{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/6722", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 6722, "subject": "Short Story 172*: The Dog of the Drops", "messages": 4, "voices": 4, "first": "2015-04-22T13:46:05+00:00", "last": "2015-04-26T18:37:56+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Marc Aramini", "address": "marcaramini at gmail.com" }, "date": "2015-04-22T13:46:05+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 172*: The Dog of the Drops", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Since I am reformatting these now, I wanted to get them out in case anyone\nhad some excellent input that needed to be incorporated. Most of these\npresented out of order are fairly straightforward, however.\n\n\n “The Dog of the Drops” first appeared in 2002 in *3SF* and is\nreprinted in *Starwater\nStrains*.\n\n\n SUMMARY:\n\n\n In a decimated future, an unnamed narrator reveals that his duties took\nhim to the lands beyond the bombed cities where they have no accommodations\nfor travelers and no cook shops. He asks at a farm and sees a “beautiful,\nvery quiet young woman and five noisy boys who called her 'Ma.'” As he is\nleaving, an elderly man stops him and tells him a tale in a dialect which\nresembles Scottish.\n\nThe elderly man starts by asking him if he knows what a dog is. He once saw\na picture of a small one, with ears like small rugs or earmuffs. It had no\nhands. His father told him those dogs could talk and do small errands for\ntheir owners as well as aid in hunting raccoons and watching the house when\nthe master was away.\n\nHowever, the “Life Man” did not like them, for they did not care for his\ntaxes, only for the masters who fed them, and ultimately decided to kill\nall the dogs, claiming that they brought sickness and plague (which no one\nhad noticed before). Those that kept dogs were hung. His father said that\nthe dogs were “dead as cats”.\n\nHe tells the narrator of a man named Pet who went hunting out into\nuncivilized areas called “the drops”, which were once called the “barbs”,\nwere people once lived around “fallinwalls”. There are holes everywhere out\nthere, most filled with water, dangerous for a man to fall into if he is\nnot paying attention. The speaker mentions how bad the drops are, where old\nfolk lived before the “Bigkill”. On one of his hunts, Pet shot a wolf and\nfollowed its blood trail. . Pet stayed the night there and heard a girl\ntalking to him. She said her mother was dead and there was no one left to\nfeed her. She refused to come by his fire, but he threw her food. He\npromised to return the next day so that she would not die. Thinking that he\nwould find a woman to take care of her, he doesn't want anymore than the\nfive kids at home he already has, yet for a year he went back and left food\nfor her.\n\nEventually, a bull gored Pet in the meadow, and his young wife, who came\nlooking for him, saw a huge creature standing over Pet which would not let\nher approach. She grabbed the speaker to come look with other neighbors,\nand he made them put their weapons down when they saw the giant black\ndog-like creature over Pet, protecting his body. He talked to it, and told\nit he knew that she wouldn't harm Pet. The giant dog creature left like a\nshadow. When they recovered Pet's body, they knew that a bull gored him.\n\nSoon thereafter, the young widow of Pet found fawn and raccoons left on her\nstep some days. She was also left with the five children Pet had from a\nprevious marriage. Soon a man named Sut started to like her, but then made\nthe mistake of hitting her. The next day he was killed by a wolf. The\nelderly man, seeing that the narrator is interested in Pet's widow, relays\nall of this and ends by warning the narrator to take care and treat the\nyoung woman good, as well as Pet's kids, or to simply go home.\n\nThe narrator looks back at the cottage of the widow, where he hopes to\nreturn soon. He wonders where the Dog of the Drops lays, who watches the\ncottage with him.\n\n\n COMMENTARY:\n\nThe challenging portion of this text is simply the dialect. Otherwise, it\nis a straightforward tale of a future torn apart by war in which dogs and\nother domestic pets were eradicated for fear of the diseases they brought.\nThe criticism implicit towards a government which would eliminate pets\nwhich have come to have some psuedo-sentience due to their freedom from\ntaxation is perhaps a barb at the concern of large government, but clearly\nsome disaster has submerged humanity into a civilization that resembles the\npeasant life of the middle ages and pre-industrialization more than the\nlife to which we are accustomed. It is conceivable that these pets are\nrelated to the speaking ones who serve mankind in “The Hero as Werwolf” and\nin “Sonya, Crane Wessleman, and Kitty.”\n\nThe irony is that Pet may have killed the mother of the wolf cub or puppy\nwhom he treats with such kindness afterwards. It seems unlikely that\nlycanthropy or fantasy is involved — this is a straight science fiction\nstory in which the remnants of the dogs elevated to a kind of sentience\n(who outlive cats, certainly) are forced to survive in the wild after a\ndestructive war just as the humans are. The bonds of kindness that Pet\nforges create a protective instinct in the Dog of the Drops towards his\nfamily.