"Kashtanka" - Anton Chekov's short story about a dog with two masters - is a fable about the conundrum of the creative life. The dog Kashtanka belongs to a drunken carpenter who takes her out one day, but on the way home loses her in the confusion of a military parade. The story is told by an omniscient narrator who privileges Kashtanka's point of view, so we follow the dog's subsequent adventures largely from her eyes.