by Peggy
Tibbetts
 |
| Lord Byron and Boatswain |
When it comes
to wearing their hearts on their sleeves, writers have gone to the dogs. Lord
Byron was enormously fond of his Newfoundland named Boatswain, whom he nursed
until his death after he was infected with rabies. The poet inscribed
Boatswain’s headstone with one of his best-known texts, “Epitaph to a Dog.” Like Byron before him, American playwright Eugene O’Neill wrote a touching
eulogy to his Dalmatian, Blemie. Sword and sorcery fiction writer Robert E.
Howard’s dog Patches was named after the famous jester who disappointed the
king and was sent outside to sleep with the dogs.
Reclusive
poet Emily Dickinson had a Newfoundland named Carlo. Together they roamed the
meadows and woods surrounding her home in Amherst, Massachusetts. Dickinson
remarked that dogs are better than people because “they know – but do not
tell.” New England novelist Edith Wharton’s husband suffered from acute
depression so she found companionship in her six lapdogs, including Chihuahuas,
Pekingese, and Poodles. Emily Brontë kept a ferocious canine brute named Keeper.
It was she who tamed him of his aggression and it is widely believed he changed
her life.
Elizabeth
Barrett Browning’s Cocker Spaniel, Flush was her devoted friend while she was
confined to her sickbed in London. Browning wrote about Flush’s adventures in
letters to her friends. Her beloved dog was dognapped twice and ransomed. She
eulogized Flush in a slushy poem, “To Flush, My Dog.” Virginia Woolf’s first published essay was an obituary of her dog. Years later,
her tribute to Elizabeth Barrett Browning and her famous canine companion, Flush: A Biography was published. Though largely ignored in her bibliography Flush remains Woolf’s bestselling
book to date.
Dog lover and
psychologist Maureen Adams wrote about these wonderful women writers and their
dogs in Shaggy Muses: The Dogs WhoInspired Virginia Woolf, Emily Dickinson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, EdithWharton, and Emily Brontë.
When the New
York chapter of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
(ASPCA) charged E. B. White with non-payment of the dog tax, he wrote a letter
defending his dachsund, Minnie. His charming letter was published in the
anthology Letters of a Nation. It begins:
2
April 1951
Dear
Sirs:
I
have your letter, undated, saying that I am harboring an unlicensed dog in
violation of the law. If by “harboring” you mean getting up two or three times
every night to pull Minnie’s blanket up over her, I am harboring a dog all
right. The blanket keeps slipping off. I suppose you are wondering by now why I
don’t get her a sweater instead. That’s a joke on you. She has a knitted
sweater, but she doesn’t like to wear it for sleeping; her legs are so short
they work out of a sweater and her toenails get caught in the mesh, and this
disturbs her rest. If Minnie doesn’t get her rest, she feels it right away. I
do myself, and of course with this night duty of mine, the way the blanket
slips and all, I haven’t had any real rest in years. Minnie is twelve.
Read the rest of the letter HERE.
For your
added enjoyment here are links to more photos of writers and their pets:
*****
Peggy
Tibbetts is the author of the nonfiction dogoir, Crazy Bitch: Living with Canine Compulsive Disorder. The Kindle Award for Excellence in nonfiction was awarded to Crazy Bitch in July 2014.
“Crazy Bitch is a great read. Not only is
it an excellent look into the world of canine mental illness, but also in
coping with bully behavior. Tibbetts writes in a style that draws you in, as if
you’re a friend. Within a few pages, you’ll find yourself caring more than
perhaps you’d like to about Venus and cheering on the author in her quest to
provide her dog with the best life possible.” -- Sue Kottwitz, “Talking DogsBlog”
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