Who was a friend of Virginia Woolf?


Grand literature. Grand passions. History. Crime. Gimlet takes a fancy to a provocative new book.


Gilbert Stuart Meets Matisse. Gimlet Rose.

"Shaggy Muses, the dogs who inspired Virginia Woolf, Emily Dickinson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Edith Wharton and Emily Bronte" by Maureen Davis. Ballantine Books, 2007.

Deadlines, blank canvases and empty screens, as familiar to me as the path to the owl nesting box in the backyard.
I am never alone on any of my attempts to paint, write or catch rats. Two feet always tread behind me.
There is acceptance, approval, daring and inspiration in the eyes that watch my every move. My morning howls are met with the opening of the kitchen door and the arrival of a biscuit at my paws.
Oh, those Sojos biscuits.
Patience for my bouts of blogging truancy. Praise for my very being. Loyalty in the truest form, yes.
But there is something more.
I have my muse. Much better than a mouse.
Every literary dog I know of, even those with the most tenuous of wordy pedigrees, has had a muse.
Humans have them, too.
It comes as no surprise, then, that psychologist and dog lover Maureen Adams has written a book examining the literary associations, human and canine, of five famous women authors.
Did Edith Wharton give the game away when she wrote
"My little old dog;
A heart-beat
At my feet."
A Pekingese takes a star turn in Wharton's ghost story "Kerfol." Is it possible that she had a canine ghost-writer?
Offering heads for the petting, and tails for the wagging, dogs have helped give voice to wonderful characters and turns of phrases. Think of Virginia Woolf : a dog person? Oh, more than that. A literary genie who shared a bottle with a succession of dogs, one of them a fox terrier by the name of Grizzle. Eventually a black Cocker Spaniel named Pinka soothed Woolf's oscillating moods and just maybe it was Pinka who persuaded her to write "Flush," the biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Cocker Spaniel.
Flush's mistress was remarkable. Imagine that you are a sickly, timid woman, overpowered by life, and you wish to write about one of the loves of your life, your dog. Now imagine that your friends and peers admonish you not to write about your dog, and you desperately want their approval. What do you do?
You tell them to go stuff it and you write about your dog. Inspired phrases trickle from your fingers because you are basking in the glow of your dog, your very own muse.
Flush was ransomed three times by a group of dognappers called "The Fancy." (I wonder if the term "taking a fancy" owes anything to these miscreants.) The third time Flush was taken, it was Elizabeth herself who traveled to Whitechapel (shades of Jack the Ripper) to confront the beasts.
As much as humans inspire us and allow their characters to animate our furry forms, we coax and provide them with creative backbones. And tales.

Be warned, there is cruelty in this book (Emily Bronte brought her own baggage to "Wuthering Heights") but there are walks, laps and fireplaces, too. More great quotes than there are biscuits in the kitchen treat jar.
Because author Adams is a psychologist, there are bits of Freud and Jung to be found here, too (and you thought Freud only thought about cigars). There is no better way to explore the nature of creativity than to take your favorite muse along with you for the journey.
Pick up your leash and take a walk through this book. You'll discover Emily Dickinson and her dog Carlo along the way.


-- Gimlet (suitably shaggy)



Posted: Sun - September 9, 2007 at 08:53 PM          

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