Niki: The Story of a Dog

by Tibor Déry, Edward Hyams (Translator), George Szirtes (Introduction)

“The Dog adopted the Ancsas in the spring of ’48”: so the story begins. The Ancsas are a middle-aged couple living on the outskirts of Budapest in a ruinous Hungary that is just beginning to wake up from the nightmare of World War II. The new Communist government promises to set things straight, and Mr. Ancsa, an engineer, is as eager to get to work building the future as he is to forget the past. The last thing he has time for is a little mongrel bitch, pregnant with her first litter. But Niki knows better, and before long she is part of the Ancsa household. The Ancsas even take her along with them when Mr. Ancsa’s new job requires a move to an apartment in the city.

Then Mr. Ancsa is swept up in a political crackdown—disappearing without a trace. For five years he does not return, five years of absence, silence, fear, and the constant struggle to survive—five years during which Mrs. Ancsa and Niki have only each other.

The story of Niki, an ordinary dog, and the Ancsas, a no less ordinary couple, is an extraordinarily touching, utterly unsentimental, parable about caring, kindness, and the endurance of love.

Genres: Fiction, Hungary, Animals, Hungarian Literature, Dogs, Classics, 20th Century

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1956

About the author

Tibor Déry was a Hungarian writer, born in Budapest in 1894. In his early years he was a supporter of communism, but after being excluded from the ranks of the Hungarian Communist Party in 1953 he started writing satire on the communist regime in Hungary.

Georg Lukács praised Dery as being 'the greatest depicter of human beings of our time'.

In 1918, Déry became an active party member in the liberal republic under Mihály Károlyi. Less than a year later however, Béla Kun and his Communist Party rose to power, proclaiming the Hungarian Soviet Republic and exiling Déry. He only returned to Hungary in 1934, having lived in Austria, France and Germany in the meantime. Nevertheless, during the right wing Horthy regime he was imprisoned several times, once because he translated André Gide's Retour de L'U.R.S.S.. In this period, he wrote his greatest novel, The Unfinished Sentence, a 1200-page epic story about the life of the young aristocrat Lorinc Parcen-Nagy who gets into contact with the working classes in Budapest during a period of strike.

In 1953, Déry was expelled from the Communist Party during a 'cleansing' of Hungarian literature. In 1956 he was a spokesman during the uprising, alongside Georg Lukács and Gyula Háy. In the same year, he wrote Niki: The Story of a Dog, a fable about the arbitrary restrictions on human life in Stalinist Hungary. Because of his part in the uprising, he was sentenced to prison for 9 years, but released in 1960. He died in 1977.

He translated Rudyard Kipling's Naulahka and The Lord of the Flies by William Goldinginto Hungarian.

Reviews

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like J.D. Salinger, dogs are sort of my litmus test. If you don't like 'em, I probably don't like you (and vice versa).

If you know me at all, then you're aware that I'm generally known far and wide for my calm, measured, reasonable, and nonjudgmental approach to disagreements with others. What? You happen to think Ingmar Bergman films are pretentious and boring? Tut, tut, tut. What an amusing thing to think, you adorable opinion-haver you! Of course, I won't fly into a violent rage; I certainly won't call you a fucking fuckheaded motherfucking fucktarded fucko; and then I likely won't attempt to smash an empty Jim Beam bottle over your head and threaten to slit your throat with one of the jagged shards. True, you may actually deserve to die (painfully) for holding such opinions, but who am I to act as the instrument of justice and to bring about the bloody fate you (may) deserve? I may privately realize how ridiculous your opinions are about so many various topics, but I'm not about to Stalinize this awareness by bringing about your sudden disappearance from your sad, misguided life, as well as from state and federal records, old yearbooks, porn website membership rolls, and even the Crate & Barrel mailing list. In other words, I'm a liberal thinker, and as such I'm content to allow you to endure in your continued error while only imagining your hoarse, verily breathless shrieks of terror rising out of a cauldron of fire and flesh-eating acids. (Did I mention that I am the one controlling the burner's flame level in that cauldron scenario? Because I am. In my imagination only, ha ha ha. Because you're perfectly entitled to your opinion. And all that egalitarian bullshit.)

