id="uc07c08c8-6eb1-54ad-9e35-23128522d91e">
Collins
a division of HarperCollins Publishers
1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain in 2005 by HarperCollins Publishers.
Copyright © Richard Surman 2006
Richard Surman asserts the moral right to be identified as the author and photographer for this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.
Source ISBN: 9780007235636
Ebook Edition © MARCH 2015 ISBN: 9780007416882
Version: 2015-03-12
For my children and grandchildren
Contents
St Edmundsbury Cathedral, Bury St Edmunds
St Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral, Edinburgh
‘A man has to work so hard so that something of his personality stays alive. A tomcat has it so easy, he has only to spray and his presence is there for years on rainy days’
Albert Einstein
Steve Mellor in conversation with Wolfie
I’m not shy about my enduring admiration for cats. I grew up with them, and carry the scars to prove it. I regularly perform the supreme and nauseating sacrifice of opening tinned cat food at six o’clock in the morning. They share my office, every nook and cranny of our home. They dig their claws into my shins as a sign of pure pleasure, and magically become a deadweight on my lap whenever I want to move.
So what do I get in return? Good conversation, and (mostly) uncontentious company. No one will ever convince me that my own two Burmese cats don’t talk to me, and it’s not just about food either: the weather, politics, art; you name it, my cats have an opinion. Cats are the most fascinating, enchanting, exasperating and contrary of all nature’s creatures. They do not substitute for human relationships,
