved his cat Hodge so much, he would treat the feline friend to oysters from time to time. Hodge has since been immortalized, along with his oysters, by a statue that is outside Johnson's house in London.

Yeats wrote a few poems that referenced his love for cats, including "The Cat and the Moon." In that poem, he uses the cat to represent himself, and the moon to represent his muse, and love, Maude Gonne. Unfortunately for Yeats, his love was never reciprocated his love.

Highsmith loved her cats, and did nearly everything with them, from writing to eating to sleeping. She's also known to have said "my imagination functions much better when I don't have to speak to people" which is exactly what we imagine a cat would say if they could talk.

Eliot had plenty of allusions to cats in his poetry, as well as a book of 15 poems titled Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats that he dedicated to his godchildren. 

Dickens was once quoted saying "What greater gift than the love of a cat?" In 1862, his favorite cat, named Bob, died, and he had the cats paw stuffed and used as the handle of an ivory letter opener. That letter opener is now on display at the New York Public Library.

Gaiman used to keep a blog that kept tabs on the cats he had living in his home, Hermione, Pod, Zoe, Princess and Coconut. He hasn't written about them much lately, but we have to think you feel pretty strongly about them to keep a whole website dedicated to them.

Williams was known for his very direct style. That style is shown in his poem titled simply "Poem (As the Cat)"

As the cat
climbed over
the top of

the jamcloset
first the right
forefoot

carefully
then the hind
stepped down

into the pit of
the empty
flower pot

Chandler may be known to many people as the person who had such a huge influence on the genre of detective fiction, but he also had a very playful side. He once wrote in a letter to a friend about his cat, Taki, that "If she finds herself alone anywhere she emits blood curdling yells until somebody comes running." That may seem awful to some, but Chandler must have found it endearing.