With a foreword by Jacqueline Wilson and edited with an afterword by Thomas Ruys Smith.

“There are a great many kinds of men; there are good thoughtful men like our master, that any horse may be proud to serve; but there are bad cruel men, who never ought to have a horse or dog to call their own. I hope you will fall into good hands; but a horse never knows who may buy him, or who may drive him; it is all a chance for us.”

Straight from the horse’s mouth, Anna Sewell’s beloved and pioneering work of animal literature is reborn in a new edition produced in collaboration with Redwings Horse Sanctuary. Featuring an original foreword by favourite children's author Jacqueline Wilson and an afterword by Professor Thomas Ruys Smith (University of East Anglia) which reintroduces readers to this much-loved book, examining the roots of its extraordinary longevity, the timelessness of Sewell’s powerful literary vision, and the ongoing necessity of her message of kindness and care to animals – and humans.

Redwings are the country’s largest horse welfare charity and proud custodians of Anna Sewell House in Great Yarmouth – the site of Sewell’s birth in 1820 and now a space dedicated to her life and legacy. Every copy of this edition sold will contribute directly to Redwings’ mission to value every horse and try to see the world from an equine point of view.

“To induce kindness, sympathy and an understanding treatment of horses.” Such was Anna Sewell’s vision for her “little book”, first published in 1877, before it went on to become one of the most popular novels of all time. True to this aim, this new edition of Sewell’s classic account of a horse’s journey through Victorian England is the first to have been produced in collaboration with a charity dedicated to equine welfare.
 
PRAISE for our special edition of Black Beauty:
 
"This thoughtful new edition reminds us that Anna Sewell's celebrated 'translation from the original equine' has much to teach us, and that Black Beauty's quiet voice can still be heard above the noise of the twenty-first century."
- Susanna Forrest, author of The Age of the Horse (Atlantic, 2016) and If Wishes Were Horses (2012).
 
“Whether it is the first time you