The Horse Dealer's Daughter

The Horse Dealer’s Daughter is a short story by D.H. Lawrence written in 1922. The story is about the Pervin family whose horse business has failed. Mabel Pervin and her brothers have been left alone with both their father and mother’s death. The story starts in the middle of Mabel Pervin’s brothers in conversation about what they will do in the future and make fun of Mabel. Then Jack Fergusson enters the story stopping by the Pervin home for a little bit then leaving to his job. Then Mabel goes out to tend to her late mother’s grave where she spies Fergusson looking at her from afar and takes no concern over it. Fergusson decides to follow Mable to a pond where Mabel is planning to attempt to commit suicide. Fergusson saves Mable and carries …show more content…
The reader can see this rebirth happen through the description of how Mabel Pervin and Jack Fergusson were before coming out of the pond and after. Before going into the pond Mabel Pervin was a dead character who did not process thoughts and was emotionless (382). She was described as “ in a sort of ecstasy to be coming nearer to her fulfilment, her own glorification, approaching her dead mother, who was glorified (382).” a sentence that referred to the bible and was foreshadowing that Mable was going to commit suicide as her death would fulfill her ultimate desire. Suicide is her ultimate goal because Mabel was living a life of poverty that see was previously unaccustomed to when her father was alive with a blooming business and felt the in the present that she no longer controlled what happened to her leading to the conclusion of suicide to feel some kind of control or say in her life (382). Likewise Jack Fergusson in the beginning is also a thoughtless being who lived life in dullness (383). Jack Fergusson had no care for anyone else but for himself and maintaining his job as a doctor. When these to “dead” beings go into the pond and coming out is a reference to baptism. Once out of the pond and at Mable’s home Jack Fergusson takes care of her, where he discovers that he has a desire (385). He suddenly felt warmth and discovered that Mabel has some sort of power over him foreshadowing his love for her that he is barely beginning to really focus on (386). After the pond scene in the short story is the only moments where the reader can see these two characters act on emotion since before they were both portrayed as dead thoughtless people showing how they are reborn as emotional people. Mable is the one who shows the most emotion after her rebirth to the point where she starts to hug and kiss Jack’s knees (385). While Jack Fergusson takes a few minutes to recollect himself from Mabel kissing