Why I’m still thinking about ‘Cat Person’
‘Cat Person’, written by Kristen Roupenian and published by the New Yorker, is a fictional short story that quickly and unexpectedly hurricaned its way to global success. Cat Person tells the story of two people: Margot a college student, and Robbie, a man in his thirties, who fall into flirtation and ultimately end up having unsatisfying, fantasy-shattering sex. If you haven’t already, grace your brain membranes and read the article here.
Even now, years after reading, Cat Person still hits the core of my being. The story presents rivers of sexuality, power and fear that are central to every human interaction, and speaks to them in their truest, rawest form. It establishes ideas that are tricky to articulate to friends over Sunday brunch, but pushes them to the forefront of hungover coconut flat white chat.
In a DM over Twitter, I spoke with Maddie*, a 24-year-old Communications manager, who felt kinship with Cat Person after a prolonged experience with an older executive at her 9 to 5. As Maddie grew closer with the executive in the office, she started to notice that the line of conversation in the office started to creep out of office. Instagram likes, comments on her private account, late-night messages; the relationship seemed to infiltrate into her personal life.
Maddie explains, “It felt pretty good, that someone was taking an interest in my life in a way that wasn’t strictly to do with work”. As the messaging continued, it became clear that his interest in her grew romantic. “He started to send lengthy complimentary messages that were initially about how I conducted my work and ended up being about how I looked or the way I dressed that day”.
Maddie wasn’t at all interested in the older executive, who made unfamiliar jokes and ate microwaved tuna during lunch. But she didn’t mind the attention, and played into the messages in a flippant effort to “spice up my draining corporate work environment”. It wasn’t until an after-work drinks, where the executive drew her alone into the meeting room, where the line between her fantasy and the stark reality of the situation started to blur.
“When we kissed in the meeting room, the whole time I was thinking ‘what the fuck am I doing’. But I just went with it, because, in a way, I encouraged it to happen”. After three more months of ‘after-work drinks’ the late hour hooking up continued. Maddie became more and more emotionally distant, but maintained the facade of interest. “It was fun, but ultimately I didn’t really know how to break out of it. And I was nervous about hurting his feelings because he was so into it”.
The workplace relationship eventually fizzled (the executive broke it off, nervous to be caught). She felt relief in this, but also a strange sense of mourning in its break.
In reflection of these stories from my friends, and in my own life, it’s curious how often they come up. It’s tricky, that blurred line between yes and no - willing for the idea to happen, while simultaneously wishing it doesn’t. The overwhelming nature of ‘not wanting to hurt somebody’s feelings’ directs so many passing relationships.
For some, Cat Person sits at the forefront of the #Metoo era. Published in 2017, the article was the most-read piece on the New Yorker’s website that year, second only to the magazines reporting on the crimes of Harvey Weinstein. Many readers saw Cat Person’s Robert as a force of manipulation, underscoring the importance of enthusiastic consent in situations of sexual coercion.
For me, Cat Person takes on so much more than a tale from #Metoo. The inconsistency in these parallels is that they completely take female autonomy out of the equation. In Cat Person, and in Maddie’s story, the women involved are not victims. Both women are active players, turning cards to fulfil their own egotistical desires.
We dive into the realisation of a woman’s hand in the game of sex and power. Both Maddie and Margot controlled the narrative, finding a self-satisfying thrill in ambiguous lines. With a cool affectlessness towards the desperate pleas of the opposite party, the almost ‘femme fatale’ glides through interactions, indifferent to the explicit sexual context, but more involved in the subtle and emotional tests to her power.
“She was starting to think that she understood him—how sensitive he was, how easily he could be wounded—and that made her feel closer to him, and also powerful, because once she knew how to hurt him she also knew how he could be soothed.”
In Cat Person, it’s the concealed power from Margot that grabs and holds me. Female desires aren’t swept under the rug, but are presented as the ambivalent and narcissistic forces that they can be. The impressionable subjectivity of women, illustrated by Margot, is a stark difference to the objectivity of Robert, certain and pointed (in every sense).
It’s like, thank god. Finally, a flawed woman who has no fucking clue what she wants (like me), but is willing to test the hypothesis of a situation for the sake of it. Cat Person expells the mystery of ambiguity towards situations of sex. It shows the flaws that come with not knowing what you want, but gives comfort in the idea that this does not mean anything less of you as a person.
Words – Ellen Ranum
