The analysis of the story «The cat in the rain»

The story “The cat in the rain” is a short story written by Ernest Hemingway that describes an American couple spending their holidays in an Italian hotel. Only two Americans were in the hotel. Their room faced the sea, a public garden, and a war monument. Many Italians came from far away to see that monument. That day, it was raining, and the American wife was looking out of the window she saw a cat in the rain, which she wanted to protect from the raindrops. She told her husband that she is going to get it. Downstairs, she was greeted by the hotel operator, whose seriousness and willingness to please, attracted her. When she went out, he sent a maid after her with an umbrella. Desperate that she didn’t find the cat she returned to her room. After returning to her room, she started a conversation with her husband George, who was reading all the time, telling him how much she wanted to have a cat and other things. Her husband seemed to be annoyed by that and not interested at all. At the end of the story there is a knock on the door and the maid stands there holding a cat for the American woman in her hands.

‘Cat in the rain” is   a piece of fiction referring to the literature of interpretation so we can observe that this story is a psychological one because the author investigates human characters and their relationships.

The title of the story is a symbolic one and admits the fact that the American woman was compared with a “poor” cat in the rain. Author uses the cat stuck in the rain with nobody to care for it, to symbolize that the wife wasn’t loved by her husband. So, the story begins with the description of the hotel where two Americans stopped: “Palms grew and the bright colors of the hotels facing the gardens and the sea”. We can say that this place is very beautiful except one thing the rain, that’s why the couple stays in their room and just a cat in the rain attracted the young woman’s attention. She wanted to get the cat inside.

At first sight everything seems to be ideal and only the description of the rain evokes the mood of sadness. To emphasize this air of melancholy which is felt when it is raining, the author uses such stylistic device as parallel constructions: “The rain dripped from the palm trees. The water stood in pools on the gravel paths. The sea broke in a long line in the rain and slipped back down the beach to come up and break again in a long line in the rain. The use of alliterations [r], [l]: «Rain dripped from the palm trees, the sea broke in a long line in the rain”, describes the rhythm of the rain, the description of the weather.

The rise of the action starts when the American young lady saw a cat in the rain. “The cat sat under the table and tried to make herself so compact that she wouldn’t be dripped on”. Suddenly the girl felt strong desire to get this cat that’s why she decided to go down and get this cat. After this situation we observe the attitude of husband towards his wife .He was lying on the bed reading a book and had no desire to go out in such weather for the cat his wife wanted so much.

Later we can see that the hotel-keeper gives to her more attention than her husband .That’s why she liked the owner of the hotel. Emphasizing the girl’s attitude to the hotel-keeper the author resorts to repetition: “She liked the deadly serious way he received any complaints. She liked his dignity. She liked the way he wanted to serve her. She liked the way he felt about being a hotel-keeper. She liked his old, heavy face and big hands “. She liked him because comparing him with her indifferent husband he displayed a kind of attention to her she felt that she was important for somebody, the author says: “The pardons made her feel very small and at the same time really important. She had a momentary feeling of being of supreme importance”

The climax starts when the young lady went upstairs in her room. The only reaction of her husband was the question if she got the cat. He was so selfish that did not notice her disappointment.

Through her sad monologue the writer shows all her dissatisfaction with the life, she is tired of a boring life, of her indifferent and selfish husband who remains absent to her despair. The author underlines the idea of dissatisfaction using repetition «I want» so the reader can see the girl’s emotional state. «And I want to eat at a table with my own silver, and I want candles. And I want it to be spring and I want to brush up my hair out in front of the mirror and I want the kitty and I want some new clothes «.Also in this example we can observe the use of polysyndeton, this stylistic device underlining her excitement.

In this story, cat is the symbol of woman. Woman feels lonely and unhappy. She is just like a cat in the rain wet, alone. She is neglected like a poor kitty and needs to be loved by her husband. George doesn’t attach importance to her ideas, feelings. He doesn’t behave her like his wife, so the woman doesn’t like her life, her clothes, and her hair. She wants to have a kitty because she wants give her love to somebody.

The moment when hotel-keeper brings her the cat is outcome. Probably he was the only who understood the melancholy of poor woman.

In conclusion I can say that this text teach us to be more attentive to the other’s inner state especially to the persons that we love, to be more responsible for our actions and to be not so selfish and unreceptive as the protagonist of the story George.