Anyway. What was my point? Oh. Yeah. Where dogs are concerned, my bilious hatred for human antagonists, neglectors, and abusers rises from the level of theoretical and democratic to ninja pretty quick. I will fuck you up in a serious way, resorting to that renowned warehouse of superhuman strength which allows hundred-pound mothers to lift Ford Explorers off their trapped children. And I don't just mean dogs either. I mean any animal, but since the protagonist of Niki by Tibor Déry is a lovable yet resourcefully Machiavellian mongrel bitch, I thought I'd take our canine friends as my jumping-off point for plots and schemes of vigilante justice. If you are such a scaly, cloven-hooved demon-from-hell that you can't love a pooch --any pooch whose butt wiggles and waggles past you, then you deserve any manner of comeuppance that the Fates, at their whim, proscribe. And we all know those Fates are some nasty motherfuckahs, so if you're an animal hater, you'd better just hide it as best you can like you're a Jew at Mel Gibson's Christmas bash or a black man at a NASCAR race. (The same goes for Salinger detractors. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, I'm completely joking with you! Incidentally, why is it that most of the people who complain about Holden Caulfield being whiny and immature are inevitably the whiniest, most immature, depthless people in the world? Split into small groups and discuss. Is it a Chris Cooper/American Beauty thing where they hate most what they are? Oh wait. I'm getting sidetracked here...)

Niki: The Story of a Dog is the story of a Hungarian dog, to be precise. She's a bit of a coquettish mutt who decides she'd rather like to live with this couple named the Ancsas who lost their only child in the war. I know what you're thinking. This sounds ripe for a Sandra Bullock vehicle, where Ms. Bullock has to train with a vocal coach for six months to perfect her Hungarian accent. Tears will be shed, Oscars® will be won. But this is really a great little book regardless of what Hollywood could conceivably do to it to make it the most horrible thing ever. Anyway, this is 1950s Communist Hungary where the Ancsas live (under the influence of residual Stalinist brutality and historical revisionism), so the couple is subject to the arbitrary 'justice' associated with Communist regimes. In this way, of course, Niki's life mirrors theirs. Niki cannot fathom the meaning behind many of the Ancsas' actions, nor can she envision what a future might entail -- except perhaps as an indefinite continuation of 'presentness.' The same applies to everyday Hungarians, the Ancsas learn, when Mr. Ancsa suddenly disappears one day... without word, without a trace. Eventually, in a culture in which self-preservation dictates that people shun those who have been politically disgraced, a Good Samaritan friend of Mr. Ancsa finally does some extensive research and finds out Mr. Ancsa has been imprisoned for unspecified reasons.

Years pass. Mrs. Ancsa only has her beloved Niki for a friend and companion, and although they are not able to communicate their hopes and fears in a direct manner, there is a supposition (by the unnamed narrator) that they share a somewhat common plight. So in other words, if you have a heart, prepare for it to break, friends. But not in a schmaltzy, mawkish way. As far as poignancy goes, this book is the real deal... and since it clocks in at a mere 120 pages, you really have no reasonable excuse not to read it, unless you happen to be one of those despicable, irredeemable subhuman types who don't like dogs. In which case, watch your motherfucking back.

[Chuck LoPresti · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many great books exists about dogs and man, dogs and dogs and men as dogs. This one stands out, in terms of its dogish elements because you are treated to Dery's great prose and insight in revealing how this dog interacts in society. Dery is witty and his sentences are long, not Proust or Krasznahorkai long, but more like countrymates Krudy and Szerb in that their length isn't ornamental but more justified expositions that breathe well. I'd think that fans of the writing of Krudy, Kostolanyi and Szerb will find joy in this book.

This isn't to say this is a joyous subject because like Krasznahorkai, what's at work behind the scenes is a horrible sadness and evil that backlights the scenes. Molnar in Lilliom uses a similiar radiating haunt in contrast with a consideration of what constitutes love and joy to great unsettling effect. Kostolanyi uses a similar tone in Skylark to sort of wave flowers in front of our nose - let us have a long sniff, tickle our noses and then invite us to watch them die.

Cervantes's Dialog of the Dogs (to be read along side Sandor Marai's Embers - another monolog as dialog), Bulghakov's Heart of a Dog and Shulz's Nimrod - guess I need a new dog or at least a few bottles of Bull's Blood and some strong bacon.

