Fifteen Dogs

“You can’t know what a life has been until it is over.” Fifteen Dogs, André Alexis

Is it possible to die happy? That is the question the gods Hermes and Apollo ponder over a beer at the Wheatsheaf Tavern in Toronto. They make a bet, grant 15 dogs human consciousness, and watch from above as the pups discover the poetry and the pitfalls of complex thought and emotion. In this modern-day fable of fate, faith, love, and language, the pack must reckon with morality and mortality and the profound relationships they share with humans.   

Fifteen Dogs, the beloved, global bestseller by Toronto writer André Alexis, won the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, and Canada Reads. Adapter and director Marie Farsi directed the wildly successful Ghost Quartet in 2019 for Crow’s Theatre, where she was Associate Artistic Director for two seasons.