Relatable Cat Poems From 800 Years Ago (feat. Accented Cinema) 

Use my code XIRAN10 and link: bit.ly/3dXAHej to get 10% off your own authentic Japanese subscription box from Bokksu! Don't miss out on this amazing snack-journey through Japan! How did y'all like Accented Cinema as Cat Grandpa Lu You? 😂

He wrote a poem about his cat doing zoomies lol. I've never heard a more relatable poem

I know this is almost a year old, but one of my favorite jokes by ancient people that shows we haven't changed at all, is a cave in Scandinavia where historians found writing like 20 feet up on a cave wall. When they translated it, it came out as something like "This is really high."

This reminds me of ancient Roman epitaphs for dogs. You can look them up, but they are very sad

I love it because he basically documented how he became a modern day "Crazy Cat Lady". And i am here for it!!

I love how their cats switch when Xiran starts talking about the other poet

xiran: they no longer have any incentive to work hard their cats: 👁 w 👁?

The judging looks she gives her cats throughout this video makes 100 times better

Aw cat dads, I'd ship it lol. Would love to see your chinese cultural breakdown of heavens official blessing, it's such a beautiful show.

I love how people just shifted from cat poems to cat videos over a millennia

I cannot take my eyes from that amazing, extremely cute cat-ear hairstyle

I love the team. When she changes the poet, another cat appears, just like what happened (changed the poet and his cats to others)

This is iconic, cats have been making us their slaves since the beginning of the times lmao

Xiran, Accented Cinema, and cats!!! So dang cool! You two have some of the best channels on RU-vid!

05:04 same. Goodness, that feels ages away.

And then your Chinese teacher would try to convince you that the cats were an allergory to the corrupt Political system the poet had face

Their enthusiasm in this video is infectious

OMG Xiran Jay Zhao and Accented Cinema crossover I'm getting starstruck 😻

No matter the when and the where, cat lovers are always extremely dedicated.

“Dammit, Kokochin! Why are you like this?” You could not have gone out on a better note.

I love these poems and I am beyond happy to hear you talking about them and sharing them yaaaaaaay

*snuggles under a warm blanket with her black cat lying on top* Few things in life are more pleasing to the body and mind than a happy kitty, and that's proven fact.

The voice of Lu You / reader of his poems in this video is very calming.

a truly delightful journey, thank you

OMG!!! I FELT ALL OF THIS IN MY SOUL

9:36 that's a mood.

I'm in LOVE with your cats!!!! 😍

That's the history lessons I'll never skip!

I humbly beseech you for more cat content 🥺

i like ur cat ears lol also, is mandarin similar enough to korean and japanese that you could have a conversation with someone who spoke either language?

I just love, love LOVE your videos! Your humor as well as your delivey of information are just 👌

There was an Irish monk who also wrote about his Cat Pangur Bán. Meaning white panther. As usual cat obsession transcends cultures.

I freaking LOVE YOU! 💜

This content gives me life 😻

so wholesome

also i would probably watch xiran jay zhao recount the whole recorded history of china and i'm not super interested in china but she's just so hilarious and insightful

This is so cute!

I love this.

Your video makes me happy :)

Ok, I love this video

Im currently listening to this while sitting down with my 3 pet cats and they keep biting my phone and pressing random buttons on it

I would love if you did more stuff on ancient China! I've been reading a lot about the imperial time and it's so interesting!

wow perception check failed, I didn't the sweater was a cat face until the end of the video...…but to be fair i was watching the kitties.

THE CAT EARS I CAN'T 😍😭😭

Old men getting a cat that they didn't really want is my favorite

holy shit your cat was about to give you a beatdown! 😂😂

I miss Cubyrops! .... Talk to the paw or get the pawfu! ~Some Cat probably.

Watching a video about cat poems while chasing the mouse that my cat brought into the house (cat found the mouse)

Engagement for the engagement god!

Niiice the same sponsor of kappa kaiju

You should try to watch Lego Monkie Kid (yes, its a lego cartoon, but its REALLY good i swear) its a fanon sequel of Journey to the west, in a modern-ish key

2:16 is that the voice of the accented cinema???

I come here for the intelligent hot-takes, critical break-downs, and the amazing outfits. Also this man is amazing, and people's adoration for cats is eternal

You're so right about humans never changing. Every Cat Dad I know is like this. Complains about how lazy they are while adoring them to bits.

“Cats are forever, humans are temporary.” -Lu You at some point

The Egyptians just fully embraced our destined role as cat servants. They understood the assignment.

