very well written book
Rating:
5 / 5
Farley Mowet's mom bought a dog from the milk man. If you think thats strange wait until you read the many adventures Farly and his dog, Mutt, have in this classic dog and boy book. Mutt walks on fences, climbs latters and does many more acrobatical stunts. if you like studying books in a literary sense than this is even greater. A good book for all ages. Literature teachers, this the book for you. Many adventures in one story. I would reccomend it to anyone!
Simple-minded but overly bombastic
Rating:
2 / 5
Summary: The true story of naturalist Farley Mowat and the first love of his life, his dog Mutt. Mowat relates excerpted tales from his childhood, most of which center around his unusual dog, Mutt. Mutt seems to be a once-in-a-lifetime kind of dog, whose unusual personality manifests itself in everything from duck hunting to cat chasing. Towards the end of the book, with the majority of Mutt's exploits behind him, the book expands to include stories of other pets, most notably a pair of great horned owls. The final chapter has the inevitable death of Mutt, although the details of his demise under the wheels of a runaway truck aren't given graphically.
The Good and the Bad:
I didn't really enjoy this book very much, although my age might have something to do with it. Actually, I don't even believe that because the completely unnecessary verbosity asks for a certain amount of sophistication from the reader, and anyone smart enough to swallow the big words is probably not going to be open to the message. The grand verbiage is related to my other big problem with the book, which is that the mythic legends of the dog are almost certainly inflated. Mowat instills his dog with so much human character and emotion that it would have been more believable if it turned out to be a man in a dog suit. Yet, he pooh poohs another naturalist for "presuming to know what an animal is thinking," with no apparent irony. Also, Mowat's sense of humor and self-importance are both extremely irritating. The humor is like a broad physical comedy in its lack of subtlety, and it's couched in so many words that it sounds like a foppish English gentleman failing miserably at a dinner conversation.
On the positive side, it did seem like Mutt was a special dog, hyperbole aside, and it was interesting to get slice of life stories about a budding naturalist in Canada in the 1930s.
Beloved dog, lost times
Rating:
5 / 5
This is a tale that couldn't happen today. Dogs don't have the lifestyle they did in the 1920's and 1930's in remote Canada, and sadly, boys don't either. Mutt is a fascinating mutt with a mind of his own; halfway through the book I realised he must be part Siberian Husky with his deafness, his love of roaming and chasing and need to attend to his own desires. Farley's mother demonstrated an act of faith- as well as the desire to save [money amount]- when she purchased Mutt as a puppy from a starving duck seller. Farley's dad wanted a hunting dog; Farley's mom didn't want to spend a lot of money on a dog during the Dust Bowl years, living in Saskatoon. Dogs roamed free, boys roamed free. Boys weren't sent off to summer camp to keep busy- there was enough to do with their own imaginations, their friends and their animal companions. Attitudes towards cats were cavalier; some parts are very hard to read if you appreciate cats. Thankfully that attitude has changed over time. The stories of the father's boating attempts are hilarious. I don't like boats, but am inspired to read "the boat that wouldn't float" by the same author. I live in the western US and have a vague understanding of how difficult it would be to navigate some of these rivers so I appreciated the delusional voyage of The Coot. Farley paints his parents as people who had their own interests and needs, but also understood the needs of their son and his dog. They understood that living in a city wouldn't work for them, after several years living in the sparse western provinces. Farley's imagination was clearly nurtured and allowed him to become the prolific writer he became. Even the car (Eardlie, a Model A) has a character and idiosycrasies that add to the story. My dog, too, is geriatric so I read the final chapter sadly. Mutt's demise will give fuel to the arguments of people who believe completely in leash laws. Yes, this is a fantastic story of a dog, but it is also a wonderful story of life in a more free time, for children. Farley skips over most of the drawbacks of that time and paints a wonderful portrait of childhood.
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