What is the significance of the catamount?

What is the significance of the catamount?

The catamount is a symbol of Vermont, the mascot for the University of Vermont. The Eastern cougar has been extinct since the 1930s, so it is an ideal representative for the ghosts of the north woods and the region around Vermont, New Hampshire, and Northern Massachusetts, where this book takes place. Creatures like the catamount, as well as characters -- people -- come and go. They leave stories and legends with a place. Like the extinct catamount, they remain, but in spirit only. The place itself remains corporeal.

The catamount is also representative of something that has been rendered extinct by human negligence. It represents something wild that has been lost. It also represents the fear of the unknown. This book's catamount has a big, multifaceted role to fill. Big cat, big job ;)

That cover art is gold. Love it.

Thanks ABeman for this wonderful explanation of the significance of the catamount. I felt that the woods and all its creatures, present or past, were so important to the arc of the story. So, human ghosts and animal ghosts, alike.

Thanks to ABeman for the info on the Eastern cougar. I am a subsistence farmer in California and am no stranger to our local mountain lion population. I am not so certain that Mason's catamount was spectral since mountain lions are experts at making a comeback. I was very puzzled by the disappearance of the stuffed catamount that resided in the house's study. What do other readers think happened to it? As to the significance of the catamount in the story, I think it represents the essence of the wild, that some things must die so that others may live.

I am luxuriating in listening to the audio of this book, and am struck by how often the catamount lurks in the background...which I had not noticed as much in my first reading. It reminds me of the gorilla experiment...
"It was as though the gorilla was invisible. This experiment reveals two things: that we are missing a lot of what goes on around us, and that we have no idea that we are missing so much. To our surprise, it has become one of the best-known experiments in psychology." (psychologicalscience.org)

Noticing the catamount, either corporeal or ghost seems rather like openness to enchantment.

Nansubet, you've hit on something important. This brings an evermore intriguing facet to the novel.

ABeman answered this so completely … there is no need to add anything . thank you !

I had never heard the word “catamount” before and had to look up the meaning. Thanks to ABeman for the explanation and history. However, I’m not sure I still understand the meaning of it in this novel, although ABeman’s interpretation was helpful. I’ll have to give it more thought.

A catamount represents something mythical and elusive that can be wiped away by ignorance or fear. In the book, there are fragile connections that are sustained or destroyed in the house over many years. I feel many creatures of the natural world, like the catamount, can be nurtured or eliminated out of ignorance. Tales of sightings of the catamount or any other extinct creature may be a human hope for our better selves.

Thanks to ABeman! I live in rural NW Connecticut, and although we have been told there are no mountain lions in CT, I have seen 3. Yes, a large tawny cat - as big as a large dog - with a long tail, so not a dog, not a bobcat (I've seen one of those as well).
It seems to stand for many things, power, a link between this world and another, how fleeting life is.

I was clueless until reading all of these replies - thanks!

The catamount is a creature that is elusive. It will decline over time and then return. It is always there, but it's numbers change, then circle back over time. For me the catamount is representative of the house itself. It was always there, however vacant from time to time, then inhabited again.

What a help you all have been on seeing the catamount and what it may represent - almost a mythical creature - once here.