7 famous fictional cats

As any owner knows, cats aren't exactly short on character – which is why they're so entertaining when we meet them in fictional form! We've rounded up seven of our favourites from over a century of page, stage and screen – which does your cat have most in common with?

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These world-famous cats are pantomime stars, literary heroes and TV treasures – and they all have their own inimitable characters. But is your own cat a sleepy Bagpuss, a scheming Salem or an enigmatic Cheshire Cat?

Puss in Boots

Originally from an Italian fairy tale, Puss in Boots became a panto favourite before making the leap to the big screen as a much-loved character in the Shrek films – and, more recently, his own line of spin-offs. His Dreamworks incarnation is a trickster through and through, but a charming one, and utterly fearless on account of his nine lives.

Character: daring, charismatic
Likes: showing off, fighting
Coat: ginger (in Dreamworks films)
Eyes: green (in Dreamworks films)

The Cheshire Cat

Along with the White Rabbit, the Cheshire Cat is one of the more memorable characters in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, published in 1865. He can disappear at will, and sometimes all that’s visible of him is his enormous grin. Originally depicted in John Tenniel’s black and white sketches, he’s since been illustrated in a variety of colourful coats: from ginger to grey-with-blue-tabby-stripes, via lurid shades of purple.

Character: elusive, cryptic
Likes: not being where you saw him last
Coat: varying colours
Eyes: round and staring

Bagpuss

Although only 13 episodes of his 1970s children’s TV show were ever made, this ‘saggy old cloth cat, baggy and a bit loose at the seams’ remains something of a national treasure. When his owner, Emily, leaves him and Bagpuss wakes up, his toy friends in the lost-property shop come to life and work together to mend whatever broken object Emily has left them.

Character: helpful, magical
Likes: sleeping
Coat: pink and cream stripes
Eyes: blue

Tom from Tom and Jerry

No list of cartoon cats would be complete without a mention of the feline half of this iconic cat-and-mouse duo, who first appeared together in 1940. Tom, commonly thought to be a domestic shorthair – although he could also be a Russian blue – does more or less the same thing in every one of their 164 shorts: attempts to catch Jerry (usually unsuccessfully) while avoiding Jerry’s tricks and booby-traps (again, usually unsuccessfully).

Character: persistent, inventive, easily fooled
Likes: chasing things he’s unlikely to catch
Coat: grey and white
Eyes: yellow and green

Rum Tum Tugger

One of our favourites from TS Eliot’s 1939 poetry collection, Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, Rum Tum Tugger – ‘a curious beast’ – is rebellious, attention-seeking and quite a difficult character. When he’s inside, he wants to be out, and when he’s offered one kind of food, he prefers another – traits a lot of cat owners might find familiar! In the musical Cats, based on the poems, Rum Tum Tugger’s appearance is said to be inspired by the Maine Coon.

Character: contrary, demanding
Likes: whatever you’re not offering
Coat: a leonine mane (on stage)
Eyes: usually withering

The Amazing Maurice

In Terry Pratchett’s The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents and the 2022 film adaptation, canny Maurice plots to con townspeople out of their money by pretending his troupe of talking rats are a new plague of vermin, and offering to have them lured away – for a price. But he’s a very winning sort of hustler, who as his story unfolds develops human traits beyond the power of speech, including remorse for a rat he once killed.

Character: cunning, self-aware
Likes: tricking you into giving him things
Coat: ginger and white (on screen)
Eyes: green (on screen)

Salem

You might recognise Salem the talking cat from Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996–2003), or the more recent Netflix adaptation, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina – or even the original comic-book series. Not really a cat at all but a 500-year-old witch sentenced to 100 years in cat form, Salem Saberhagen was usually portrayed on TV by an animatronic puppet, but real American Shorthairs were used to play him in certain scenes.

Character: self-centred, secretly loyal
Likes: his owner, but everyone else is a pawn
Coat: black
Eyes: green