猫头鹰与猫咪 (1871)

《猫头鹰和猫咪》（英语：The Owl and the Pussycat）是英国打油诗人爱德华·利尔于1867年创作的荒诞诗歌，1871年首次出版，收录在《荒诞的歌、故事、植物和字母》之中。

1867年耶诞节时，利尔为好友约翰·爱登·赛门斯生病的女儿珍妮特写下这首诗歌。

在2014年的民意调查中，《猫头鹰和猫咪》获选为英国最受欢迎的童谣，其次是《一闪一闪小星星》和《矮胖子》。

故事简介

《猫头鹰和猫咪》诗歌以四只拟人化的动物——猫咪、猫头鹰、小猪、火鸡作为主角人物。猫头鹰和猫咪一同出海航行，猫头鹰弹奏吉他给猫咪听，它们随即恋爱了。在航行了一年又一天后，它们来到树林子内，用一毛钱买下小猪的戒指，第二天在山上的火鸡的见证下成亲。最后它们手牵手在月光下的沙滩上跳舞。

《猫头鹰和猫咪》还有一部未完成的续集《猫头鹰和猫咪的孩子》于1938年出版。

衍生作品

英国绘本作家碧雅翠丝·波特曾表示她的作品《小猪罗宾逊的故事》是《猫头鹰和猫咪》中的小猪的人物背景故事。1970年改编为同名电影。

"The Owl and the Pussy-Cat" is a nonsense poem by Edward Lear, first published in 1870 in the American magazine Our Young Folks and again the following year in Lear's own book Nonsense Songs, Stories, Botany, and Alphabets. Lear wrote the poem for a three-year-old girl, Janet Symonds, the daughter of Lear's friend and fellow poet John Addington Symonds and his wife Catherine Symonds. The term "runcible", used for the phrase "runcible spoon", was invented for the poem. It is believed that the cat in the poem was based on Lear's own pet cat, Foss.

Synopsis

"The Owl and the Pussy-Cat" features four anthropomorphic animals – an owl, a cat, a pig, and a turkey – and tells the story of the love between the title characters who sail off to marry in the land "where the Bong-tree grows".

Unfinished sequel

Portions of an unfinished sequel, "The Children of the Owl and the Pussy-cat", were published first posthumously during 1938. The children are part fowl and part cat, and love to eat mice.

The family live by places with strange names. The Cat dies, falling from a tall tree, leaving the Owl a single parent. The death causes the Owl great sadness. The money is all spent, but the Owl still sings to the original guitar.

Derivative works

British picture book author Beatrix Potter stated that her work The Tale of Little Pig Robinson was the backstory of the character Piggy from "The Owl and the Pussy-Cat".

The text has been set to music many times, such as by Victor Hely-Hutchinson, whose 1927 setting was recorded by Elton Hayes in 1953 for Parlophone, Humphrey Searle in 1951, using twelve-tone technique for the accompanying flute, guitar, and cello, but sprechgesang for the vocal part, and Igor Stravinsky, who composed his setting in October 1966. American avant-garde artist and composer Laurie Anderson's fifth album, Bright Red (1994), features the track "Beautiful Pea Green Boat", which incorporates lyrics from the poem.

"The Owl and the Pussy-Cat" was the main topic of The Owl and the Pussycat Went to See..., a 1968 children's musical play about Lear's nonsense poems. The play was written by Sheila Ruskin and David Wood. In 1996, Eric Idle published a children's novel, The Quite Remarkable Adventures of the Owl and the Pussycat, based on the poem. Idle's narration of the audiobook was nominated for the 1998 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for Children. In 1998, Naxos Records produced the album Seven Ages: An Anthology of Poetry with Music, which contains a recording of John Cleese reading "The Owl and the Pussy-Cat" on track 15.