A future world, a potential world. The perspective of animals on humanity in Demain les chats by Bernard Werber

Abstract

The novel Demain les chats (2016) by French writer Bernard Werber favors an analysis of the animal perspective in the narrative. Understanding the way the feline protagonists as well as the relationship between animals and humans are presented can allow conclusions about a potential world of the future in which humanity has failed during the transition between the Anthropocene and the apocalypse. Thus, the animals become both the victims of the catastrophe and the new dominant group. First, the context of the argument needs to be established by providing the fundamental information on the author, his works and the novel in question, including the feline protagonists. In the subsequent stage, the analysis will shift to the manner in which the characters of cats are depicted, examined by the means of a classification focused on the relationship between animals and humans. It leads to the observation of the hybrid nature of the characters and the perspective adopted by the author to describe them. Finally, the analysis results in the examination of the world perceived by the animals, a dystopian reality where the apocalypse marks the end of the Anthropocene and the change in the existing balance of power.