By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Previously, we’ve compiled ten of the best poems about cats, so we thought it was time to complement that with a similar post about the best poems about dogs. Dogs have been a popular theme in English poetry for many centuries, and in 1893 an anthology, The Dog in British Poetry, was even published (pleasingly, it can be read in full online here).
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.