Allegorical
"The Rocking-Horse Winner" reads like a parable, or a folktale. The language is simple and unadorned—it relates crucial dialogue and actions, but leaves out the prose and lengthy descriptions we associate with classic realist novels.
Like parables or folktales, the story keeps an air of mystery to it, hinting at a multitude of possible interpretations just waiting to be untapped. For example, like other mythical objects such as the Holy Grail, we sense that the rocking horse symbolizes something, but we're never quite sure whether it's a symbol of good, evil, or perhaps something else entirely.