\n\nIt is conceivable that “The Drops” represents a kind of barbaric backwater,\nand that this is the meaning of the word “barb” which the elderly speaker\nuses to describe it. The dialect might resemble a Scottish one. The\nlibertarian attitude of the speaker, criticizing the “Life Man” for blaming\ndogs for their problems, is perhaps presented without irony.\n\nThe idea introduced by the elderly speaker that dogs were already speaking\nto their owners might be taken literally in a science fictional environment\nas evidence that the genetic evolution of dogs to something “more” than\nthey currently are was already occurring, especially given the government's\ndisdain for them and there freedom from taxation.\n\n\n UNANSWERED QUESTIONS:\n\n\n There has clearly been a war, possibly leaving large radiated areas. Is\nthe giant talking dog a product of this a mutation as a result of the\nweapons of war, or is it a natural outgrowth of the dogs which had already\nbegun to change under the guidance and manipulation of men, an advanced dog\nsimply returning to a natural, harsh environment but still capable of love,\naffection, loyalty, and communication?\n\n\n CONNECTION WITH OTHER WORKS\n\n There is certainly a strain in Wolfe which presents the future as a\nbarbaric and less civilized past. “The Hero as Werwolf”, “King Rat”,\n“Tracking Song” and *The Book of the New Sun* all have features which\nmirror this post apocalyptic future. The animals raised up to something\nhigher with the ability to communicate with their human masters may be\nfound in all of those works as well. The use of dialect and dogs will be\nrepeated in “Rattler”." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "David Duffy", "address": "david.duffy at qimr.edu.au" }, "date": "2015-04-22T23:35:34+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 172*: The Dog of the Drops", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wed, 22 Apr 2015, Marc Aramini wrote:\nThe idea introduced by the elderly speaker that dogs were already speaking" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I would interpret this as suggesting dogs had been deliberately \ngenetically modified, given the size possibly for military purposes - in \nkeeping with a later turning against them post disaster (?).\n\nCheers, David Duffy." } ] }, { "message_id": "<55389DA2.5030704@bindweed.com>", "from": { "name": "Gerry Quinn", "address": "gerry at bindweed.com" }, "date": "2015-04-23T07:22:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 172*: The Dog of the Drops", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 22/04/2015 14:46, Marc Aramini wrote:\n\nHe tells the narrator of a man named Pet who went hunting out into \nuncivilized areas called “the drops”, which were once called the \n“barbs”, were people once lived around “fallinwalls”. There are holes \neverywhere out there, most filled with water, dangerous for a man to \nfall into if he is not paying attention. The speaker mentions how bad \nthe drops are, where old folk lived before the “Bigkill”." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I never read the original, but it occurred to me that 'Barbs' could be a \ncorruption of 'Burbs'. They became the 'Drops' after heavy bombardment \nduring the BigKill.\n\nFallinwalls sound like \"fallen walls\" but that seems a bit too obvious \nsomehow, as if there ought to be something better. Then again, the \nconversion of other vowels to 'ah' fits with Burbs to Barbs.\n\nAnyway, maybe from the story itself it is possible to tell whether the \nDrops could have once been suburban regions.\n\n- Gerry Quinn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Stephen Hoy", "address": "stephenhoy15 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2015-04-26T18:37:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 172*: The Dog of the Drops", "in_reply_to": "<55389DA2.5030704@bindweed.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The barbs are littered with glass and fallen walls, leaving water-filled\nfoundations that unwary travelers fall into. So there's a play on words\navailable that allows falinwalls = fall in wells, as in: \"what's the\nmatter, Lassie? Timmy fall in a well again?\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Thu, Apr 23, 2015 at 2:22 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:\n\n\nOn 22/04/2015 14:46, Marc Aramini wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "He tells the narrator of a man named Pet who went hunting out into\nuncivilized areas called “the drops”, which were once called the “barbs”,\nwere people once lived around “fallinwalls”. There are holes everywhere out\nthere, most filled with water, dangerous for a man to fall into if he is\nnot paying attention. The speaker mentions how bad the drops are, where old\nfolk lived before the “Bigkill”." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I never read the original, but it occurred to me that 'Barbs' could be a\ncorruption of 'Burbs'. They became the 'Drops' after heavy bombardment\nduring the BigKill.\n\nFallinwalls sound like \"fallen walls\" but that seems a bit too obvious\nsomehow, as if there ought to be something better. Then again, the\nconversion of other vowels to 'ah' fits with Burbs to Barbs.\n\nAnyway, maybe from the story itself it is possible to tell whether the\nDrops could have once been suburban regions.\n\n- Gerry Quinn\n\n---\nThis email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.\nhttp://www.avast.com\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] } ] }