Smoky, the Cow Horse
1926
Smoky, the Cow Horse
1926
Born on a spring morning onto the vast prairie, Smoky knows only freedom. He runs with his mother across endless grasslands, learns to read the wind and the wolves, becomes the smartest, wildest colt the range has ever seen. He can outrun predators, outthink rattlesnakes, outlast anything the wild dishes out. But then comes the enemy he cannot fight: a two-legged creature who speaks in strange sounds and carries a rope that feels like fate. Smoky must decide whether to break or bond, whether the bit in his mouth means defeat or something more complicated than defeat. What unfolds is one of the most honest portraits of the American West ever written, from a man who actually lived it. Will James won the 1927 Newbery Medal for this book, the only Western ever to do so, and reading it reveals why: it captures a world vanishing before our eyes, and the impossible tenderness between horse and human that sometimes grows in the breaking.
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“For that pony had got tangled up in the cowboy's heartstrings a heap more than that cowboy wanted to let on, even to himself. He couldn't get away from how he missed him.””
— Will James
“There was so much life wrapped up in that pony's hide that it was mighty hard for him to settle down and behave...he sometimes had to bust out and do things that wasn't at all proper...””
— Will James
“To my way of thinking there's something wrong, or missing, with any person who hasn't got a soft spot in their heart for an animal of some kind. With most folks the dog stands highest as man's friend, then comes the horse, with others the cat is liked best as a pet, or a monkey is fussed over; but whatever kind of animal it is a person likes, it's all hunkydory so long as there's a place in the heart for one or a few of them.””
— Will James
“The poor (horse) had sure got a reason to be mean, and I guess he's at the point where he figgers no human is his friend any more.””
— Will James
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James, Will. Smoky, the Cow Horse. Lex, lex-books.com/book/smoky-the-cow-horse-5eb28d7d-1906-4605-b146-0e9ef3212f14.James, W. (1926). Smoky, the Cow Horse. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/smoky-the-cow-horse-5eb28d7d-1906-4605-b146-0e9ef3212f14James, Will. Smoky, the Cow Horse. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/smoky-the-cow-horse-5eb28d7d-1906-4605-b146-0e9ef3212f14.
