My talks with Dean Spanley

the long version

This is a short comic novel, very focused on the idea of reincarnation. The protagonist is a British gentleman c.1900, who has read of the Hindu idea that a man might be reincarnated as an animal, or vice-versa. When he discovers that Dean Spanley, a member of his club, remembers his life as a dog, he becomes obsessed with learning more. The problem is that the Dean (an honorific title) only speaks of his previous life as a dog under the influence of the right amount of a rare wine, Imperial Tokay, so that he has to enlist the help of a man who specializes in finding rare items. The best parts of the novel are the Dean's memories of what it was like to be a dog on a large estate. The 2008 movie "Dean Spanley" captures the essence of the novel well.