A Must-Have for Anyone Who Loves Winnie the Pooh

As you may have guessed by my name, I am a big fan of the bear of very little brain known as Winnie the Pooh. So when I recently received Winnie the Pooh: A Celebration of the Silly Old Bear as a birthday gift, I was duly delighted. I had never heard of this book before, but it presents a wonderful history of my favorite ursine fluff ball through informative prose and dozens of artistic renderings. The author’s name, appropriately enough, is Christopher Robin Finch. He confesses in the book’s Foreward that he used to believe he was the Christopher Robin referenced in A. A. Milne’s stories. Clearly this is someone who has a particular passion for the book’s subject, and readers are rewarded with the rich details he provides from every step of Pooh’s evolution.

The book is published by Disney Enterprises, so its primary concern is with Pooh’s incarnation as a Disney creation. But it does devote its early pages to a discussion of Milne’s life and work and the popularity his characters began to enjoy long before they were Disneyfied. Chapter One: In Which The Origins of Winnie the Pooh Are Discussed features photos of Milne, his famous son, and the original stuffed animals which inspired the Pooh stories. Also included are some of Ernest Shepard’s illustrations. Although Milne wrote many works for adults, his most famous stretch of writing began in 1923 with a poem called Vespers, which featured the young Christopher Robin. Next year he published the volume When We Were Very Young and used to proceeds to purchase a home near the Ashdown Forest, which would serve as the model for the Hundred Acre Wood. After watching Christopher Robin act out stories involving his beloved stuffed bear, as well as his stuffed pig and donkey, Milne allowed himself to become lost in the world of his son’s imagination. He added to the cast Rabbit and Owl, who might reasonably live in the forest, and later bought Tigger and Kanga and Roo to complete the cast of characters. One unfortunate note in all of this is the fact that Christopher Robin himself grew to resent the fact that he could not escape his fictionalized identity as the young lad in the Pooh tales. While the silly old bear and his friends brought happiness to countless people, he haunted Christopher Robin for the remainder of his life.

Chapter Two: In Which Walt Disney Becomes Involved focuses on Disney’s development of Winnie the Pooh. After finally securing the rights to Milne’s characters, Walt Disney decided to introduce them in a featurette, Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree, so that American audiences could get to know them gradually. So concerned was he with the inherent Britishness of Pooh that he turned over the making of the cartoon to a team of writers and animators with no particular passion for the project in hopes that they would feel free to take liberties in Americanizing the cast. As a result, Christopher Robin sounded American and his room looked American. Most noticeably, a new character, Gopher, was introduced. The presence of this very American creature as a resident of the forest is a particularly significant alteration, though he does not appear for very much of the featurette. The final result was a great success, and the chapter goes on to detail the creation of three more featurettes: Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too, and Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore. These remained more true to the original and also enjoyed great success.

The third chapter focuses on each of the individual characters and their attributes, as well as information on who animated them and who provided their voices. The pages are rounded out with illustrations ranging from sketches to full-color movie cels. The fourth chapter presents each of the films, first with a synopsis and then with 20 or so pages of scenes, in various stages of completeness, from the films. The fourth chapter takes up nearly half the book and is a treasure trove of art for fans like myself. Many of the cels take up an entire page.

Finally, the book closes with a chapter about Pooh’s continued popularity. Although it is the shortest of the chapters, it provides a great deal of information on Pooh’s further adventures and the types of merchandise he has been a part of. In addition to the four featurettes, Pooh has appeared in four educational films, the Disney Channel puppetronics show Welcome to Pooh Corner, and the exceptional Saturday morning cartoon The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. This show gave rise to several holiday specials, and two full-length Pooh movies – Pooh’s Grand Adventure and The Tigger Movie – appeared in 1997 and 2000. The chapter’s list of Pooh merchandise ranges from books, toys, and clothes to cookware, collectibles and games. Some of the most treasured of these items are, not surprisingly, the stuffed animals themselves, which have enjoyed numerous manifestations by a number of manufacturers from Disney and Gund to the intricate doll makers Agnes Brush and R. John Wright.

Finch leaves the readers with his thoughts on why it is that the world of Pooh is so well-loved. Simple enough for children but engaging enough for adults, idyllic with no real villains to be found, the stories transport readers and audiences to a setting of bother-free simplicity. Finch beautifully puts into words Pooh’s enduring appeal, and the oodles of information and artwork in this 176-page book make it a must-have for anyone who loves the silly old bear as much as Mr. Finch and I do.