This podcast is a presentation of The Meow Library.
Tolstoy enthusiast, Oxford guest lecturer, and cat fancier Mia Khalifa recently made the following comment regarding the state of the publishing industry:
At best: it becomes trendy to read and people inadvertently also learn. At worst: morons buy books to showcase as a status symbol, inadvertently supporting publishers, writers, and print media in general.
The Meow Library applauds this insight as absolutely critical to the preservation and advancement of our literary heritage. One can scoff at those who buy books solely for algorithmic brownie points, but the publishing industry is laughing all the way to the bank -- and financing new authors, projects, and editions of classic texts along the way.
On that note, Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace (For Your Cat), which features nothing but 300,000+ repetitions of the word "meow" and retails in excess of $30 USD, may seem like a frivolous novelty, but that's only if you're human. Since its release in July of 2023, it has made Tolstoy's work available to between 600,000,000 and one billion readers -- all domestic felines, the largest untapped literary market in the world. (Mia's cats, of course, have long cherished Richard Peaver and Larissa Volokhonsky's English translations of Tolstoy, but they're built different).
For those still unconvinced of the power of Meow, we now present an 30-minute excerpt of War and Peace (For Your Cat) recorded by a professional audiobook narrator. It may not improve your understanding of Tolstoy -- especially if you consider books mere fashion accessories -- but your cat might pick up some French if they're patient enough to make it to the Napoleon scene.
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