Cruelty and Black Beauty

It is interesting how subtle a children’s novel can read from the perspective of an adolescent and an adult. I was always a horse enthusiast growing up, and read every young adult’s novel about horses. I loved the story of Black Beauty both as a novel and a movie. However, even after the fourth time I read the novel as a child, I never picked up on the blatant comments on animal cruelty from Beauty’s point of view.



The constant desire for horses to please was a common trait I had learned growing up on the ranch at home. When Beauty’s mother tells him that “the better [he] behaved, the better [he] should be treated, and that it was wisest always to do my best to please [his] master,” I was not surprised (Chapter 3, pg13). Yet I began to wonder if it were fair to domesticate and train horses to understand us as “master” and their fate to be determined by their ability to serve us. I am sitting at a horse show in Gifford, IL right now in front of my horse’s stall doing my homework. He does not look at me in fear nor does he seem miserable or unhappy. I have already shown him in five events this morning and he has given me 100%. But I wonder if he is happy competing as a famous show horse or if we trained him to think he was happy and to enjoy competing.



Black Beauty gives its reader the perspective of horse-human interaction from the horse’s point of view. The horse’s views of animal rights are not out of line and they persuade readers to understand their plight of bondage. The pony, Merrylegs, explains that “Boys, you see, think a horse or pony is like a steam engine or a thrashing machine, and can go on as long and as fast as they please; they never think that a pony can get tired, or have any feelings” (Ch 9, pg34). I can understand that at the time when this novel was written and horses were a means of transportation, that people would see them as we see cars today – inanimate objects designed to get us from Point A to Point B. However, we also want pretty flashy cars. Thus, Ginger shows her disgust of fashion when remembering Skye’s puppies that were “bleeding and crying pitifully; they had all had a piece of their tails cut off, and the soft flap of their pretty little ears was quite cut off” (Ch 9, pg38). She asks why humans don’t cut their own children’s ears to look “sharp” and in regards to how humans treat animals, I can’t answer that question. Its a fair point.



Since I run a horse training facility, I fully support John’s mission at the end of Part I. He explains that “many young animals are frightened and spoiled by wrong treatment which need not be; if the right man took them in hand. [He] always gets on well with horses, and if [he] could help some of them to a fair start, [he] should feel as if [he] was doing some good” (Ch 21, pg80). John’s point of view seems to be that society depends upon horses for transportation and that humans owe them respect and a proper quality of life. This idea is consistent with Sewell's idea that in "bustling Victorian London's society, transportation and industry was dependent on horse power" (837). This is why I feel as though showing my horse today is not a cruel where I force him to act as my personal slave to make me happy. Instead, he lives in a 12x36 foot stall at home with a large grassy turn out. He eats the best alfalfa hay from Mexico and sweet feed five times a day and get s ridden four times a week to stay in shape to compete. He has the utmost veterinary care, an air ride climate controlled trailer to ride in and me who would probably buy him anything he needed. When there are horses being turned out on interstates all over I-10 in west Texas because they can’t afford to keep them and the kill plants are closed, is what I am doing really considered cruel?



I do not think that I am cruel. I just believe that Sewell's novel was sucessful in persuading its readers to feel a "conscious awakening about the ethical treatment of all beings" (838).