I'm in love with Hungarian writers lately - so many amazing talents: Frigyes and Ference Karinthy, Krasnahorkai, Szerb, Marai, Kostolanyi, Dery, Molnar, Krudy, Esterhazy, Kertesz, Zilahy...

[Analía · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dogs are like angels, they have all merits of men and none of their defects, beautiful book, we all have nikis in our lifes, we are so lucky....there is not that kind of loyalty, not even in our families. No wonder I love dogs so much, to me animals are so much better than us not doubt it...niki is in my heart I will remember her, running after the little stones and being happy.

[Rita Welty Bourke · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was truly shaken when I finished this book. I thought I was reading a story about a middle-aged couple who lived in Budapest in 1948. And I was, until it became so much more. Without being a spoiler, I’ll only say that life under a government—in this case, communism— that cares nothing about individual rights and freedom is no life at all. It saps the very soul from those who are forced to live under such a system.
Was there ever an author who observed more closely a dog who attached herself to a man she would love her whole life through? Who speculated, but never without cause, what might be going on in the dog’s head? Who noted her swelling belly during her pregnancy, who kept the reader focused on her body language, her eyes, her whiskers, her little muscular body, her antics? Who watched the joy go out of her life as she waited for her master, the engineer, to return? Who showed us how the dog grieved, and tried to heal herself when her mistress took her for walks, who retrieved stones when nothing else was available, who tried to love others, but found none to replace the man whose pant legs she sniffed when she was hardly more than a puppy?
I said no spoilers. Read this book and you will be changed. When you go for a walk, and you see a dog, you will think of Niki, and Mr. Ancsa, the engineer, and his wife, and what happened to this little family when Budapest was under Stalinist rule. This is a story you won’t soon forget.

[Stephen Varcoe]

Whilst I found a cheap and rather beautiful old 1960’s Penguin edition of this book, I missed out on the introduction written by George Szirtes for a later edition. It would be good to know what George has to say about this book.

For example how did it escape the censor in 1956? It’s explicit anti-totalitarian story line could hardly have been missed.

If you like dogs, are interested in Hungary, enjoy beautifully structured writing and gentle, sensitive satire then you’ll probably enjoy this book. If you don’t then you’re probably not going to be reading this.

[Nati Korn · Rating 5 out of 5]

לפני מספר שנים קראתי שתי נובלות מצויינות מאת טיבור דרי ההונגרי, שקובצו בספר "שעשועים בשאול", והתלהבתי. לעברית תורגמו עוד שני סיפורים ונובלה שלו בראשית שנות האלפיים בקובץ בשם "אהבה" שיצא בספריית מעריב, זכרה לברכה. לאחרונה איתרתי את הספר אצל מוכר ספרים משומשים בחיפה ומהרתי להזמינו.

הוא לא הכזיב את התקוות שתליתי בו. שני הסיפורים "אהבה" ו"שתי נשים" יפים. הנובלה "ניקי – סיפורה של כלבה" מעולה. מצאתי בו את מה שזכרתי שהיה נוכח גם בשתי הנובלות הקודמות של דרי שקראתי – השקפת עולם הומניסטית חומלת, יכולת תיאור וסיפור של מספר מחונן וכתיבה שהיא גם פשוטה למראה וגם מתוחכמת מבחינת המבנה. המשותף לנובלה ולסיפורים הוא הנתק הפתאומי שהוא מנת חלקם של משפחות בהן אבי המשפחה נאסר בידי השלטונות הקומוניסטיים ההונגריים על לא עוול בכפו. נתק המשפיע על האישה הנזנחת ההופכת מבודדת ומרוששת אך הנותרת נאמנה לבעלה על אף הקשיים.

הנובלה "ניקי" היא מיוחדת במינה מאחר והסיפור מתמקד בכלבה שמאמצת את הזוג הנשוי (מעניין שגם בנובלה "שעשועים בשאול" שמור מקום מיוחד לבעלי חיים – סוס, בלתי נשכח) ונכנסת לחייהם. תמצאו כאן מצד אחד את אחד התיאורים הספרותיים המדוייקים ביותר של כלב (שיצא לי לקרוא) ומצד שני שימוש סימבולי יפה בכלבה כדמות מראה לנפשה של אישה. לא קשה להבין את ההקדשה שכתבה בעלים קודם של הספר לחברתה, בה הזכירה את אהבתה לכלבים. זהו סיפור שכל אוהב כלבים ישמח לקרוא (וכל אוהב אדם).

