Short facts about writers and their pet dogs – and the canine figures in the works of famous authors
Fearing attacks from rivals, poet Alexander Pope rarely left his house without a brace of pistols and his dog, a Great Dane named Bounce.
One of Virginia Woolf’s first published pieces of writing was an obituary for the family dog, Shag.
The first draft of John Steinbeck’s novel Of Mice and Men was eaten by his dog, Max.
Emily Brontë’s dog, Keeper, followed her coffin to the grave when she died and, for weeks after, howled outside her bedroom door waiting for its owner to return.