44 pages • 1 hour read
Sharon CreechHate That Cat
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2008A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Skitter McKitter
Jack’s new kitten, Skitter McKitter, is a symbol of hope and love. Skitter helps him to move forward, heal, and embrace love again after the death of his dog, Sky. Although Jack initially claims he does not want another pet because of the disastrous events that could befall the animal—and thereby cause Jack more pain and grief—once Skitter arrives on Christmas, Jack immediately begins to love her. His response to Skitter makes it clear that it’s not pets he’s trying to avoid; he wants to avoid further heartache.
Jack’s January 8 poem, “So Much,” which is inspired by Williams’s “The Red Wheelbarrow,” reveals how Jack sees Skitter as a symbol of hope. In his five-line verse, Jack states that “So much depends upon” this little black kitten, who sits beside a photograph of his dog, Sky (61). Putting the two together in this tableau demonstrates that Jack realizes the kitten’s significant emotional importance and the second chance the animal presents. Jack has loved and lost a pet in the past, which makes him hesitant to take a risk and love again. Jack’s emotional vulnerability and his willingness to love again depend upon this kitten.
Deafness
Jack’s mother’s deafness is representative of the differences and the variety of experiences that exist among all people. There are myriad kinds of diversities that differentiate one person’s experience from another’s, and people require empathy to relate to and understand that others’ experiences of the world can be dissimilar from their own. Since Jack is studying poetry and the musical devices that convey auditory experience, he becomes acutely aware of his mother’s deafness and how this shapes her perception of language, communication, and even art.
Jack uses poetry as a means to contemplate the differences between his mother and himself, musing over big questions as he develops the empathy necessary to contextualize all such differences among people. On October 12, he writes, “if you cannot hear / do words have no sounds / in your head?” and “Do you see / a / silent / movie?” (16). He has become very aware of sounds and how they impact the way he thinks and remembers, and now he wonders how his mother’s thinking and memory might differ from his own. Jack grapples with this throughout the novel, eventually reading poetry aloud to his mother while tapping out its rhythm, which she cannot hear but can feel. This helps him to better understand her experiences. This moment also illuminates The Emotional Power of Poetry.
The Fat, Black Cat
The fat, black cat who first attacks Jack, and then later lovingly brings the battered Skitter McKitter home, symbolizes the importance of keeping an open mind, and that oftentimes quick, passionate judgments are often incorrect. The novel opens on September 12 with Jack’s poetic proclamation: “Hate to see it in the morning / hate to see that / F A T black cat” (1). For him, at first, things are very black and white: He loves his dog, Sky, and he hates the black cat at the bus stop that attacked him when he tried to help it. This experience prompts him to decide that cats are “creepy” and dogs are “delightful,” and he tries to persuade Miss Stretchberry, who has a cat, to get a dog. Even more appalling to him is the knowledge that Walter Dean Myers, his favorite poet, has a cat. Jack has decided that all cats are terrible, and he cannot understand why some of his favorite people seem to like—even prefer—cats to dogs.
Despite Jack’s growing love for Skitter McKitter and the fact that Miss Stretchberry and Myers have cats, it isn’t until the “mean” black cat that attacked him brings Skitter home that Jack learns he may have been wrong about this cat and cats in general. When the fat black cat appears on the porch with Skitter, it reaches out “protectively” and quietly licks the kitten’s injured ear, “nudg[ing]” the kitten into Jack’s hands. Jack “think[s] the fat black cat / found Skitter McKitter / and / saved her,” prompting him to reevaluate his former hate for the animal (109). For the remainder of the year, he doesn’t write any more poems about hating this cat or about a preference for dogs, indicating a change of heart and an adjustment to his former, simplistic thinking. He learns that while cats can lash out or be “mean,” they can also be affectionate and loving. Thus, the behavior of the fat black cat from the bus stop shows Jack that his initial assumptions were incorrect and teaches him to keep an open mind.
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By Sharon Creech
