Odyssey Book 17. Here is the dog.
Most readers seem to get upset about the poor old dog, and not so much about the human suffering (slavery) evoked in the same passage. Here's a thread I wrote a while ago about this bit of the poem, & translation thereof.
I showed this clip to 9 yr old. She wanted to know why exactly the dog dies. Is he over-excited at seeing Odysseus? Heart attack? If so, does Odysseus cause the death of his own dog? Maybe. This homecoming has a high casualty rate.
I had thought it would be stylish to leave out Penelope. You can get the bones of the plot quite well without her, and I'm bored of people assuming she must be my favorite character. But tomorrow, I will relent: Penelope will appear.
