My Cat Yugoslavia. A novel by Pajtim Statovci

My Cat Yugoslavia is about Emine, an Albanian woman from Kosovo who, when her country (ex-Yugoslavia) is torn apart by war in the 1990s, flees, with her abusive husband Bajram and their five children, her country for Finland. Her story is intertwined with the story of her younger son Bekim, a gay, resentful, and lonely man who has a relationship with an anthropomorphic, aggressive and homophobic cat and, despite his phobia, has as a pet a boa constrictor. It is a surreal and extraordinary story.

Both Bekim and his mother face domestic abuse at the hands of the husband and father, whom Bekim and his siblings learn to be afraid and later hate.

“I wanted him to suffer for as long and as painfully as possible. I wanted him to choke underwater, suffocate in an airless wooden box, thrashing like a fish on dry land.”

Symbolism plays an important part in the novel. Pajtim Statovci' s ingenious attempt to use animals instead of humans for his characters, allows readers to visualize difficult subjects, such as racism, xenophobia and isolation. The snake which Bekim kills it as it tries to kill him, paints the picture of loneliness and isolation that is extremely prevalent among migrants and refugees. The obnoxious, talking cat represents the racism and the sharp criticism of the refugee experience in modern-day Finland.  Bekim hears the cat saying

“I most certainly am right,” he [the cat] retorted and commended that most immigrants are stupid and brash and that when they walk past the smell is enough to knock you out.”……  “If it was up to me, I’d ship the troublemakers back where they came from.”

Pajtim Statovci is an original, brilliant writer. In today’s increasingly, politicised and fraught political climate, My Cat Yugoslavia is a fresh and strange novel, an exploration of displacement, belonging and desire. 

My Cat Yugoslavia has been translated from the Finnish by David Hackston and published by Pushkin Press