COVE

A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh (1926) has become one of the most well-known children’s books across the world, with one of the most recognizable protagonists. It has spawned merchandise of every kind—from clothing, to cookbooks, to bags—translations into over seventy languages including Latin, and a number of adaptations across different genres and forms of media. The book was first published on October 14, 1926, by the U.S. publisher E.P. Dutton and the British publisher Methuen & Company. By the end of the year, Dutton had sold over 150,000 copies, a stark comparison to the less than one thousand first edition copies that were printed. Pooh follows its eponymous protagonist as he goes on a variety of different adventures with his friends Christopher Robin, Piglet, Rabbit, Owl, Eeyore, Kanga, and Roo, across the Hundred Acre Wood. He hunts for strange animals, helps Eeyore find his lost tail, and even discovers the North Pole (or a version of it). Though the book has no overarching plot (each chapter tells a different story), certain plot points carry over across multiple chapters and enable the characters to grow and change by the book’s end. The characters’ development, particularly Pooh’s, mirrors that of a young child discovering how to navigate the world with the aid of friends and family. The book places an emphasis on the importance of strong and loving friendships and demonstrates the ways in which these relationships are necessary for facilitating growth.

“A.A. Milne,” artist unknown, circa 1920, Encyclopædia Britannica. Alan Alexander Milne was born on January 18, 1882 in Kilburn, London. His father ran a small private school which he attended, where he was taught by the writer H.G. Wells. Milne attended Trinity College in Cambridge, and while there he began writing for Granta, a student magazine, and Punch, a British satire magazine. After graduating from Trinity with a B.A. in Mathematics, Milne was hired as an assistant editor by Punch. He served in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment during WWI between 1915-1920 and afterwards developed a strong anti-war stance, which he expanded on in his book Peace With Honour (1934). Before writing Winnie-the-Pooh, Milne had already established himself as a successful novelist and playwright, having written four full-length novels and twenty-three plays and screenplays by the time of the children's book’s publication. He was inspired to begin writing children’s books and poems by his wife, Daphne, and his son, Christopher Robin. Pooh’s characters are based on his son’s stuffed animals and the setting on Ashdown Forest near the family’s home in Sussex where Milne took his son on walks. Milne wanted to be known for more than his children’s books and was frustrated that his later works did not receive the same level of acclaim and success. He also did not want to keep putting his son in the spotlight out of fear that Christopher would resent him when he grew up, which, unfortunately, did happen. Milne passed away in January 1956 at age 74.

“Winnie-the-Pooh and Friends,” photograph by Robert Kato, n.d., New York Public Library, and “Christopher Robin Milne,” photograph by Marcus Adams, 1928, Wikipedia. The left photo shows the stuffed animals that were the basis of A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh (from left to right) Eeyore, Winnie-the-Pooh, Kanga, Piglet, and Tigger. Milne’s son, Christopher Robin received each as a gift between the years of 1920 and 1928. Christopher also had a stuffed animal of Kanga’s son, Roo, but lost the toy in an apple orchard sometime during the 1930s. The stuffed animals were restored by the New York Public Library in 2016 for Pooh’s 95th birthday and remain on display there. The right photo shows Christopher Milne with Pooh, who was named after a black bear at the London Zoo named Winnipeg that he was close with as a boy and a swan he called Pooh. Christopher was born in 1920 in London, England, but spent most of his childhood at Cotchford Farm in Sussex. Though he was close with his father, he was raised primarily by his nanny, Olive Rand Brockwell. After the publication of Winnie-the-Pooh, Christopher became conflated with his father’s fictionalized version of himself by the public. Though he did not hate the fame that came from the book, he, for a time, blamed his father for using him as a way to gain success. Christopher Milne passed away in 1996 at 75 from a neurological disease called myasthenia gravis.

