The Science of Monsters

Just the name Cujo conjures images of snarling teeth and bestial violence. Ever since Stephen King’s novel debuted in 1981, Cujo has come to describe any sort of vicious dog. While the TV series Lassie (1954–1974), and films like 101 Dalmatians (1961) and Beethoven (1992) showcase the lovable traits of human’s best friend, King’s novel and its film version Cujo (1983) depict what happens when dogs go bad. In the first scenes of the film, Cujo appears how we would normally assume a dog to be. He seems happy and curious, enjoying a summer day in the fields of Maine. Lassie’s day would have ended there, with nothing more treacherous than perhaps having to save a child who’d fallen down a well. But for Cujo, this is when the horror begins. On a hunt for a spry rabbit, Cujo sticks his fluffy head into a cave. Suddenly, a bat bites poor Cujo on the nose! While these sorts of misadventures happen in any number of children’s movies (remember when Milo the cat gets his lip pinched by a crab in Milo and Otis (1986)? Cujo is a horror film from the get-go. It is this bat’s bite that sets in motion the tragic story of Cujo the dog and the unfortunate humans around him.

Bats have long been characterized as villains. Count Dracula and his contemporaries could transform into the winged creatures, spreading vampirism across the lands of Europe and beyond. In The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) a victim is murdered by a large, bloodthirsty bat, secreted in his room for the purpose of his demise. A bat also attacks in Suspiria (1977), getting caught in the long hair of main character Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper). So, what is it about bats that cause many of us to shudder? Biologist Elizabeth Hagen can guess why people have a natural aversion to the nocturnal animals. “Most people are afraid of bats because they think that all bats have rabies.”¹ This, of course, is the case in Cujo and perhaps this story has perpetuated the myth that bats are more likely to carry rabies than other animals. Hagen insists that in reality “very few bats have rabies.”

Bats can be carriers of rabies but very few are.

Dogs, too, can strike fear. This is less common, as dogs are often portrayed as kind, cute, and innocent in media. Cynophobia, the clinical term for the “irrational and persistent”² fear of canines, is often brought on by a traumatic experience with a dog. Phobias can bring about both physical and emotional symptoms. An important distinction is that a person suffering from cynophobia would be afraid of Cujo even before he was stricken with rabies. Most of us don’t have cynophobia, and with over forty-two million³ households with dogs in the United States alone, they are a ubiquitous piece of our cultural puzzle. Despite their prominence in our lives as symbols of good, there have been occasions when they were characterized as monsters long before Cujo. If the “boy next door” can be frightening, as in the case of gentle-seeming Norman Bates of Psycho, then what is more horrific than the darling creature at your feet turning on you?

Cujo is not the first dog in literature to have rabies. Meg remembers the emotional reaction she had to Tim Johnson’s death in Harper Lee’s masterpiece To Kill a Mockingbird (1960). It’s a scene, both in the book and in the 1962 Gregory Peck film, that has stuck with her. Tim, a happy-go-lucky dog, is infected by rabies. He becomes “mad,” foaming at the mouth and snarling as menacing as Cujo. Many a high school teacher has speculated over the symbolism of Tim Johnson. The poor dog has been described as an emblem of racism, mob rule, and injustice. He is then killed by Atticus Finch, a necessary compassion for the animal, and a preventative measure to avoid human death.

If only Atticus Finch had lived in Castle Rock.

Aside from the obvious association our beloved pets have with the werewolf, there is a supernatural being known as the “black dog” which shares even more canine traits. The folklore surrounding black dogs dates back to the sixteenth century when “on August the 14th in the year 1577 the ‘Black Dog’ was responsible for killing a mass of people who were praying in a Church which was situated in East Anglia.”⁴ From its inception, the black dog has found particular purchase in the UK, from the beaches of Cornwall to the moors of Yorkshire, where sightings of these unnatural beings have been reported. These black dogs are larger than any house pet, and, interestingly, they are considered to be nocturnal and have glowing eyes, which is a striking link to the feared bats. They are unlike werewolves in that black dogs are believed to be ghosts or demons, canine creatures that exist in the hazy border between our world and the world of the dead.