The fly ran away in fear of the frog, who ran from the cat, who ran from the dog.
A Fly Went By is a children's book by Mike McClintock.
In it, the narrator (a little boy) is sitting around by a lake when he sees a fly flying past in fear of a frog. However, the frog does not actually want to eat the fly; he is just running away from a cat, who in turn is running away from a dog, leading to a whole chain of animals, all of whom wrongly think the one behind them wants to hurt or kill them.
The story follow's the boy's journey as he seeks to find out who is at the beginning of the chain and stop them.
A Fly Went By provides examples of:
- Ambiguous Gender: It's unclear whether the sheep is a ram or a ewe, since unlike the other characters, who are referred to as "he" or "she", it is only referred to as "it".
- Animal Jingoism: Subverted. The cat thinks the dog wants to bite him, but it turns out the dog was just running in fear of a pig.
- Animal Lover: Implied for the boy, who goes out of his way to help all the animals and scold whoever he thinks is threatening them.
- Bewildering Punishment: When the boy threatens to whip the fox and accuses him of wanting to kill the little cow, he is confused and asks what he did.
- Book Ends: The story begins and ends with the boy sitting by the lake and looking at the sky.
- Dark Is Not Evil:
- The dog thought the pig wanted to bite him because she was very large, but she turned out to be harmless.
- The pig thought the cow wanted to hit her because she had big horns, but the cow was also innocent.
- The fox thought the man wanted to kill him because he was carrying a gun, but he didn't want to kill him either.
- Dramatic Irony: While we find out about a character's innocence at the same time the boy does, the character who runs in fear of them never finds out until the end.
- Failed a Spot Check: The man is suspected of wanting to shoot the fox, but it turns out that he didn't even see a fox.
- Foul Fox: Subverted. The fox is suspected of wanting to kill the calf, but he turns out to not want to.
- Friend to Bugs: The boy is willing to stop the frog from eating the fly.
- Irony: The characters all thought that the one behind them wanted to hurt, or in some cases, kill them, but they turned out to be just as scared as the others were, with the exception of the sheep, who started the whole thing but was just an innocent sheep in need of help.
- Mistaken for Insane: When the boy confronts the pig, he wonders if she's "out of [her] head" for allegedly wanting to bite the dog. However, she isn't out of her head; she's running away from a cow.
- Mistaken for Murderer: A few of the animals wrongly think someone wants them dead:
- The fly thinks the frog wants to eat him.
- The frog thinks the cat wants to eat him.
- The cow thinks the fox wants to eat her calf.
- The man thinks that whatever made the thumping noise (which turns out to be a sheep with a can on its hoof) wants to kill him.
- No Antagonist: The majority of the animals, plus the man, were only running in fear from what they thought was an adversary. It is eventually traced back to a sheep with a can on its hoof, who didn't mean to scare the man.
- Predators Are Mean: Zigzagged. A frog is seen as bad for chasing a fly... but it turns out he didn't even want the fly... he was trying to get away from a cat... who was also innocent. Somewhere along the line, a cow believes a fox wants to kill her calf and he's portrayed unsympathetically... until it turns out he's also running away, this time from a man with a gun.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
- When the boy meets the dog, he says, "Now stop! You are the one, who did all this! Why did you run? Why did you want to bite that cat? Oh, you are bad to be like that!".
- When he meets the pig, he says, "So YOU are the one, in back of all this! Now, why do you run? Now, why would a pig bite a dog? And why are you mad? Are you out of your head?".
- When he meets the fox, he says, "Oh, shame on you! Oh, shame, shame, shame for what you do! You want to kill the little cow! You stop or I will whip you— NOW!".
- Red Is Violent: The man thinks that whatever made the noise is "big and fat and bad and red". It isn't, though. It turns out to be a sheep with a can on his foot.
- Talking Animal: All of the animals can speak, but otherwise behave according to their species.
- Would Hit a Girl: Subverted for the fox, who's suspected of wanting to kill the calf (who is probably a female, since she's described as "a little cow") but he turns out to not be interested in them; he's just running from a man he thinks will shoot him.
- Would Hurt a Child: Subverted for the fox. The cow thought that he wanted to kill her calf, but he didn't.