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Moving, intelligent, artful. That's all I ask for in a book, and this modest little book delivers, marred only by some gently outdated attitudes. The descriptions of a dog's experience of life are insightful and wise, and the way peripheral way it addresses life in the age of the gulag is subtle, powerful. It has none of the heaviness of Solzhenitsyn but is somehow just weighty enough. Niki is just an ordinary dog - an every-dog - but we love her all the more for that. What a writer. I'll be checking out more of Dery's work and that of his contemporary, Sandor Marai.

[Meaghan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The earliest dog story I've ever read, a la Marley and Me -- though I doubt it was THE first, I expect this genre is very old. This one is set against the backdrop of 1950s Communist Hungary -- the spectre of which grows ever more menacing as the story progresses. This book turned out to be a lot more interesting and thought-provoking than I thought it would be, and unlike most dog stories it's quite matter-of-fact and not at all sentimental. A person could read it for the "life in Communist Europe" aspect alone as well as for the dog part.

[Erica]

just an incredible little book. somewhere near the very very top of everything i've read this year

[Chrissie · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this book a terrier, perhaps a jack russel, adopts a Hungarian couple living outside Budapest after WW2. A NY Times classic. I am really stumped on how to review this book. The language is very wordy. The philosophical undercurrents are never blatant and this is reinforced by the style of writing. Descriptions of how dogs see the world around them are usually spot-on. The energy of a young dog could with the words of this book be perceived better than shown in a film. And yet the book goes beyond this. It is making a comparison of how dogs and people deal with the absurdities of life. How we deal with life that makes no sense to us. How the only way to manage in this absurd world is to have a feeling of "reciprocal affection" with another, be it a dog or a human. So the book is NOT just about a dog, but about how it was to live in Hungary before the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. The ending really bothers me, and it is important b/c it is concerned with why the book was written. I can find no explanation for the ending that I could like. It is not only ambiguous, but either trite or inconsistent with what has ohappened. For the ending and the lengthy, convoluted language employed, I give it only 3 stars.

Now I will read another book about Hungary: The Storyteller: Memory, Secrets, Magic and Lies. I need to know more Hungarian history. This is about a Hungarian family, starting at the end of the 1800s and going through the Hungarian Revolution. It is a biography of the author's family.

[Howard Jaeckel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a gem. Without a touch of sentimentality or anthropomorphism, Déry touchingly imagines the interior life of a dog, a creature of little understanding but great feeling. Anyone experienced in observing canine behavior will be completely convinced of the dead-on accuracy of the author’s portrayal.

The book is set in Hungary during the late forties and early fifties, a period of Stalinist oppression. The human characters understand as little of the arbitrary arrests and disappearances that have cast a pall of terror over their lives as our animal protagonist, Niki, does of the comings and goings of her mistress and the sudden absence of her beloved master, who for reasons unknown simply vanishes from her life. For both man and beast, such utter vulnerability to the incomprehensible can be made bearable only by “a strong reciprocal affection.” That mutual affection allows Niki and her mistress, whose husband has disappeared, to go on, at least for a time.

As noted, human emotions and thoughts are not attributed to Niki. She is not a heroine, just a dog. But this reader came away with a renewed sense of the infinite value of these living and sentient creatures, and more convinced than ever that the word “dog” should never be accompanied by the modifier “just.”

[fire_on_the_mountain · Rating 5 out of 5]

I should have known better than to read a book about a dog. They're too tightly enmeshed with the highest and lowest points of my life, and have always buttressed me from the worst. I've never felt equal to them and I can't approach this kind of work un-emotionally.

