Black Beauty Level 1 for Class 5

Black Beauty is a 1877 novel. The story is narrated in the first person as a autobiographical memoir by a horse named Black Beauty – beginning with his carefree days as a colt on a English farm with his mother to his difficult life pulling cabs in London to his happy retirement in the country. Along the way he meets with many hardships and recounts many tales of cruelty and kindness. The text advocates fairer treatment of horses in Victorian England. Each short chapter recounts an incident in Black Beauty’s life containing a lesson or moral typically related to the kind sympathetic and understanding treatment of horses. Anna Sewell’s sympathetic portrayal of the plight of working animals led to a vast outpouring of concern for animal welfare.