Authors like cats because they are such quiet, lovable, wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reasons.
Interpretation
This quote highlights the mutual admiration between authors and cats, emphasizing their shared qualities of quietness and wisdom.
Robertson Davies suggests a unique bond between authors and cats, implying that both possess a certain quiet charm and intelligence that draws them to each other. It indicates that authors appreciate cats for their serene presence and thoughtful nature, while cats, in turn, are drawn to the introspective and creative spirit of authors, creating a harmonious relationship based on these traits.
In practice
During a speech at a literary festival, one could use this quote to illustrate the connection between creativity and companionship.
Pessimism is a very easy way out because it is a short view of life. If you look at what is happening around us today, you can't help but feel that life is a terrible complexity of problems. But if you look back a few thousand years, you realize that we have advanced fantastically. If you take a long view, I do not see how you can be pessimistic about the future of mankind.
This is one of the cruelties of the theatre of life; we all think of ourselves as stars and rarely recognize it when we are indeed mere supporting characters or even supernumeraries.
Everything matters. The Universe is approximately fifteen billion years old, and I swear that in all that time, nothing has ever happened that has not mattered, has not contributed in some way to the totality.
The egotist is all surface; underneath is a pulpy mess and a lot of self-doubt. But the egoist may be yielding and even deferential in things he doesn't consider important; in anything that touches his core he is remorseless.
The world is full of people whose notion of a satisfactory future is, in fact, a return to the idealized past.
The best among our writers are doing their accustomed work of mirroring what is deep in the spirit of our time; if chaos appears in those mirrors, we must have faith that in the future, as always in the past, that chaos will slowly reveal itself as a new aspect of order.
When we were arguing on my twenty-fourth birthday, she left the kitchen, came back with a pistol, and fired it at me five times from right across the table. But she missed. It wasn't my life she was after. It was more. She wanted to eat my heart and be lost in the desert with what she'd done, she wanted to fall on her knees and give birth from it, she wanted to hurt me as only a child can be hurt by its mother.
People should be conscious of the large contribution made by anything that gets people together easily in the reduction of loneliness and emotional well-being.
Once we make our relationship choices in an adult way, a prospective partner who is unavailable, nonreciprocal, or not open to processing feelings and issues, becomes, by those very facts, unappealing. Once we love ourselves, people no longer look good to us unless they are good for us.
We have begun to slam doors, and to throw things. I throw my purse, an ashtray, a package of chocolate chips, which breaks on impact. We are picking up chocolate chips for days. Jon throws a glass of milk, the milk, not the glass: he knows his own strength, as I do not. He throws a box of Cheerios, unopened. The things I throw miss, although they are worse things. The things he throws hit, but are harmless. I begin to see how the line is crossed, between histrionics and murder.
The 'public' scares me, but people I trust.
The world says of marriage: A short joy and a long displeasure. But he who understands it finds in it delight, love, and joy without ceasing.
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