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Anna Sewell's evocative, poignant and yes, often devastatingly brutal autobiography of a horse, her 1877 Black Beauty, is a novel which even though I very much and dearly cherish and appreciate (and consider it even a personal favourite), I am also glad to have first read as an adult, and NOT as a child. For with horses being amongst my favourite animals, particularly Black Beauty's many many trials and tribulations, his often neglectful and at times even deliberately cruelly abusive grooms and owners, the fact that there are also horses depicted who succumb, who perish due to abuse and neglect (with poor Ginger's suffering and death being especially sad, heartbreaking and infuriating), all this would have likely been much much too saddening for my sensitive childhood self (and indeed, I would thus not automatically recommend Black Beauty for younger children, and would also strongly encourage parents and caregivers to pre-read Black Beauty to check if the subject matter could perhaps not be too much for very sensitive children, and especially for children who are ethical vegetarians or vegans).
But as an adult (and I first read Black Beauty at around age twenty or so), I can not only appreciate both Beauty's life story, but also (and perhaps even more so) the historical fact that Anna Sewell's masterpiece (written with pathos, understanding, humanity, but also with gentleness and tenderness) actually did have a profound and socially relevant effect in so far that particularly in Great Britain, there was a deliberate move started to make life easier and less strenuous, less harsh for especially work and carriage horses (the eventual banning of the bearing reign which caused horses' heads to basically be yanked into a permanently unnaturally high position, and the even more horrid docking, cutting of horses' tails were two of the most well-known and necessary changes brought about partially due to the popularity of Black Beauty and the public outcry its publication engendered).
Now Black Beauty is a first person narrator who seems to think and feel as a human being would, albeit he is also not ever to be considered as an anthropomorphic and human-like equine, as Black Beauty cannot and does not actually speak to and with humans and still always looks, moves and acts like a typical horse. And this is actually also the case with all of the other horse characters being described in Black Beauty, as Ginger, Merrylegs and even Beauty's own mother all think and emote rather like humans would and with their thoughts and musings being textually presented by Anna Sewell, but that they also and always do act and react like typical horses in Black Beauty, not like horses in a humanoid costume, a for me profound and very much appreciated consideration. For I have never truly enjoyed very anthropomorphic animals all that much and especially so if they behave and are featured not according to their biological nature, but according to how people would act and react, and thus, if Black Beauty were to have actually spoken aloud, if he and the other equines of Black Beauty had been depicted as quasi talking horses, I would definitely not have enjoyed Anna Sewell's text all that much.
And considering that Anna Sewell was an invalid since an accident at age fourteen, and often confined to her bed (in almost constant, often excruciating pain for most of her adult life, she died very soon after Black Beauty's publication), the themes and also the writing style are exquisite and nuanced, balanced, showing not only Black Beauty's trials and tribulations, but also equally demonstrating tenderness, joy and much happiness (Beauty's life with his mother and original aristocratic owners, even his first sojourn as a London cab horse are happy, the latter being a rather hard working existence perhaps, but with a kind and thoughtful owner/driver who as much as possible strives to ease the often difficult conditions Beauty faces, until he himself falls ill due to thoughtless aristocratic customers keeping the carriage waiting in the pelting rain and snow, as they arrogantly enjoy society's extravagances). And while Sewell's story does, indeed, hold very clear and powerful pleas for a change in attitudes towards horses, towards poverty, it is nevertheless Black Beauty's own biography that shines through (Black Beauty is thus not simply preachiness, and while the messages are obvious and thankfully strongly and emassdioantely presented, the plot, the themes, the tale itself for Black Beauty always comes first and is as readable and as approachable today as it was in the late 19th century and that is certainly saying an awful lot and all of it good and nicely affirmative and positive).
But as an adult (and I first read Black Beauty at around age twenty or so), I can not only appreciate both Beauty's life story, but also (and perhaps even more so) the historical fact that Anna Sewell's masterpiece (written with pathos, understanding, humanity, but also with gentleness and tenderness) actually did have a profound and socially relevant effect in so far that particularly in Great Britain, there was a deliberate move started to make life easier and less strenuous, less harsh for especially work and carriage horses (the eventual banning of the bearing reign which caused horses' heads to basically be yanked into a permanently unnaturally high position, and the even more horrid docking, cutting of horses' tails were two of the most well-known and necessary changes brought about partially due to the popularity of Black Beauty and the public outcry its publication engendered).
Now Black Beauty is a first person narrator who seems to think and feel as a human being would, albeit he is also not ever to be considered as an anthropomorphic and human-like equine, as Black Beauty cannot and does not actually speak to and with humans and still always looks, moves and acts like a typical horse. And this is actually also the case with all of the other horse characters being described in Black Beauty, as Ginger, Merrylegs and even Beauty's own mother all think and emote rather like humans would and with their thoughts and musings being textually presented by Anna Sewell, but that they also and always do act and react like typical horses in Black Beauty, not like horses in a humanoid costume, a for me profound and very much appreciated consideration. For I have never truly enjoyed very anthropomorphic animals all that much and especially so if they behave and are featured not according to their biological nature, but according to how people would act and react, and thus, if Black Beauty were to have actually spoken aloud, if he and the other equines of Black Beauty had been depicted as quasi talking horses, I would definitely not have enjoyed Anna Sewell's text all that much.
And considering that Anna Sewell was an invalid since an accident at age fourteen, and often confined to her bed (in almost constant, often excruciating pain for most of her adult life, she died very soon after Black Beauty's publication), the themes and also the writing style are exquisite and nuanced, balanced, showing not only Black Beauty's trials and tribulations, but also equally demonstrating tenderness, joy and much happiness (Beauty's life with his mother and original aristocratic owners, even his first sojourn as a London cab horse are happy, the latter being a rather hard working existence perhaps, but with a kind and thoughtful owner/driver who as much as possible strives to ease the often difficult conditions Beauty faces, until he himself falls ill due to thoughtless aristocratic customers keeping the carriage waiting in the pelting rain and snow, as they arrogantly enjoy society's extravagances). And while Sewell's story does, indeed, hold very clear and powerful pleas for a change in attitudes towards horses, towards poverty, it is nevertheless Black Beauty's own biography that shines through (Black Beauty is thus not simply preachiness, and while the messages are obvious and thankfully strongly and emassdioantely presented, the plot, the themes, the tale itself for Black Beauty always comes first and is as readable and as approachable today as it was in the late 19th century and that is certainly saying an awful lot and all of it good and nicely affirmative and positive).
