Previous
George Orwell
Dr. Yazdovsky is the lead scientist of the Soviet space program in “Plautus: A Memoir.” Plautus finds Dr. Yazdovsky impressively kind—for instance, when the dog Laika ran away the day before she was supposed to be launched into space, Dr. Yazdovsky was concerned only that the wolves surrounding the compound would eat her. He loves Plautus the most of all his lab animals. When it comes to sending animals into space, though, Dr. Yazdovsky prefers small, white, female dogs because they show up better on film. It’s not until 1968 that Dr. Yazdovsky decides Plautus should go to space. He chooses her to be the first animal to orbit the moon because tortoises don’t eat as much as dogs, and he hopes she’ll hibernate. He seems to believe she’ll survive the journey, but like many of the dogs, Plautus dies.
Dr. Yazdovsky Quotes in Only the Animals
The Only the Animals quotes below are all either spoken by Dr. Yazdovsky or refer to Dr. Yazdovsky. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Plautus: A Memoir of My Years on Earth and Last Days in Space: Soul of Tortoise
Quotes
The Soviets were sending animals into space like there was no tomorrow (which, for the animals, there mostly wasn’t), desperate to finalise their research on the viability of manned space flight and the effects on living creatures of prolonged weightlessness and radiation from the Van Allen belts, and get a man on the moon before the Americans. They’d heard rumors that the Americans had sent a bunch of black mice into space and the cosmic rays had turned them grey; this would be undesirable in humans.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Only the Animals LitChart as a printable PDF.
Dr. Yazdovsky Quotes in Only the Animals
The Only the Animals quotes below are all either spoken by Dr. Yazdovsky or refer to Dr. Yazdovsky. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Plautus: A Memoir of My Years on Earth and Last Days in Space: Soul of Tortoise
Quotes
The Soviets were sending animals into space like there was no tomorrow (which, for the animals, there mostly wasn’t), desperate to finalise their research on the viability of manned space flight and the effects on living creatures of prolonged weightlessness and radiation from the Van Allen belts, and get a man on the moon before the Americans. They’d heard rumors that the Americans had sent a bunch of black mice into space and the cosmic rays had turned them grey; this would be undesirable in humans.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
