Harlan Ellison's A Boy and His Dog … is a cautionary fable employing satire and mythic patterns to define a future world that in some respects may already be with us. The "boy" is Vic … and the "dog" is Blood …; their world is the American Southwest in 2024, shortly after World War IV and the near-total destruction of the human race. (p. 162)
In Blood, we have one of the variations in mythic patterns and folk motifs that make … [Ellison's novella] so fascinating and disturbing. At first glance, Blood seems much like the wise magic animal of folk and fairy tales who comes to the aid of the hero when the hero is at an impasse. But Blood goes beyond this role to become Vic's link to the lost pre-war civilization, teaching him reading, arithmetic, recent history, and "Edited English" grammar. He becomes the culture-bearer of the bombed-out wasteland, superior to Vic in everything but the necessary skills of animal survival. The normal relationship of human and animal is inverted.
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