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WRITING THE SHORT STORY REPORT

The Woman Who Talked to Horses

by Leon Rooke

The short story, ‘The Woman Who Talked to Horses’ was first published in Leon Rooke’s collection of short
stories ‘Sing Me No Love Songs I’ll Say You No Prayers’ by The Ecco Press in 1984. ‘The Woman Who Talked to
Horses’ was selected by Margaret Atwood & Robert Weaver and reprinted by permission in The New Oxford
Book of Canadian Short Stories by Oxford University Press in 1997.

The story takes place at the farm of a racehorse owner in the second half of 20th century, somewhere in North
America.

Mr. George Gaddis is a farmer who experiences troubles with his racehorses: ‘I’m losing. I haven’t had a horse in
the running all year’ (p. 180). He has difficulties in relations with his wife Sarah too. She talks Mr. Gaddis into
inviting a professional horse talker to be consulted on their horses’ problems. Mr. Gaddis does not believe in
usefulness of Sarah’s idea and invites a horse talking lady just ‘. . . to keep a little peace in the house. To keep
poor Sarah upright and not shrivelling’ (p. 179). The story is narrated by Mr. Gaddis and starts from his dialogue
with the unnamed horse talking lady, who visits his farm. The farmer cannot recognize a horse specialist in the
neatly dressed, fragile lady with a slim figure: ‘She was wearing blue cloth shoes with thick white shoelaces – all
very clean. Too clean. She looked clean all over. I didn’t think she knew snot about horseflesh or about anything
else’ (p. 178). This first look is enough for Mr. Gaddis to figure her to be ‘. . . a straight-out phoney’ (p. 178). The
farmer feels quite nervous about wasting his time, wants to expose the lady’s incompetence and to stop the
stupid business. He is not going to give her a chance to teach him how to bargain and expects her to answer on
whatever he wants to know right away. He asks: ‘Your fee’ (p. 178). The lady never tells her fee unless the client
understands her services: “I can’t tell you my fee,’ she said, ‘until I know what you want of me and why you want
it” (p. 179). In response he nearly laughs in her face. The lady makes another attempt to start a quiet discussion:
‘All I need to know is what trouble it is you are having. With your horses. Then we can talk price’ (p. 179). Mr.
Gaddis has neither interest nor patience to follow the lady’s reasoning. Instead he tries to poke her by a
judgmental conclusion: “How about we talk method,’ I said. ‘Then price. You going to go up and whisper sweet
nothings in these horses’ ears? Is that what I’m paying you for?” (p. 179). The lady keeps patience and responds
by eyeing him peculiarly. Not seeing the desired reaction out of the lady’s bruised pride, Mr. Gaddis tries to
sound more reasonable: “I don' t know what the trouble is,’ I said. ‘That’s why I called you. I want to know
what’s going on. All I know is they’ve been acting funny lately” (p. 179). The lady tries to lead the farmer to the
idea that the horses’ mood can be a factor: ‘Horses are like that. Can’t horses have moods, Mr. Gaddis?’ (p. 179).
The farmer simply rejects the lady’s suggestion without consistent reasoning: “Not on my time,’ I said. ‘They’re
not producing. You’d think the bastards had gone on vacation. Zombies, the lot of them” (p. 179).
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Mr. Gaddis is difficult to talk to as his thoughts seem to be focused on a compulsive idea to disprove the horse
talker’s competence and to “. . . go into the house and tell Sarah, ‘Well, Sarah, you got any more of your dumb
ideas? Let’s hear them, Sarah.’ Something like that. And watch her shrivel up. Watch her mew and sob and burn
and hide away” (p. 179). After these words one may find that Mr. Gaddis is possessed by the sense of superiority
over women. The author leads the reader to the idea why Sarah angrily throws a pot into the yard, followed by a
bed pillow and a blanket, as well as why ‘. . . outside not a hint of wind was stirring. Even the grass wasn’t
growing. It seemed to me all the life had gone out of that house. It looked dumb and impenetrable and cold’ (p.
179).

The plot organization of the story is straightforward with no flashbacks to previous events. The dialog of the
main characters is periodically interrupted by description and interpretation of thoughts, emotions, actions and
motives of people and horses on behalf of Mr. Gaddis. As the story progresses, the reader is kept by a question
on who of the two characters is going to win the battle of arguments and authorities.

The lady finally dislikes Mr. Gaddis too: “You are a difficult person to talk to,’ she said. ‘You are a distrusting
person, a bullying one” (p. 182). She is ready to leave, when she takes a minute to communicate with his horses
distantly sitting in her car. The horses behaviourally and emotionally respond to her. Mr. Gaddis’s wife – Sarah,
who initially talked him into inviting the lady, is unhappy and angry with her husband and asks him to stay away
from her. By the end of the story the farmer seems to feel sorry for being a difficult person and has an epiphany:
‘I wondered what had gone wrong with my life. How I had become this bad person’ (p. 184).

The theme of the story is reciprocal and interdependent relations between men and women. Mr. Gaddis can be
understood as a business-minded racehorse owner who reflects his refined pragmatic business views on all
aspects of his life. He holds women in low regard as he believes that there is no place for women’s sensitivity
and irrationality in business. His fossilized mind, self-opinion and the sense of superiority over women play a
low-down trick on him. Mr. Gaddis has not realised yet that horses are thinking creatures and their mood can be
an important factor in his business. Ironically the horse talking woman, invited by Sarah’s dumb idea, and who
he recognizes as ‘. . . another one of those frail, inhibited, emaciated females who knew nothing about the real
world but like to think they could tell you about horses’ (p. 178), seems to have a unique talent capable to bring
Mr. Gaddis’s business to success. By sharing his final epiphany, Mr. Gaddis seems to discover a new level of the
universe complexity, how he insulted it and how comprehensively it answers on his global life problems.

I find the story especially effective because of the characters developed through the dialog with detailed
description of their thoughts, emotions, actions and motives.