ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the nature of the relationship between a person (Harry) and his dog. It delineates some of the reasons why dogs, and by extension other beloved pets, have such a powerfully positive psychological meaning and effect on their owners. The chapter describes some of the psychodynamics between an owner and his dog, as well as the developmental needs and wishes that the owner uniquely satisfies through his hound. It discusses that what makes one's relationship with an adored dog so moving, so self-transformational and self-transcendent, is that emanating from the hound, especially from his "face", there is an irresistible ethical call, an ethical address, of responsibility for the other. Harry, in other words, has ethical exigency that demands an ethical response. The chapter suggests Sigmund Freud's thought that the secret to his uniquely strong attachment to his dog was that his relationship to Jo-fi embodied the highest form of friendship.
