Deterioration In The Dog Stars

“Grief is an element. It has its own cycle like the carbon cycle, the nitrogen. It never diminishes not ever. It passes in and out of everything” (Heller 115). Throughout tragedy primal values come to the surface of even the most civilized people. These types of intense feelings come from one of two places: fear or desperation. Throughout The Dog Stars by Peter Heller, Hig takes on roles on the dealing and receiving ends of new primal directives as protector and intruder while on his journey to and from Grand Junction. Cima and her father responded to Hig’s intrusion with the same unfinished emotion that Hig and Bangley possess when people intrude on their respective hangar and home. Both groups encompass fear and desperation through their

Famine and drought have combined with the flu epidemic and later disease. The struggle to keep their animals and themselves alive is a constant worry from Cima and her father. The threat of dehydration consumes their days and available energy; so when Hig arrived in his plane, they had no choice except to protect their limited resources from the unknown intruder (Heller 177). The same all-consuming desperation is also true for Hig. While he abandoned the house he called a home when his now deceased wife and child were still living, Hig desperately holds on to the little normalcy in his routine that remains. The highlight of which includes looking for Bangley and Bangley looking out for him. The two neighbors stick together throughout all the trials they are faced with. Whenever there is a threat near their dwelling or even when looking after the nearby Mennonites that they have gotten to know in the town over, the challenge is faced with the ambition required for the truly life or death situation (Heller 51). Both Cima and her father and Hig and Bangley are searching to fulfill their own needs during the extreme game of survival of the fittest that has enveloped their old lives. The human search for normalcy is shaken when put in danger and psychologically distorts the main character’s views on their fellow