Anna Sewell 1820 - 1878. Just from reading the book I would take a wild guess that she grew up with an alcoholic somewhere in the family. She really doesn't like them. Just a minute, she grew up a Quaker. She fell over at the age of 12 and due to lack of proper medical treatment, she was lame for the rest of her life. She got around in horse-drawn carriages - hence her love of horses and pleas for the humane treatment of animals.
She was sickly, it appears, for most of her life. She dictated Black Beauty to her mother from her bed over a 6 year period. It was published in 1877, when Anna was 57 years old. Black Beauty immediately did well and broke publishing records, at the time being the 'sixth best seller' in the English language. Go, you Beauty! Unfortunately for Anna, she died 5 months after publication.
It was intended to be only really for people who worked with horses, it was a plea to induce people to treat them with more understanding and kindness.
I really did like this book as a child, reading it now I'm not as big a fan, but it still plucked at the heartstrings one or two times.
Beauty is born into an idyllic and caring farm. Her mother is loving and the owner is humane to all animals under his care. The various servants around the place take care of animals and any mistreatment is punished. Sewell really pushes throughout the book that animals have no means to alter their living conditions if we have placed them in artificial ones. It is up to us to take care of their welfare.
For one reason after another, Beauty is successively sold into gradually worse conditions. His/Her innocence ( I recall that gender doesn't much come into it for horses) is replaced by wisdom and knowledge of the cruelty of man. I think about half of the wrongdoing towards horses in this book is caused by people who have been 'on the drink'. I wonder if a different attitude would have prevailed had this been written in continental Europe???
Anyway, the horses Beauty comes across all have their own stories to tell of life. I think only one horse that Beauty encounters doesn't have a past filled with cruelty or harshness. Ginger, who Beauty becomes quite good friends with, is known for her temper, but as she explains, she can't help it as she has only known cruelty from Man and why should she let herself be further exploited. The kindness of the place they are in does cool her attitude for a while. They are later sold together and she teaches Beauty how to 'buck' against their cruel conditions. They are soon separated and Beauty is exposed to much cruel treatment, in particular - the 'holding up' of horses' heads is discussed. The practice of keeping horses heads held right up so they look 'proud'. This damages their necks, windpipes and stamina. Beauty only has to put up with this briefly before moving on to a new owner, whose drunken stable hand whips the bejesus out of her causing her to stumble due to a missing shoe and ruins her knees. She is sold off to harsher treatment again and then onto a kind cabbie who is a good soul and has a loving wife and daughter. She encounters Ginger as well, who is looking the worse for wear and we are pretty sure we see her dead in a cart, taken through the streets of London. Beauty considers that this is a good thing, for Ginger is now in a better place than the 7 days a week hell she was in previous to this.
The cabbie takes a turn for the bad, and Beauty is sold to a 'hire horse' type place. It's the equivalent of our 'rent a car' yards. She is subjected to mercilesss treatment by those who hire her as they need to get the most value they can from her.
Eventually she collapses, is given a brief time to recover and sold. Turns out, she has been bought by a gent who was once a stable-hand years ago for Beauty and accidentally had given her pneumonia. He recognises her and vows to never sell her and she ends up in a nice little stable with a meadow nearby and some nice ladies to drive around occasionally. So it all ends up nice and cosy.
There are exhortations throughout to be kinder to animals and to see things from their point of view. I think it definitely influenced me when I was young and I do remember shedding a tear or two during my many readings of the book.
I don't know how well this is holding up now amongst the youngsters. Most of the 'occupations' Beauty finds herself are now all but obsolete. It still gets included in classics reprints, but it's not one that is spoken about much anymore, which is a pity as it really does help kids see things from the animal's point of view.
The cruelty in this is vivid, but dumbing it down as happens in most of today's children's books, does no one any favours whatsoever.
A good read.
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