Previous
The Briand
In “Pigeons, a Pony, the Tomcat and I,” the soldier is a young French soldier whom Kiki befriends and adopts as her stand-in owner. He’s fighting in the trenches in World War I. Kiki fears for the soldier’s survival, as he’s thin and doesn’t seem suited to surviving the war. When the young man befriends another soldier, Kiki starts to suspect that the two are secretly in love. As Kiki imagines her death, she looks up into her soldier’s face and imagines that he’s either Missy or Colette dressed as a man.
The Soldier Quotes in Only the Animals
The Only the Animals quotes below are all either spoken by The Soldier or refer to The Soldier. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Pigeons, a Pony, the Tomcat and I: Soul of Cat Quotes
“Don’t eat any of it,” I said.
The tomcat looked offended at my suggesting he would take the food. “I have my own adopted soldier. But you should eat what he’s offering even if you’re not hungry. You might be the only thing keeping him alive until he’s rotated out of the front line and can get some rest.”
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Only the Animals LitChart as a printable PDF.
"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
The Soldier Character Timeline in Only the Animals
The timeline below shows where the character The Soldier appears in Only the Animals. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Pigeons, a Pony, the Tomcat and I: Soul of Cat (Died 1915, France)
...after midnight and the tomcat still hasn’t returned to his spot near the narrator’s. The soldiers like the narrator, but they were disappointed that she’s not also a male cat. They...
(full context)
...narrator isn’t prepared for him; she’s busy lapping up some condensed milk that a young soldier offered her. She’d initially turned down the soldier’s offer so he’d eat it himself, but...
(full context)
Late in the afternoon, after shooting at the Germans, the soldiers get the order to go over the top of the trenches. Kiki lets her adopted...
(full context)
When Kiki’s young soldier brings over food scraps for the cats, Kiki warns the tomcat to leave it alone....
(full context)
Later that night, Kiki watches her adopted soldier lie beside his friend. She suspects that they’re in love. She watches as frost suddenly...
(full context)
Suddenly, the soldiers snap to attention. Henri appears, studies the soldiers suspiciously, and says he heard about the...
(full context)
Kiki’s soldier tells her to hide during the day. She tells the tomcat that she has to...
(full context)
Rather than join the tomcat hunting in no man’s land, Kiki sits and watches her soldier and his friend sleep. She worries her soldier won’t survive; he’s too skinny. Colette, strong...
(full context)
...cold and empty without him. Kiki knows what’s happened, but she can’t move from her soldier’s feet. Instead, she’s going to imagine movement and maybe it’ll lead her toward her destiny—which...
(full context)
