The Book of the Dun Cow (novel)

The Book of the Dun Cow (1978) is a fantasy novel by Walter Wangerin, Jr.. It is loosely based upon the beast fable of Chanticleer and the Fox adapted from the story of "The Nun's Priest's Tale" from Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

The Book was named The New York Times Best Children's Book of the Year and its first paperback edition won a U.S. National Book Award in the one-year category Science Fiction.

It was later adapted as a musical by Mark St. Germain and Randy Courts, and produced as an Off-Broadway show in 2006 by The Prospect Theater Company.

Wangerin wrote two sequels, The Book of Sorrows (1985) and "Peace at the Last" (2013).

The novel begins with the introduction of the hero, Chauntecleer, a rooster in command of a company of hens, and the land surrounding his coop. The story takes place at a time when humans have not yet made an appearance upon the Earth (a time before the Book of Genesis). Animals have been put on earth before man in order to protect the world from an ancient evil Wyrm, which is trapped at the center of the Earth. Chauntecleer, while not a bad ruler, is a flawed character, somewhat quick to anger, and self-important. The novel's initial chapters define several important characters as well as the origins of the main antagonists in the book, Wyrm and Cockatrice.

While Chauntecleer spends his days dealing with a rogue rat that has invaded his coop, and trying to become accustomed to a newcomer, Mundo Cani, a depressed dog that is always crying out in anguish, the reader is shown another country from across the river. There is where the author introduces the evil in the book. For in the land away from Chauntecleer's there lives another rooster named Senex. He is a rather weak ruler, and his barnyard subjects don't think anything of him. What troubles Senex the most is his lack of a son, which he mourns greatly over. One day though, he is spoken to by Wyrm, who communicates to him through dreams. Wyrm instructs Senex to have faith in him, and to wait for him to deliver Senex a son of his own. Senex does exactly what his visions request, and soon he manages to lay an egg, defying the natural order of mating. Eventually the egg hatches, though what appears from it is a horror beyond words.

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