Sexism in pony books

Jessie Haas is writing a book about pony books (it will be published in 2009 and is, at the moment, called Horse Crazy), about which we've been corresponding, and she told me recently about a book she read called The Ginger Horse by Maureen Daly, which I've never read, but "has a girl hitting her teen years and starting to think that her boy friend really is smarter and stronger and more important" (quote from Jessie).

That started me thinking about sexist attitudes in pony books. I suppose one of the reasons pony books are so very popular with girls is that they show girls as strong and capable, or as equal partners with boys. I'm going to pick the books I've read recently as examples (though I may be self-selecting here, as I've been reading titles by authors I already knew I liked). So, Veronica Westlake's The Mug's Game has a heroine who is initially a bit of a wimp being initiated by the twin girls with whom she goes to live into a country life which is something of a walk on the wild side. The boy character is an elder brother intent on writing a play, who is seen as eccentric but in an entirely understandable way. Here, the mother is the one with the high-powered job, who keeps the household going.

Next came Cecilia Knowle's Hippo, a Welsh Cob. This has a good mix of male and female characters, with never a hint that one might be better than the other. The only villains of the pieces are so because they are thoughtless.

Josephine Pullein-Thompson's Six Ponies has a character who is extraordinarily dismissive of girls; but he is one of the book's villains and JPT obviously disapproves of him. JPT is unusual in having a virtually equal distribution of male and female characters, and what sex you are has absolutely no bearing on how well you do with your horse.

I suppose one really glaring example of stereotyping comes in Pony Jobs for Jill. Until this point, Jill has wanted to be a Matron of an orphanage, run a stable, work for Captain Cholly-Sawcutt and be an MHF. Although she obviously becomes a writer as she describes herself as the author of the books, in what always struck me as a bizarre turn, after trying various horsey jobs, she and Ann go off to do secretarial courses. I am not decrying secretarial courses: I did one myself after university when it soon became plain that I needed a few practical skills as well as the ability to argue about Alexander the Great.

The thing that really made the Jill episode stick in my craw, I suppose, is that it's one of the few times you sense Ruby Ferguson's authorial voice coming through. It is so absolutely what your mother or grandmother are going to recommend what you, a horsey girl, do, and it doesn't ring true with Jill's character as we know it. I know she says she's going to be secretary to the Prime Minister, but why not be PM herself?