I know there's other layers to this work, some that I can grasp and some that flutter beyond my outstretched fingers... but at the end of the day, seeing the struggle of the Ancsas and Niki to live their ideal lives against an unfeeling system broke me a little bit. It's very simple to see this as a fable condemning a Stalinist state, but I find that too simple. I found it about the struggle, and the suffering, that comes from being denied the ability to live your ideal life. The *real* ideal life, one stripped of the demands of any societal structure, one centered on our loved ones and the ability to experience real human beauty. When we are denied that, we are diminished, and we lose so much along the way.

This is hardly a useful review for anyone but I've been in these shoes before, and their pain and determination really struck a chord with me. I've scarcely had such an emotional reaction to a book before and I think that's worth something.

[Jennifer (formerly Eccentric Muse) · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sweet and poignant story, with a cheeky and somewhat old-fashioned (even for the 50s) omniscient narrator, which adds to its charm. The Ancsas are a middle-aged couple in Communist Hungary that adopts a dog, or rather, she adopts them. Shortly after, Mr. Ancsa is imprisoned without a word of explanation. Déry explores political oppression and its effects through a non-anthropomorphic character study of a "little white terrier bitch" -- an Everydog -- named Niki. Really well-done, but have tissues on hand.

[Tatjana Bordukalo Nikšić · Rating 4 out of 5]

Na prvu, ova pripovijest pomalo podsjeća na Čehovljevu Kaštanku. S tom razlikom da je Kaštanka pisana u potpunosti iz perspektive psa, a Niki je ipak ispričana iz ljudske perspektive - sredovječnog bračnog para Ancsa kojima se pas Niki jednostavno odlučuje useliti u obitelj. Sve što se dalje dešava - i selidba, i gubitak posla, i političko hapšenje - ova skromna obitelj dijelit će sa psom, a kroz ponašanje i reakcije Niki proživljavamo i život njezinih novih gospodara.
Topla, emotivna i tužna priča.

[Judith · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would not have learned about this wonderful book except that the publisher NYRB contacted me about using the picture on the cover from my Flickr account, Antique Dog Photos. The picture was collected by my brother. The book concerns essence of a dog (especially a terrier) living in a very dark time in post war Hungary. Available on Amazon and from the publisher.

[Jonny Keen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not only was this book interesting, it also had a dog in it. What more do you want?

[Alejandro Orradre · Rating 4 out of 5]

Novela corta que narra las peripecias de una perra y en la que el autor intenta plasmar el mundo que el animal ve a través de sus ojos.

Niki: la historia de una perra no deja claro si lo que se lee es una fabulación sobre el pensamiento canino o un intento real de intentar adivinar qué pueden pensar los perros de los humanos, si tienen sentimientos y cuáles pueden ser sus motivaciones vitales. Ese tono de observación es lo que puede hacer dudar al lector a la hora de afrontar esta obra, que por otra parte está llena de ternura y bonitos pasajes que son una oda a la paz y la tranquilidad.

[Anne · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a lovely little book. It is the story of a dog, lovingly and beautifully portrayed, but it also describes the confusion, sadness and cruelty of living in a totalitarian state. It is a little gem which I would never have found without the New York Review of Books. As George Szirtes writes in his introduction, “Niki is spectacularly unspectacular. Niki is nothing special. It is just that she is closely observed by an outstanding writer, writing .... at the very end of his tether.”

[Valerie · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7275613@...

[Siskiyou-Suzy · Rating 2 out of 5]

What I remember about this book is the goddamn dog dying, right? So I can't ever re-read it. No need to torture myself.

[Marta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite the title, the book isn't really about the dog. It shows the political and social situation in Hungary during the Stalin era. After the war the residents of Budapest try to start a new life and rebuild, what they have lost. Unfortunately, the hope for a better life doesn't last long, as various people start disappearing in prisons and the atmosphere in the country is getting more and more dangerous. The people no longer are able to talk freely and even neighbors don't help each other in a difficult situation. The family of Ancsas is also being affected by the political changes. The only positive thing in their life seems to be Nika, the dog they've taken in. Unfortunately, even Nika seems to notice that the situation isn't ordinary, when her owner suddenly disappears and no one knows where he is...
Short, but brilliant. Definitely worth reading.

