In William Saroyan’s short story “The Summer of the Beautiful White Horse,” Aram justifies his cousin’s acquisition of the horse using his personal reasoning process. By examining the text for evidence, the reader can follow Aram’s thought process.
Aram and Mourad come from a poor but proud, honest, self-sufficient Armenian family. Stealing is unheard of in their clan. When Mourad arrives with the horse in the middle of night, Aram is forced to justify how the animal came to be in his possession. After thinking about it, Aram decides his cousin did not steal the horse because he was not going to sell it for money. The boys were only going to ride it, which he reasoned did not constitute stealing. If they decided to sell it, which would never enter their minds, then the line would be crossed, and the animal would be considered stolen goods.
