Feel the bit in your mouth and the saddle on your back. Gallop through the green fields of Victorian England and the dark streets of industrial London, and read the complete novel online for free.
Published in 1877, Black Beauty is the most successful animal story ever written. It has never been out of print. It has sold more than fifty million copies. It changed the way the Western world regarded horses, contributed directly to the abolition of the bearing rein, and established a literary tradition that extends from Lassie to Babe. Yet its author, Anna Sewell, lived only long enough to see its first modest printing. She died five months after publication, unaware that her quiet, urgent book would become a phenomenon.
The story is told in the first person by Black Beauty himself, a handsome black colt raised in the gentle meadows of Farmer Grey. He recounts his life in episodes: the kindness of his first groom, the wisdom of his mother, the cruelty of ignorant handlers, the terror of the hunt, the dignity of the London cab horse. He passes from owner to owner, from pasture to pavement, from youth to age. He suffers, endures, and hopes. He is a horse. He is also, unmistakably, a soul.
On this page, you can experience the novel that taught generations of children that animals feel pain, remember kindness, and deserve justice. We offer the complete 1877 text for online reading.
Book Info
| Detail | Information |
|---|---|
| Title | Black Beauty: His Grooms and Companions |
| Author | Anna Sewell |
| Year of Publication | 1877 |
| Genre | Children’s Literature, Autobiographical Fiction |
| Language | English |
| Legal Status | Public Domain Worldwide |
| Format | Online Reading |
Read Black Beauty Online
Trot beside the most famous horse in literature through sunshine and shadow. Begin this beloved classic by entering the meadows of Farmer Grey interactively below.
This preview introduces the young colt, his mother Duchess, and his first taste of kindness. However, the full, moving narrative—the breaking-in, the fire, the cab driver’s family, the auction, and the final, peaceful pasture—is available in the complete text for our subscribers.
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About the Novel Black Beauty
Anna Sewell wrote Black Beauty for a specific purpose. She was a Quaker, an invalid, and a lifelong advocate for animal welfare. She could not ride; she could barely walk. She drove a pony cart and saw, every day, the suffering of working horses in the streets of Victorian London. She wrote her book to change the world. Remarkably, it did.
The Bearing Rein
The bearing rein was a fashionable device that forced a horse to carry its head high and arched. It looked elegant. It also caused chronic pain, breathing difficulty, and permanent injury. Sewell devoted an entire chapter to its condemnation. Black Beauty, sold to a wealthy lady, suffers under the rein until a sympathetic gentleman intervenes. The passage is not melodrama; it is investigative journalism. Sewell documented the physiological effects of the device, named its defenders, and demanded its abolition. Within a decade of publication, the bearing rein was in retreat.
The Autobiographical Voice
Sewell made a radical literary decision: she gave the horse a voice. Black Beauty narrates his own life in precise, dignified, slightly formal English. He does not speak to other animals; he speaks to the reader. This technique, now commonplace, was revolutionary in 1877. It allowed Sewell to render the interiority of a non-human consciousness without sentimentality or fantasy. Black Beauty remembers, judges, grieves. He is not a person in horse form; he is a horse who has earned the right to speak.
The Episodic Structure
Black Beauty’s life is a sequence of placements, each with new owners, new grooms, new stables. Some are kind; some are cruel; most are simply indifferent. This structure reflects the precarious existence of the working horse, passed from hand to hand, valued as tool and discarded as waste. It also allows Sewell to examine the full range of human-animal relationships: the farmer who names his horses, the cab driver who shares his supper, the drunkard who races his mare to death, the lady who loves her pony and the lady who loves only her carriage.
The Cab Horse’s Testimony
The middle third of Black Beauty is set in London, where Beauty pulls a cab for the kind but impoverished Jerry Barker. These chapters are Sewell’s social documentary. She describes the cobblestones that jar the horse’s legs, the heavy loads that strain his back, the winter cold that seeps into his joints. She also describes the dignity of the labor: the pride of a well-kept horse, the pleasure of a grateful fare, the solidarity of the cab stand. Beauty is not merely a victim; he is a worker, a provider, a partner.
Ginger’s Tragedy
Beauty’s companion Ginger is the novel’s most tragic figure. She was broken by cruel handling in her youth, her spirit crushed before her strength developed. She is angry, defensive, mistrustful. She bites. She kicks. She is labeled vicious and sold down the chain of ownership. Beauty meets her once more, years later, in a London cab stand. She is exhausted, broken, waiting for the knacker. Her death is not sentimentalized; it is reported, as a fact, a verdict on the system that destroyed her. “My troubles will all be over soon,” she says. They are.
The Happy Ending
Black Beauty ends in reconciliation. Beauty, old and worn, is bought by the very grooms who cared for him in his youth. He returns to the green meadows of his childhood. This conclusion is not merely sentimental; it is theological. Sewell believed in a moral order, a justice that extends beyond human affairs. Beauty suffers, but his suffering is witnessed. He endures, and his endurance is rewarded. The book is not naive; it has shown the full extent of human cruelty. But it insists that cruelty is not the final truth.
The Evangelical Inheritance
Sewell came from a devout Quaker family. Black Beauty is, in its quiet way, a religious book. Its morality is not sectarian but foundational: kindness is owed to all sentient creatures; cruelty is a sin; the powerful will answer to God for their treatment of the powerless. This framework gives the novel its gravity. Sewell is not asking her readers to be nicer to horses. She is asking them to be righteous.
Why Read the Novel Black Beauty Today?
Because it is the original protest literature of the animal welfare movement. Every organization dedicated to the humane treatment of horses, from the RSPCA to the ASPCA to the wild mustang sanctuaries of the American West, stands in the shadow of Anna Sewell’s little book. But Black Beauty is not merely a historical document. It is a moving, beautifully crafted narrative about dignity and endurance, about the connection between species, about the obligation of the strong to the vulnerable. Children still read it and weep. Adults who return to it find new depths.
FAQ
Is this a children’s book?
It was written for adults and quickly adopted by children. Sewell’s prose is sophisticated, her themes complex. The novel is entirely appropriate for younger readers—it contains no sex, minimal violence—but it does not condescend. It is one of those rare books that can be read at eight, eighteen, and eighty, and reveal something new at each age.
Did Anna Sewell write anything else?
No. She was already in declining health when she began Black Beauty. She dictated much of the text to her mother, unable to hold a pen. She died knowing her book was in print but not yet aware of its success. She left no sequel, no second novel. She had said what she needed to say.
Is the book still used by animal welfare organizations?
Yes. The novel’s depiction of the bearing rein, the checkrein, and other cruel practices contributed directly to legislative reform in England and America. Modern animal advocates still recommend it as an introduction to the ethics of human-animal relationships.
Are there sequels?
Not by Sewell. Many unauthorized sequels and imitations appeared in the decades after publication, including Black Beauty’s Clan and Black Beauty’s Companions. None approach the original.
Can I read it on my phone?
Yes. The novel is divided into forty-nine short chapters, each a discrete episode in Beauty’s life. It is perfectly suited to mobile reading, a chapter at bedtime, a chapter on the train. Keep tissues handy.