Anna Sewell (30th March, 1820 – 25th April 1878) was an English novelist, best known as the author of 1877 novel Black Beauty. Sewell was born in Great Yarmouth in Norfolk, England to a deeply religious and literary family, her father the successful author of children’s books, her mother also authored a series of evangelical children’s books, but Anna herself was not a writer.
In poor health, Sewell eventually moved to Old Catton near Norwich and through weakness she was confined to her bed. Even writing at this time was a challenge, but she dictated Black Beauty to her mother and wrote on scraps of paper, which her mother transcribed.
Finally a year before her death, Black Beauty was published. Sewell was 57 years old. Five months later the author would succumb to hepatitis or tuberculosis, and Black Beauty would go on to become a children’s classic. Another interesting point to note is that it was never meant to be a children’s book, she wrote it for those who work with horses in the hope it would invoke kindness, sympathy and an understanding treatment of horses.
Today we accompany our short bio with six quotes from the book that we hope you enjoy:
“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.”
“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.”
“It is good people who make good places.”
“If you in the morning
Throw minutes away,
You can’t pick them up
In the course of a day.
You may hurry and scurry,
And flurry and worry,
You’ve lost them forever,
Forever and aye.”
“Do your best wherever it is, and keep up your good name.”
“God had given men reason, by which they could find out things for themselves; but he had given animals knowledge which did not depend on reason, and which was much more prompt and perfect in its way, and by which they had often saved the lives of men.”
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