Shagpiles and Borderlines

Press, 19 December 1981, Page 18

Shagpiles and Borderlines

Intelligent and Loyal — A Celebration of the Mongrel. By Jilly Cooper. Eyre Methuen, 1981. 221 pp. Illustrated. Index. $19.95. (Reviewed by Doreen Mansbridge) There never has been another dog book like Jilly Cooper’s “Intelligent and Loyal.” With library shelves full of “breed” books, she hoped to strike a blow for “mongrellib” by writing a non-fiction book devoted entirely to mongrels. At once, she found a major problem with research — there was no available literature on the subject. To overcome this she had an advertisement inserted in “The Times” and the “Daily Telegraph” in London, asking for information from .mongrel owners. To her amazement, she was swamped with replies — and what stories they were. Illogically still surprised by man’s sickening cruelty to his “best friend," I shed tears at the appalling start to life which some of these dogs had endured. I felt tears, too. at the moving letters Jilly Cooper received when a mongrel pet finally left an aching gap in an owner’s life, perhaps after a companionship lasting 15 years or more.

I. laughed aloud at the many funny canine exploits in love, in fights, in England and abroad, and in a time span from before the First World War. to the present. Breed books are reluctant to admit to failings or problems; such reticence does not exist amongst the mongrel fraternity and owners have told all about their pets with delightful frankness. . i No less engaging are the many photographs that accompanied the letters, all fitting into Jilly Cooper’s categorised identifying types — a vertical shagpile, a family circler, a borderline collie, or a Bertrand Russell.

Graham Wood, a staff photographer on the London "Daily Mail,” also supplied pictures of “dog life." Jilly Cooper has worked for 10 years as a columnist on the London “Sunday Times” and has written 10 previous books. A very grand, but stupid, acquaintance of hers asked her what breed her three dogs were. “Mongrels.” she replied. The woman drew back in horror, then remembering her manners said. “Well, they’re supposed to be awfully intelligent and loyal, aren't they?”

A marvellous Christmas present for a dog lover.