“E.H. Shepard,” photograph by Howard Coster, 1932, National Portrait Gallery. Ernest Howard Shepard was born in December 1879 in St. John’s Wood, London, about five minutes from A.A. Milne’s place of birth. He attended the Royal Academy Schools, the oldest art institution in England. Soon after, he began illustrating for Punch magazine and illustrated editions of books such as David Copperfield and Aesop’s Fables. He quickly became a notable painter, and his work was shown in some of England’s largest galleries. He fought in the first World War between 1914 and 1919, simultaneously continuing to contribute to Punch. After the war, he became a regular and then lead cartoonist for the magazine. In 1923, another writer for Punch, E.V. Lucas, recommended Shepard as an illustrator to Milne. Their first collaboration was in Milne’s collection of poetry When We Were Very Young (1924) in which Winnie-the-Pooh first appears. Shephard based his design of Pooh off of a stuffed bear owned by his son called Growler, rather than on Christopher Robin Milne’s stuffed bear. Growler was later given to Shepard’s granddaughter and was subsequently destroyed by a neighbor’s dog. Similarly to Milne, Shepard felt that his illustrations for the Pooh series overshadowed his other work, and resented the series and his connection to it. Shepard had two children, both of whom became illustrators, and his daughter, Mary, is best known for her illustrations for the Mary Poppins book series. Shepard passed away in March 1976 at ninety-six.

E.H. Shepard, “‘This Party,’ said Christopher Robin, ‘Is a Party Because of What Someone Did,’” for Winnie-the-Pooh (1926), by A.A. Milne, Wikipedia. In this scene, Christopher Robin is holding a party for Edward Bear, better known as Winnie-the-Pooh, to commend him for rescuing Piglet during a flood. This moment also celebrates Pooh’s transformation from a gluttonous oaf into a courageous, thoughtful, and clever bear. Pooh's growth replicates the trajectory of a child's development from toddlerhood to middle childhood. At the beginning of the book, he is similar to his younger friends, Piglet and Roo. He is extremely impulsive and forgetful, which often leads to him getting hurt. Over the course of the book, Pooh becomes increasingly similar to his more mature friends, such as Owl, Rabbit, and Kanga. By the end, he is significantly more observant, considerate, and brave than before. Not only does he save Piglet during a flood, but he also creates multiple makeshift boats in order to do so and saves Roo from a fast-moving river (and discovers the "Noth Pole" in the process). Shepard’s illustration depicts all of Pooh and Robin’s closest friends as well as some others the reader has not been fully introduced to, excellently conveying the cheerfulness and importance of the scene. Though the exact setting of the scene is not mentioned, the background is reminiscent of the animals’ tree houses, which gives the setting a comfortable and familiar atmosphere—a perfect ending to the book.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Walt Disney Productions, 1977, IMDb. Since its publication, Winnie-the-Pooh (1926) and its characters have been adapted countless times into plays, cartoons, games, and many other forms of media. The Walt Disney Company first acquired the rights to adapt Milne’s Pooh books in 1961 from the widow of Stephen Slesinger, a producer and literary agent who had bought the merchandising and adaptation rights for the United States and Canada from Milne in 1930. Between 1966 and 1974, Disney released three featurettes centered around Pooh, each adapting multiple stories from Milne’s books. In 1977 these featurettes were combined into a full-length film, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. This adaptation closely follows Milne’s original stories. Like his two books, it is episodic with no clear story arc and often breaks the fourth wall. The narrative takes advantage of the movie’s animated format, having Pooh and his friends interact directly with the narrator and jump across pages. The animation is energetic and captivating, which perfectly fits the characters and tone. The movie mixes and matches  stories from the Pooh books, which, while providing a fresh take on the source material, diminishes the character arc Pooh experiences in Winnie-the-Pooh. Most notably, the “Pooh Party” scene, which occurs at the end of the book and marks Pooh’s growth into a smart and confident bear, is moved to the middle of the movie. However, the movie adds to the episode a moment from the second book in which Piglet gives his house to Owl, who has recently lost his own. This change allows Piglet to develop as a character and strengthens the movie’s themes of community and connection.