LETTERS from T. S. Eliot to his three-year-old godson show the birth of his Practical Cats poems eight years before publication.

Eliot is revered and respected as a poet for the seminal work The Waste Land but has been loved by children and adults for his Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.

He first revealed his idea of a light-hearted series of cat poems in letters in the early 1930s to Thomas Faber, his godson and the son of his publisher, Geoffrey, of Faber & Faber.

The poems later provided inspiration for the West End musical Cats by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Trevor Nunn.

Eliot, whose nickname was Possum, corresponded with Thomas Faber until the poet’s death in 1965 and on January 20, 1931, he introduced the first of his Practical Cats. He wrote: “I am glad you have a cat, but I do not believe it is so remarkable a cat as my cat. My cat is a Lilliecat. “What a Lilliecat it is. There never was such a Lilliecat. It’s name is Jellylorum and it’s one idea is to be useful.”

By the time his book of Practical Cats was published in 1939, Eliot had decided to tinker with the names and Jellylorum the Lilliecat became Jennyanydots the Gumbie Cat.

Descriptions of the tasks the tiny feline accomplished around the house are accompanied by charming ink drawings by Eliot, including one of the cat sitting on his ear. “Yet it is so lillie and small that it can sit on my ear,” he wrote. In Easter 1931 Eliot wrote again, this time penning an “Invitation to all Pollicle Dogs & Jellicle Cats to come to the birthday of Thomas Faber”.

The spoof invitation, written as a poem, starts, “Pollicle Dogs & Jellicle Cats, Come from your kennels & houses & flats”, and describes how all the animals should make their way, “with a flute & a fife & a fiddle & drum”, over the mountains and valleys to the boy’s home in Wales. The poet signed himself off as “Your Silly Uncle Tom”, then explains that the invitation cannot be sent because so many cats and dogs would block all roads, eat all the birthday cake and “track muddy feet into the house”.

For Christmas 1931 Eliot wrote of a black-and-white Jellicle Cat living with him until it “got to staying out nights and trying to be a Big Bravo Cat” and becoming contrary about its food.

In the collection of poems this cat was the Rum Tum Tugger. Abandoned by this animal, Eliot explained, he got another which may have evolved by 1939 into Bustopher Jones, the Cat About Town. In the letter he wrote: “It is a very grand cat too because it is a Persian Prince and it is blue because it has blue blood. Its name was Mirx Murad Ali Beg but I said that was too big a name for such a small flat so its name is Wiskuscat.”

Some of the letters show Eliot experimenting in the 1930s with a series of other animals, including an elegant pig. Of dogs he wrote: “I would tell you about our Cus Cus Praps except that I can’t draw dogs so well as cats yet; but I mean to.”

He went on to write: “The Porpentine Cat has been in bed with earache so the Pollicle Dog stopped at home to amuse it by making cats’ cradles.”

The letters form part of T. S. Eliot memorabilia to be sold by Bonhams in September. About 50 letters from Eliot to his godson are to be auctioned with an estimate of £25,000 to £30,000.

Not all the letters refer to cats. In 1946 he concluded after a stay in hospital that the best way to eat Spam was “straight out of the tin” and in 1950 branded sociology “an American disease”. A handful touch on serious subjects. During the postwar years of rationing he sent his godson a clothing coupon with a letter lamenting the ability to be well-dressed. In 1954 he complains of the “deadening effect” of scientific study on general intelligence.

Felix Pryor, Bonhams’ manuscript expert, said: “This is an utterly wonderful collection from possibly the greatest poet of the 20th century.”

Tom Faber’s widow, Elisabeth, said: “Tom was too young to read the first letters which I think is why T. S. Eliot drew those beautiful pictures. Tom’s mother would read the poems to him.

“All the letters and poems were for Tom. It was only later that Tom’s father suggested to T. S. Eliot that they should be collected and published. That’s how Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats came about.”

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