"They no long have any incentive to work hard!" And the cat stares at the camera for a second Perfection.

it's funny how he says "this cat must've been my servant boy in a previous life," and then becoming a servant boy to his cats lmao

I feel a connection to this guy. We are separated by time and space and a million other things but we both agree that cats are awesome

People in medieval England wrote about their cats a lot too. I love how evidently that's one of the most fundamental human features

Aw sh$t, I forgot this was a thing.

Damn that 'Rat Kept Ruining My Books So I Got A Cat and Within Days the Rats Were Vanquished' has a huge isekai light novel title energy lol

Xiran, looking at their cat intensely : They no longer have any incentive to work hard Their cat : Shouldn’t you be the one who worship me? Smh

If you write a book about the two cat dads on different sides of a war bonding over cats and then eloping with their cat children, I will sell my soul to get it

From vengeance and honor to liveblogging cats. Sounds like Zuko's canon-to-fanon arc.

I feel so connected to this cat dad. I too like to sit and do nothing while cuddling my cat. I may be wrong but I think I read about a Japanese (prince? Some guy? Can’t remember) man who also wrote either poems or stories full of frustrated adoration about his cats. I remember at one point he talks about his cat being the best cat to have ever lived and if that’s not the most accurate cat owner sentence, I don’t know what is.

They never sleep on the themed "costumes" that shirt is adorable 😺

Holy! Never knew the famous "A Rainstorm on the Fourth Day of Eleventh Month" I learnt in school is just an accompanying piece to a cat live blog! 铁马冰河入梦来

there is something so soft and tender about reading these poems written centuries ago. kind of like the bear from the cave painting, it makes me feel happy to be human sometimes. thank you for sharing Xiran! would love more of these from different time periods!

"Cats have been having the zoomies and getting weird on catnip for over 800 years." This is comforting and also amazing.

I remember reading a Tumblr post (that, therefore might not be real) talking about one Japanese emperor's writings about his cat. He says, among other things, "I am convinced it is superior to all other cats", which checks out.

Things I'm not surprised by: Ancient people saying "let me show you my cats"

Reminds me of that Japanese poem written by a young emperor about his cat. I don’t remember it perfectly but it boiled down to “look at how pretty and silly my cat is, clearly it’s the best cat”. Cat ownership is the same everywhere and every time.

Adoring the clips of Temujin and Kokochin in the background. This will be one of my favorite videos XD Gotta love a poet who writes at length about his cat XD

I've never felt such a strong connection with a person who lived that long ago.

At my high school we studied ancient greek literature, and sure, we read the great poems likethe Iliad, Oddisey, Theogony, etc. But we also read the little symposium poems about food, drinks, cute boys, or Theocrite's urban and pastoral scenes, like the one about two sicilian immigrant women going out together to a religious festival. I just love ancient poetry about the everyday things that just doesn't seem to change!

there's something so heartwarming about how a man living in china 800 years ago had the exact same relationship with his cat as I do now on the opposite end of the continent

In this video, we have an two people whose careers in politics were not meant to be so turned to the arts (though different types)

I loved this! So cute! Also reminded me how there's an ancient manuscript with cat pawprints on it in ink because cats absolutely will knock over your ink and step on your stuff

What I love is that the titles of the poems sound like actual RU-vid titles. Poems really were just RU-vid Vlogs before the Internet was born

"It's not drinking alone if the cat is with you" - Lu You

It took me almost a full minute to realize the hair peices on your head are made to look like cat ears, and almost another minute to realize you are wearing a cat shirt. Great thematic clothing!

I love that we can guess the color of an 800 year old cat based solely on their names. Nice that some things never change.

I love this collab, my two educators in Chinese history and culture

My personal ancient-people-are-the-same-as-us moment was reading Sei Shonagon's The Pillow Book in premodern Japanese literature class. Intensely relatable.

i wish you could see how big i'm smiling watching this video. if you want an irish version of this exact same medieval cat monk phenomenon, look up 'pangur bán'. humankind has literally never, ever changed anywhere and NEITHER HAVE CATS

Wow, What a legend. He will be a hero for the cats lol.

"They no longer have any incentive to work hard" Ah I see you've met my cats

7:23 I love how your cat looks at you and then at the camera, like "Were you talking about me? Were they talking about me?"

