Dog Years
A Memoir
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- ¥1,500
発行者による作品情報
A Washington Post Book World Best Book of the Year
Winner of the Israel Fishman-Stonewall Book Award for Nonfiction
"Tender and amusing. . . . Doty brilliantly captures the qualities that make dogs endearing." -- The New Yorker
When Mark Doty decides to adopt a dog as a companion for his dying partner, he brings home Beau, a large, malnourished golden retriever in need of loving care. Joining Arden, the black retriever, to complete their family, Beau bounds back into life. Before long, the two dogs become Doty's intimate companions, and eventually the very life force that keeps him from abandoning all hope during the darkest days.
Dog Years is a poignant, intimate memoir interwoven with profound reflections on our feelings for animals and the lessons they teach us about living, love, and loss.
This lyrical memoir explores the profound depths of love and grief through:
A Poignant Love Story: Mark Doty adopts Beau, a golden retriever, as a companion for his dying partner, Wally, beginning a journey of love and survival through the AIDS crisis.Coping with Grief and Loss: When the darkest days arrive, the two retrievers—Arden and Beau—become the life force that anchors the author to hope.Lyrical, Poetic Prose: From an award-winning poet, this memoir is a beautifully crafted, unflinching look at mortality, bereavement, and the solace we find in our animal companions.An Unforgettable Bond: More than just a story about the loss of a pet, this is a profound reflection on what dogs teach us about living in the moment, loving without reservation, and facing the inevitable.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Award-winning memoirist (Firebird) and poet (School of the Arts) Doty explores, with compassion and intelligence, the complicated, loving territory inhabited by devoted dogs and their loyal humans. In 1994, when the author's longtime lover was dying of AIDS, beloved pet Arden kept the surviving partner afloat. A new adoptee, the rambunctious Beau, in his "sloppy dog way," becomes a part of the tribe and carries some of the burden of grief. Doty says Beau "carried something else for me too, which was my will to live." In a time of devastating pain, as well as in happier times, Doty's two dogs are the "secret heroes of my own vitality." The dog characters in the book are irresistible, and the arcs of their lives are delineated with the tenderness and passion of the truly smitten. Arden's quiet nobility and slow decline breaks the heart, while Beau's goofy enthusiasm peaks with youth and mellows in illness. With a marvelous ability to present the pain of mourning with a poet's delicate hand, and an irrepressible instinct for joy, Doty delivers a soulful love story which illuminates no less than the big human mysteries: attachment, death, grief, loyalty, happiness. The book nimbly sidesteps sentimentality and lands squarely on a philosophical, inquisitive tone as intellectually evocative as it is emotionally resonant.
