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73rd out of 7,902 books
—
39,459 voters
Black Beauty
by
Anna Sewell
A horse is a horse of course unless of course the horse is Black Beauty. Animal-loving children have been devoted to Black Beauty throughout this century, and no doubt will continue through the next.
Although Anna Sewell's classic paints a clear picture of turn-of-the-century London, its message is universal and timeless: animals will serve humans well if they are treated...more
Although Anna Sewell's classic paints a clear picture of turn-of-the-century London, its message is universal and timeless: animals will serve humans well if they are treated...more
Paperback, 245 pages
Published
March 1st 2003
by Scholastic Paperbacks
(first published 1877)
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Feb 26, 2011
Susan
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
favoritechildhoodstories
This is the first book I ever read. I remember the day that I brought it in to show to my teacher, Miss Gerardi. She asked me if I could read it, so I started reading it aloud to her right away.
The story is told in Black Beauty's own words. Beauty's friends are hard to forget, especially high-spirited Ginger. Anna Sewall's words are full of loving empathy for these beautiful animals. The story was set in 19th century England, at a time when almost everyone came into frequent contact with horses...more
The story is told in Black Beauty's own words. Beauty's friends are hard to forget, especially high-spirited Ginger. Anna Sewall's words are full of loving empathy for these beautiful animals. The story was set in 19th century England, at a time when almost everyone came into frequent contact with horses...more
I'm sorry, I read this book when I was 6 or 7 and it almost scarred me for life..the sight of Ginger's body being carted away stayed with me for years. Between this, Where the Red Fern Grows, The Yearling, and of course Old Yeller I have to assume that somewhere there is a Marquis de Sade school of children's literature. I never gave these to my children as they were growing up (they had to make do with Narnia, Charlie Bucket, and some others). Neither the books nor the movies did I take them to...more
Aug 28, 2007
Lisa Vegan
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
anyoone who loves horses or well written children's literature
This book probably deserves 5 stars or at least 4, and I do recommend it to everyone, especially to girls who love horses. I’m giving it only 3 stars, however, not because I wasn’t one of those girls who were big horse fans (which I wasn’t really), but because for me it was just too emotionally harrowing. This might have been the first book I ever read that made me sick with depression. The horse goes through a lot of suffering in this book. Not for the overly sensitive but a beautifully told st...more
I revisited this classic horse story not knowing what to expect, really. I have found that I can't really trust my childhood memories. In this case, however, the years made no difference. The odd thing I noticed while reading this book was how completely I'd internalized the messages regarding animals and how one should treat them. I know that I must have read this 20 or 30 times before I was 14, but I didn't realize that I was memorizing whole chunks of it and grafting it into my moral code. It...more
Black Beauty is one of those rare books that can preach without being preachy. Anna Sewell wrote this to illustrate the abuse of horses, in particulary the harsh use of the bearing rein. The bearing rein was used to get the horse's head arched, but made it difficult for the horse to breathe and near impossible for the horse to pull a carriage uphill. When Sewell died, the hearse to carry her body used horses with bearing reins. Her mother went out and made the driver get rid of them.
Another Sewe...more
Another Sewe...more
Apr 06, 2008
Johnny Waco
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
childrens-literature
The Victorian period saw a dramatic rise in the middle class and in the leisure time that this new class had to spend on themselves and their causes. Childhood became more important to the middle class and so the first flowering of children's books, a genre that has prospered up until our own time. One of the great Victorian children's novels is Black Beauty, which illustrated the virtues of obedience and cheerfulness, while also bringing the issue of animal abuse into the public eye.
Black Beaut...more
Black Beaut...more
Ah, the Victorians! I had no idea that this book wasn't in fact a cute story about a horse, but actually a treatise on animal cruelty. So there I was, reading this book aloud to my three-year-old, and skimming over things like horses being beaten to death or just whipped until blood is dripping in the streets of London! WOW! It's a great book, but I think it's definitely for older children, who can handle this sort of realism and will be able to discuss their feelings with you.
One of my all time favourite classic. It comes out from the horse's mouth literally. Transports one to get a glimpse of the lives of horses,their agonies and feelings that creates a feeling of pity towards them. While humans undergo suffering,the animals are a step further in this aspect and certainly proves the fact that the grass is not greener on the other side.
Sep 18, 2007
Jordan
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
horse lovers
Shelves:
animals,
literature
I was so in love with horses from a young age and I remember crying my little eyes out when I read this book. It broke my heart when poor Black Beauty was abused and broken. I was elated when Beauty was reunited with a former caregiver. This classic story is great and a must for anyone who cares for animals.
My first written introduction into the wrd of animal cruelty. As an animal loving youngster of about 7 years, this book made me angry, made me cry. It had stayed with me always, though I could never read it again - too upsetting. An important book with as much relevance today as when it was written, sadly.
I would like to swap this book!
