Meet Tony, the Cat Behind Catastrophe
Every great literary magazine needs a muse—and ours just happens to have four paws and a talent for chaos. Tony is the original Catastrophe: a curious, vocal, and utterly adorable troublemaker whose daily missions include opening doors, scaling closets, and breaking into the fridge (yes, we now have child locks).
Playful and affectionate, Tony isn’t just a cat—he’s a living metaphor for the spirit of our magazine: bold, uncontainable, always climbing higher and poking his nose where others might not dare. He reminds us that curiosity is power, boundaries are made to be tested, and sometimes, the best stories start with a little mess.
We like to think that when writers crack open our pages, Tony’s pawprints are somewhere between the lines.
Our Logo: A Symbol of Catastrophe
Designed by one of our brilliant editors, Niki Wildrose, our logo features a bold, geometric rendering of Tony—the mischievous feline muse behind Catastrophe Literary Magazine. With his wide, curious eyes and angular, fragmented form, this striking image captures everything we love about Tony and about our magazine itself: curiosity, tension, disruption, and undeniable charm.
The use of sharp, abstract lines reflects the magazine’s commitment to experimental, genre-defying work. Tony’s gaze is intense, almost intrusive, mirroring the way our contributors peer into the strange corners of life, language, and identity. The fragmented style suggests both play and rupture—a visual nod to our celebration of work that breaks, rebuilds, and questions literary form.
The phonetic spelling beneath the image—
/kəˈtas-trə-(_)fē/—grounds the design in both chaos and precision, much like our editorial vision. It’s a reminder that catastrophe isn’t just calamity—it’s an opening, an invitation to reconsider, to claw through the quiet and emerge with something true.
Just like Tony, our logo is a little weird, a little wild, and impossible to ignore.