[L · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved how heart heavy this book was. I finished it a minute ago and the last two pages made me cry. Déry succeeded in creating a dog that lacked human attitudes which most dog books tend to not have. He made Niki come to life on the page and fully embody what a dog truly is. I could see every hair on Niki’s body and feel every difficulty that ailed Mrs. Ancsas. I loved this book for every part and for the ending that perfectly captured the essence of a dogs death. I loved that Mrs And Mr Ancsas refused at the beginning to open their hearts to a dog because they did not want a replacement for their dead child, and Niki was not a replacement child but rather a dog. Not a human but a living creature and the author never made us the reader forget that fact.

[Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite a combo here: the charm of dogs and the cruelty of Stalinist Hungary. It would be easy for Niki to become a mere symbol, an innocent victim of forces she can't understand, but she's rendered with detail that makes her a very ordinary and dog-like dog. The precise, clinical tone also play a big part in how well this book works--it's poignant but not at all mawkish IMO. Quick (120 page) and affecting read, even if it didn't quite measure up to that other Hungarian novel that prominently features a dog, the life-changingly good The Door.

[Pascale · Rating 2 out of 5]

Although I don't disagree with most of the glowing assessments of this book on Goodreads, I have a feeling it won't stick in my memory and feel let down by it, maybe because it had been on my to-read list for too long. Yes, it is utterly charming, and if you've ever been in love with a dog (as I have) it can't fail to make you smile. However, I found it a trifle heavy-handed. The best paragraph is the one in which Déry compares dogs, who have no conception of time, with human beings confronted to the arbitrariness of dictatorial régimes, writers who don't know why they choose to write what they write or even readers who can't account for choosing to read them.

[Lauren ❦ · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an incredible look into what the world felt like for those under the oppressive regime of Stalin's Hungary. I'm still in shock this made it past the censors, but the storytelling, while clinical, made sense given the time and the characters involved.

I don't want to spoil the story, but reading the heavy heartache and pain is something that reminded me deeply of how my Grandma, Great-Uncle, and Uncle felt about that time. But also, there was a continued sense of hope and desire to keep going, even when it doesn't feel worth it.

[Mia Kovač · Rating 5 out of 5]

it's a story about a loving dog, what more do you need. but fr it's a beautiful story about letting love enter your hearth, even in the darkest of times, even if it's in a shape of a dog. and, in the end, tears could be healing (10/10 crying session).

and if my words weren't good enough to explain the loveliness of this book, read this:

"The story of Niki, an ordinary dog, and the Ancsas, a no less ordinary couple, is an extraordinarily touching, utterly unsentimental, parable about caring, kindness, and the endurance of love."

[Jim Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I'm not a dog person, I seem to really like books about dogs! One of my earliest memories of reading is the Bowser the Hound series. White Jack, Old Yeller, and Virginia Woolf's Flush were also favorites. Now I can add Niki to that list. This short Hungarian novel not only describes the life of a couple's dog with astounding accuracy but also holds up the dog's life as a clever mirror to the life of ordinary citizens in a Communist society where they are treated like dogs by the state-- without reason or routine.

[Postmodjane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything is said about the novelette by the fact that Niki was nominated for the Nobel-prize.
Although from another point of view nothing is said about the text itself by this.
Everybody who would like to keep a dog should read it.
Everybody who has ever felt disappointment, injustice should read it.
Everybody should read it because it depicts as well as questions universal human values.
And the commonplace: Niki’s story not only represents the dog’s story.

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

I couldn’t help falling in love with Niki, the terrier bitch who wormed her way into the Ancsas’ heart because she needed a new home. Niki’s tale (no pun intended) parallels the story and tragedy of her owners struggles under a repressive and nonsensical Hungarian regime. The writing is exquisite. I highly recommend this short book which begins as the story of a very charming dog but ends showing what lack of freedom does both to Niki and Hungary.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

Egy kisregény, ami egy kutya életén keresztül mutatja be az emberek életét is. A korról, politikáról nem annyira tudok, azt nem éreztem át, viszont az, ahogy a szegény kutya a vidékről a városba költözve elveszíti a szabadságát, az megérintett.

Ahogy Nikit emberi nőkhöz hasonlítja - és ahogy így a kutyáról és a nőkről is ír - az néha eléggé kellemetlen, de egyébként tetszett a stílus és hogy igazán kidolgozta Niki érzelmeit.