I really liked this book! It tells about a horse called: Black Beauty that will have an amazing adventure through his life!
Read the book to know his adventure!
I really liked this book! It tells about a horse called: Black Beauty that will have an amazing adventure through his life!
Read the book to know his adventure!
No book review by a horse loving reader would be complete without this childrens classice. I still have my copy after what must be 50 years.
‘Black Beauty’ by Anna Sewell is the timeless tale of life in Victorian era Britain through the eyes of the main protagonist, Black Beauty himself. The story begins with the horse’s carefree life as a young colt through to his difficult life pulling cabs under different owners and finally to his happy retirement in the countryside. The story was revolutionary in its time and helped to bring about changes in people’s attitudes to animal welfare and ultimately changes in the law also, something th...more
Wow, well to start with I am the type of girl that tends to read EVERYTHING in books, forewords, recommendations, epilogue's, you name it, I read it-or in some cases skip if it is boring!. In the case of this book, I am really grateful for that commitment to detail as the Life and Times section preceding the story so impressed me. Not only was this book Anna Sewell's only book, it changed the world in a way that has stayed with me in a very powerful way. So clever was her approach in linking the...more
Oct 03, 2009
Dee
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Anyone who loves animals.
Words can not describe the beauty and atmosphere of Anna Sewell's "Black Beauty". This classic follows the story of the remarkable Black Beauty, who spent his whole life working almost non-stop for the sake of his one-too-many masters. Injured by one, cared for by another, Black Beauty has been through it all. The majority of the story goes into depth about how horses were treated back in the 1800s--how the bearing rein slowly and painfully injured them, how most cab drivers forced the horses to...more
I really enjoyed this book as well. I thought it might just be a story about a horse and horses in general, which it is, but it was MUCH more than that. It was a story about Redemption. It too was the hero's journey. The hero was the the horse. I loved learning about the masters and how they treated their horses because I think there's much to learn about parenting through the relationships of all the horses with their masters. The way the masters treated their horses had EVERYTHING to do with h...more
Oct 13, 2007
Chicklet
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
animal rights activists
Shelves:
classics
Don't write this off as a horse-loving girl story.
Black Beauty delves into the cruel and unregulated treatment of horses during its time period. I like to think that this story inspired better laws regarding animal cruelty.
It is not simply a story with an agenda. It is a good story and still worth recomending to an elementary student. (Which is when I read it.) It is through the viewpoint of the horse.
If you enjoyed Wild Animals I Have Known, Old Yeller, or Where the Red Fern Grows, you are...more
Black Beauty delves into the cruel and unregulated treatment of horses during its time period. I like to think that this story inspired better laws regarding animal cruelty.
It is not simply a story with an agenda. It is a good story and still worth recomending to an elementary student. (Which is when I read it.) It is through the viewpoint of the horse.
If you enjoyed Wild Animals I Have Known, Old Yeller, or Where the Red Fern Grows, you are...more
This book has crowned my living room bookshelf for several years and it can never be replaced. The story, told from the point of view of a sweet and carefree horse, wraps you up in an adventure that will leave you tingling. The detail, the story line, the exquisite charm that this book radiates, all endear it to anyone who loves animals.
With no beating around the bush this book tells the cruel truth of the lives of some horses, and explains it all from their view point.
Full of lively and reali...more
With no beating around the bush this book tells the cruel truth of the lives of some horses, and explains it all from their view point.
Full of lively and reali...more
What can I say about this? I read it because it is on the BBC Big Read Top 100 books and I'm trying to read them all.
It's an old fashioned book for girls who like horses. I'm a grown man who has no interest in horses.
It's essentially a guide about how to look after a horse written in the style of an autobiography of a horse written in the first person. Basically as horse has a good owner, then a bad owner, then a good owner, then a bad owner and so on.
If this is the 53rd best book ever then I'm...more
It's an old fashioned book for girls who like horses. I'm a grown man who has no interest in horses.
It's essentially a guide about how to look after a horse written in the style of an autobiography of a horse written in the first person. Basically as horse has a good owner, then a bad owner, then a good owner, then a bad owner and so on.
If this is the 53rd best book ever then I'm...more
I read this at the same time as my 9 year old, and we both truly enjoyed it. Besides a great, touching story that is well-written and from an unusual point of view, this novel addresses important issues that I was able to discuss with my son: treatment of animals, keeping the Sabbath, kindness versus selfishness, doing your best work, and others. Very readable to young children...we read the original text without too much trouble and that's not always possible with those "old" books. Add this to...more
Ok, I really enjoyed this book. It was published in 1877 and is a book focused on humane animal treatment, from that far back! Mind you, this is not, "using animals to perform work is bad," but more, "whipping a horse to death is wrong" sort of animal rights advocacy, which I think we can all agree is a good thing. But that is not really the part about it that I liked. I enjoyed the parallels between how humans behave around animals and what it reveals about their true characters. This book is f...more
Black Beauty
First of all, English is not my first language and secondly I always love horses though I never own one. So I'm being enthusiastic is understatement. I was beyond that when I found this book. The beginning chapter is being easy enough to understand. You learn the horse life and I'm feeling like I'm the horse myself. This story has many moral values and the most important is you need to care for animals as they also have feelings.
