Where to Exist in a World of Men and Dogs

There is a character in Disgrace that only appears briefly but seems to have knowledge of David and how his life will and has played out.  The character is the unnamed young man who is Melanie’s boyfriend.  In the beginning of the novel he comes into Professor Lurie’s office and confronts him about sleeping with Melanie.  He says, “And don’t think you can just walk into people’s lives and walk out again when it suits you.”  This line, more than any other sums up David’s entire life, and how he interacts with the other characters.  His relationship in the beginning of the novel with Soraya ends after he got too curious, and followed her and her boys around town.  She ended the relationship but only after he found out too much, after he interfered with their routine and as a result she moved, changed her contact info and had to do all of this because of David.  Obviously he walks into Melanie’s life and causes all manner of problems.  While she made her share of decisions, David pushed and began the whole thing, so once again he interfered. He had the option of staying at the university but he was stubborn and he decided to leave, to “walk out”.  Then he moves on, on to Lucy and her simple life, here again he questions and prods, trying to find his place as a father who has been absent for so long.  He stays with Lucy through their troubles but he is always pushing her to leave, to walk away and start over somewhere else, to do what he has done so often.  Leave one setting, one woman, in favor of new beginnings, a safer place, away from robbers, rapists or angry husbands/boyfriends.  David again encounters the young man toward the end of the novel, where he says, “Only doing you a favor, prof. didn’t you learn your lesson? ‘What was my lesson?’ Stay with your own kind.”  Stay with your own kind, the wanderers, the nomads, the whores, who are David’s kind?  That question can provoke a whole new discussion but for now, David is alone in the novel.  None of the other characters are wanderers, Lucy has settled and does not wish to leave, Melanie strayed from her path but she has been put back on it.  Bev and Petrus and all the other people David encounters work to continue their lives as they are, they have a goal and no desire to start again.  David cannot stay with any of the people he knows because they are not his kind, he is alone in this sense and that is why I feel he develops such a strong attraction to the dogs.  His life is that of a curious puppy, poking its snout into everything it can and moving on as soon as it becomes bored.  His attachment to the dogs allows him to feel connected again, like he is part of the world that he exists in, instead of an outsider, stopping here and there on the way to an unknown end. 

Also here's a link to an interesting look at the relationship between David and the dogs in Disgrace .
 http://research.uvu.edu/albrecht-crane/3090/Herron.pdf