Maia Wojciechowska

A Kingdom in a Horse

Harper & Row, New York, 1965, 143 pp.

Harper Trophy, New York, 1966 pb. Cover Lydia Rosier.

When David’s father refuses to let David follow his career as a rodeo clown.  As David’s father
was gored by two bulls in the ring, this is perhaps understandable, but David sees it as a
betrayal.  He won’t let his father buy the mare Gypsy for him, not wanting to get fond of
another creature.  Even though Gypsy is sold, David still meets the mare, and learns to
accept what he feels for her and for his father.

A review of the book on Pony Book Chronicles

Maia Wojciechowska (1927-2002) was born in Warsaw, and lived in France and England after her family fled Poland in the Second Wor ld War.  The family eventually settled in America.  Maia Wojciechowska was a friend of Ernest Hemmingway, and herself fought bulls in Mexico, giving her the experience she needed to write her Newbery Medal winning book Shadow of a Bull, the story of 12 year old Manolo, son of the renowned bullfighter Juan Olivar, killed in a bullfight when Manolo was just three.  Her one horse book follows a similar theme of a boy on the cusp of adulthood, wrestling with the position his father has come to assume in his life.  She and her daughter Oriana owned a chestnut mare just like the horse in the book, Gypsy.

Finding the books:  easy to find in the USA.  It was not published in the UK.

Sources and links:

Terri A. Wear:  Horse Stories, an Annotated Bibilography, Scarecrow Press, 1987

Biographical detail

New York Times obituary, June 21, 2002

Many thanks to Susan Bourgeau for the photographs

Bibliography - horse books only