This book teach me so much about horses. I was actuall...more
First of all, English is not my first language and secondly I always love horses though I never own one. So I'm being enthusiastic is understatement. I was beyond that when I found this book. The beginning chapter is being easy enough to understand. You learn the horse life and I'm feeling like I'm the horse myself. This story has many moral values and the most important is you need to care for animals as they also have feelings.
This book teach me so much about horses. I was actuall...more
Having just reviewed
War Horse
, I thought I'd reflect on this. It was Anna Sewell's only book. She was devoutly religious and an invalid; she dictated some of the book to her mother, and wrote some laboriously in bed over her final years. The book is marked by an extraordinarily piercing, almost obsessive, anthropomorphic empathy for suffering. I've noticed many Goodreads reviewers commenting on what a fraught, harrowing experience it was to read it as a child, but it wasn't meant for children...more
“My doctrine is this, that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt.” This is a quote from Black Beauty. This portrays one on of the characters personality, John, who is a kind stable hand at the first stable Black Beauty, went to. I grew to like this character as the story went on how caring he is and how people who come from backgrounds like his would not expect them to be as kind as he is. This book is amazing with the l...more
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One of my favourite books. I was about eight years old the first time I read it, and got very upset about any kind of cruelty to animals. I cried when I read about Ginger’s fate and got so angry. I also felt like Ginger was being punished for being rebellious, whereas to some extent Black Beauty’s compliance and kind nature helped him to survive.
I was, and still am, greatly moved by the reason Anna Sewell wrote the book and the fact IT DID MAKE A DIFFERENCE. She changed things for the better and...more
I was, and still am, greatly moved by the reason Anna Sewell wrote the book and the fact IT DID MAKE A DIFFERENCE. She changed things for the better and...more
To be honest, this autobiography is pretty different from other autobiography books.
This book was good, because it taught a theme that everyone should know. Also, it was good because it was interesting to see the perspective of a horse, and his point of view. If I wrote his book, I would change it just a titch by adding a little more adventure, or romance, to make the book have a little more spice. The author, Anna Sewell, wrote this book, because of her childhood. Anna Sewell and her family st...more
This book was good, because it taught a theme that everyone should know. Also, it was good because it was interesting to see the perspective of a horse, and his point of view. If I wrote his book, I would change it just a titch by adding a little more adventure, or romance, to make the book have a little more spice. The author, Anna Sewell, wrote this book, because of her childhood. Anna Sewell and her family st...more
I have never been into horses and as a child, mostly avoided horse books. NPR's Backseat Book Club discussed Black Beauty in November 2012 and I decided that I should pick up this classic horse story.
And I enjoyed it! Black Beauty narrates his life, beginning with life on a pastoral farm with his sweet tempered mother, Black Beauty describes the many owners and jobs that he and other horses experienced in the second half of 19th century London. Sewell's book changed practices for horses and led...more
And I enjoyed it! Black Beauty narrates his life, beginning with life on a pastoral farm with his sweet tempered mother, Black Beauty describes the many owners and jobs that he and other horses experienced in the second half of 19th century London. Sewell's book changed practices for horses and led...more
What does it feel like to be free? What does it feel like to be accepted? In the the heartwarming novel, Black Beauty, by Anna Sewell, a baby horse and his mom grazed in a meadow day by day, and enjoyed their lives. The baby horse was called Blackie, and he was treated well by his owner, and much loved. His good owner passed away, and Blackie was sent on journey for life. He went through many good and bad owners, and through the years, was given the name Black Beauty. As I read the book, I came...more
I looked forward to reading this book because I choose it on the grounds of it having had a revolutionary effect on the maltreatment of animals, and particularly horses. When I was young and I went on the playground there would be boys who were crushing snails with stones and rocks they found, I did not join them. And when someone I know wanted to flush her fish down the toilet because he didn’t fit her new interior I was disgusted. I could tell you of more examples. So that created a connection...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| read more! | 5 | 58 | Mar 31, 2013 11:30am | |
| About Black Beauty | 39 | 159 | Mar 09, 2013 06:12am | |
| ED273: Black Beauty | 8 | 10 | Sep 19, 2012 12:47pm | |
| Mathematical Quizzes | 20 | 44 | Aug 13, 2012 06:42am | |
| The Reader's Group: What do you think? | 1 | 4 | Jun 30, 2011 09:22am |
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“We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words.”
—
73 people liked it
“My troubles are all over, and I am at home; and often before I am quite awake, I fancy I am still in the orchard at Birtwick, standing with my friends under the apple trees.”
—
50 people liked it
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