This was informative, entertaining, AND adorable all at the same time! It's heartwarming knowing that someone from long ago loved his cats like I loved my cats. It makes me think of all the classic artwork (from every culture) where they include their dogs and cats as a detail, or even as the subject of the artwork itself. I get the same vibes and warm feelings of sonder. It's cool that these poems were even translated into English. Even though I can't understand the original language and I probably miss some smaller nuances, I get the feeling. It's adorable and hilarious.

These poems are so... Simple yet relatable. You feel that these people had lived so much slower than we do nowadays. There's a definite beauty in it.

One of my favorite things about studying literature is finding gems like these that prove that humans have always been weird.

I can feel it in my heart that this dude is either my ancestor, or I'm his reincarnation, for I have too written poems about my cats, such titled as "Little S.O.B.", which sort of goes like: Little S.O.B., those were my clean sheets; What had you eaten I can tell, Since I see it really well, That you have puked the fur of mice, Making me shout "What the hell!". And now we wait until someone brings up this comment in a video 800 years from now, so the cycle starts again :D

This reminds me of "The cat who went to heaven" by Elizabeth Coatsworth. A poor painter adopts a tricolor cat. He then gets a commissioned to paint for the buddhist temple- the scene where animals show up to mourn the death of Buddha- where a cat was one of the only animals that didn't show up [I'm not Buddhist so I don't know if this is based on a story in the religion's canon or made up for the book]. Thus "no cat goes to heaven", but the the cat prays with his master and clearly wants to be part of the painting. Dilemma of the painter: make the cat happy by adding it and lose the money from the temple or make the cat depressed but get the money? After this would be spoiler territory.

I'm glad the world got to listen to Accented Cinema read poetry. *May the Gods bless you both*

The Crossover we all needed! Please do more with Accented Cinema!! Imagine a podcast together!

What I expected: a few poems detailing Chinese legends of cats What I’ve got: a old wise scholar’s slow decent to become a cat lady.

Love how you talking about cat poems, while your cats are crawling all around you. Not will you only find that humans from ancient times are not all that different, or humans of different locations, but you will find many animals of the world are not that much different from us.

"Your plan was so clever that my frustrations are difficult to explain." (every one that has a pet, ever)

This reminds me of the poem "Pangur Bán", which was written in the notebook by an Early Medieval Irish monk, who compares his little white kitten chasing mice to himself, diligently writing and illuminating his Bible. Both his kitten and himself, he writes, are fixated on a common art. They are both masters of their crafts, whether it's writing intricately decorated letters, or stalking rodents in the depth of night. Old Irish: Messe ocus Pangur Bán, cechtar nathar fria saindán; bíth a menma-sam fri seilgg, mu menma céin im saincheirdd Caraim-se fos, ferr cach clú, oc mu lebrán léir ingnu; ní foirmtech frimm Pangur bán, caraid cesin a maccdán. Ó ru·biam - scél cen scís - innar tegdais ar n-óendís, táithiunn - díchríchide clius - ní fris tarddam ar n-áthius. Gnáth-húaraib ar gressaib gal glenaid luch inna lín-sam; os mé, du·fuit im lín chéin dliged n-doraid cu n-dronchéill. Fúachid-sem fri frega fál a rosc anglése comlán; fúachimm chéin fri fégi fis mu rosc réil, cesu imdis, Fáelid-sem cu n-déne dul hi·n-glen luch inna gérchrub; hi·tucu cheist n-doraid n-dil, os mé chene am fáelid. Cía beimmi amin nach ré, ní·derban cách ar chéle. Maith la cechtar nár a dán, subaigthius a óenurán. Hé fesin as choimsid dáu in muid du·n-gní cach óenláu; du thabairt doraid du glé for mu mud céin am messe. Modern English: I and Pangur Bán, each of us two at his special art: his mind at hunting (mice), my own mind is in my special craft. I love to rest-better than any fame-at my booklet with diligent science: not envious of me is Pangur Bán: he himself loves his childish art. When we are-tale without tedium-in our house, we two alone, we have-unlimited (is) feat-sport-something to which to apply our acuteness. It is customary at times by feat of valour, that a mouse sticks in his net, and for me there falls into my net a difficult dictum with hard meaning. His eye, this glancing full one, he points against the wall-fence: I myself against the keenness of science point my clear eye, though it is very feeble. He is joyous with speedy going where a mouse sticks in his sharp-claw: I too am joyous, where I understand a difficult dear question. Though we are thus always, neither hinders the other: each of us two likes his art, amuses himself alone. He himself is the master of the work which he does every day: while I am at my own work, (which is) to bring difficulty to clearness.