Acknowledgements

My first thanks go to the dogs. To Rupert and Tom; to Husky, Kite and Nimbo; to Eddie; to Shadow, Finley and Daisy; to Seven, China and Io; to Cleo; to Juno; to Luna, Rafa and Diego; to Eric; to Azul; and to Cheidle. Thanks also to my more recent acquaintances Peggy and Django, Jessie, Charlie, Reggie, Nico, Lena, and Blake, all of whom have waited patiently (or seemingly patiently) while I rambled on to their humans about this book.

Some of the best parts of my life are shared with women with a passion for dogs, and these women, too, have for years put up patiently (or seemingly patiently) with conversations about this book, and have read various versions of it. Heartfelt thanks to Lisa Rabanal, especially for our weekly dog discussions, without which my life would be much diminished; to Emer Lenihan, whose insight and gentleness have supported both Monk and me through many challenges, outside as well as inside the veterinary clinic; and to Joanne Martin, my tutor, who has with great patience tolerated numerous interruptions to my Ad.Dip. (and also my lengthy essay answers). Above all, I am deeply grateful to Susan Close, who over the past eight years has taught me more about dogs and humans than it is possible to convey.

It is a profound privilege to have friends and colleagues who have been generous enough to look beyond the confusion on the page and to support me in clarifying my thinking. Grateful thanks to Celia Lury, Alberto Toscano, Martin Savransky, Sarah Pike, Lynn Turner, Charles Hirschkind, Maisie Tomlinson, Sonia Turcotte and Nick Millet. Thanks also to Tom Farsides, for sending me things to think about, including the work of Charles H. Turner, and to Richard Burkhardt, whose extensive knowledge and personal kindness brought nuance to my understanding of ethology, and of the animal sciences more broadly. My thanks also to the anonymous reviewers of this book, in the USA and in the UK, for their careful and attentive reading. These comments made a real difference, raising the bar for this book right at the finish.

Every year I have taught students who have created worlds in which books such as this one and, more broadly, commitments to animals, can flourish. I am indebted to all the students who have participated in my undergraduate and master’s animal modules at Goldsmiths. In particular, however, I want to thank the students on Thinking Animals 2017–2018, which was my first teaching class after an extended period of medical leave, for sharing, intensifying and enriching my excitement about and dedication to the module, and for all the work that we achieved together in that basement café in Bloomsbury. Sari Easton, you were right; we learned that the world is bigger and less lonely than we thought. I also want to extend special thanks to the three generations of students on the Ethics and Politics of Animals module (2021–2024), which is a core course on the M.A. in ecology, culture and society at Goldsmiths. The wide range of these students’ disciplinary backgrounds and work experiences, coupled with their remarkable openness, warmth and integrity, has made a deep impression on me and on this book.

I was lucky enough to meet Laura Swift, the commissioning editor at Manchester University Press (MUP), somewhat by accident. Yet no author could have received better intellectual and practical support than I have had from her. I also want to thank the editors of the Inscriptions series at MUP, Des Fitzgerald and Amy Hinterberger, for welcoming me on board, and the teams at MUP and Newgen, and Sarah Cook, for turning these words into a book. Important thanks are due to Hugh Macnicol, Sarah Jackson, Monica Greco, and Dimitrios Giannoulopoulos for the immeasurable efforts that they made on my behalf, to ensure this book is available to a wider audience through Open Access. This means a huge amount to me, and they made it possible.

This book has been supported by old friends: Brenna Bhandar, Natalie Fenton, Yasmin Gunaratnam, Gholam Khiabany, Stephanie Lawler, Cath Le Couteur (who generously gave me the final line of this book), Nirmal Puwar, Nikolas Rose, Marsha Rosengarten and Evelyn Ruppert. And by new ones: Gail Davies, Charles Foster, Jay Griffiths, Engin Isen. It has been supported by my family, both immediate and extended, nearly all of whom have lived or live with dogs, especially Kayvaan and Rosanna, who are rarely seen without one (or two, or …). Finally, always, it has been supported by Michael Parker, who actively created, with love, humour and endurance, the many different kinds of spaces in our lives that this book demanded. And who read it all, transforming entire lines of thought with just a word or a sentence. I am so glad to be in your debt, Michael.

I said in the preface that this book was motivated by work. Also, it was motivated by love. By my love, of Monk.