Ben-Hur

Synopsis:
Black Beauty was first published in 1877 and had an almost immediate impact on improving the treatment of animals-horses in particular-in England. Saddened by the animal abuse she had seen throughout her life, Anna Sewell wrote a novel using a horse's voice. Beauty tells the powerful story of his own descent from a well-groomed carriage horse to a mistreated cab horse. More than one hundred years after its first publication, Black Beauty remains a popular novel as well as an effective tool for teaching about animal cruelty. And with vivid illustrations and informative captions unique to the whole story, this striking edition provides background information modern readers could otherwise access only through a broad range of supplemental research.

Review:

"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 with consideration and kindness.Black Beauty tells the story of the horse's own long and varied life, from a well-born colt in a pleasant meadow to an elegant carriage horse for a gentleman to a painfully overworked cab horse. Throughout, Sewell rails--in a gentle, 19th-century way--against animal maltreatment. Young readers will follow Black Beauty's fortunes, good and bad, with gentle masters as well as cruel. Children can easily make the leap from horse-human relationships to human-human relationships, and begin to understand how their own consideration of others may be a benefit to all. (Ages 9 to 12)"