Why read At Home and Astray?

Book cover of At Home and Astray: The Domestic Dog in Victorian Britain

Book description

Although the British consider themselves a nation of dog lovers, what we have come to know as the modern dog came into existence only after a profound, and relatively recent, transformation in that country's social attitudes and practices. In At Home and Astray, Philip Howell focuses on Victorian Britain, and…

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Why read it?

1 author picked At Home and Astray as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Michael Worboys

Author

Philip Howell explores the place of dogs in Victorian homes and on the street.

There are familiar topics – vivisection, rabies, dogs’ homes, and dog cemeteries – but what set this book apart is that these are discussed in new ways drawing on literature and geography. Thus, we learn about Charles Dickens’s pet dog Sultan, alongside the many, many dogs in his novels, not just Bill Sikes’s Spike.

It surprised me just how many dogs roamed the streets of Victorian towns and cities, and how the police, often reluctantly, were responsible for bringing order to the streets. But public spaces…

From Michael's list on the history of modern dogs.