LIFE:
     Alan Alexander Milne was born in London, the third son of a schoolmaster who ran his private school out of his own home.  As a boy, he was close to his father and to his brother, Ken (his closest friend until Ken’s death in 1929), and appears to have been the favorite of his parents.  He was aware of and seems to have experienced the privileged position third children are put into by fairy tales.  Wullschlager describes his childhood as “idyllic,” unlike those of other children’s writers, and consequently Milne writes out of nostalgia for the actual past, rather than an idealized vision (177).
     Milne won a scholarship to Westminster School at age 11, an unusually precocious accomplishment.  His scholarship gave him access to the House of Commons terrace and exposed him to daily chapel services in the Poet’s Corner of Westminster Abbey (SATA 178). He excelled at games and math and went on to study math at Cambridge, but was more interested in writing and editing the college literary magazine, so received an inferior degree before settling in London (Carpenter & Pritchard 350-51).
     He wrote sketches for various magazines; his first book, Lovers in London (1905), which he later repudiated, was a novel compiled from his sketches for The St. James Gazette.  Family friend H. G. Wells, who at one time had taught in his father’s school, suggested that he do the book. (Kaupunginkirjasto).  His success in this field led him to being named an assistant editor at Punch, the well-known humor magazine, in 1906.
     Milne married in 1913, but the relationship was one more of friendship than of love; there was not a great deal of sexual intimacy, as they maintained separate bedrooms.  However, Wullschlager suggests that Daphne was the perfect match for him, providing domestic emotional support without demanding more (182).
     Milne was already a pacifist when World War I broke out, but felt he had to contribute to the war effort in some way, volunteering and eventually being assigned to the Signal Corps.  He was sent to France in 1916 but was returned home after less than a year after becoming ill with trench fever.  He served the rest of the war as a signal officer on the homefront, where he also wrote his first work for children – a play (Once on a Time), written at the instigation of his commanding officer for the colonel’s children to perform (SATA 178).
     After the war he devoted himself more fully to his plays, in part because his job at Punch had been given to someone else (J. Milne).  His 1920 play, Mr. Pim Passes By, had a successful London run, and he soon became a popular playwright and novelist.  He greatly admired P.G. Wodehouse, and was more likely to read to his son from Wodehouse’s books than from his own (Dennis).
     In 1920, his first and only child, Christopher Robin Milne, was born, significantly altering the future course of his life.  By most accounts, Alan Milne was unusually involved in rearing his son, which in turn led to his four children’s books. Christopher Robin was never known by that name in his family – he was called “Billy Moon,” which somewhat protected him from later notoriety.  Nevertheless, he did experience teasing by schoolmates after his father’s children’s books made him one of the most famous children in the world, and became alienated from his parents as a result.
     When Christopher was 3, his father wrote “Vespers” and gave it to his wife, who consequently profited independently when it became enormously popular.  Shortly after, while on a vacation, Milne wrote several more short chidlren’s verses, then added still others after returning home to produce the collection When We Were Very Young, with illustrations by Punch illustrator E.H. Shepard.  Wullschlager says “The best poems. . . are all humorous revelations about the workings of a child’s mind.” (187)
     Within six weeks of its publication, When We Were Very Young had sold 40,000 copies in Britain and made Milne “the bestselling children’s author of the decade” (Wullschlager 184). Within the first year, 42 editions had been published, and the book has never been out of print since (Wilson 163).  It is in the pages of this poetry collection that Pooh, then known as Edward Bear, makes his first appearance (SATA 178).
     The following Christmas, the Evening News pressed him for a children’s piece and he adapted a story he had told Christopher Robin about his teddy bear. The first Winnie-the-Pooh episode appeared on Christmas Eve 1925 under a front-page headline and was broadcast on Christmas Day from all radio stations. (Wullschlager 184)
    Winnie-the-Pooh (1926) was an even bigger success than the poems, and sealed Milne’s fate.  Although he came to loathe his success, he became pigeon-holed as a children’s writer, even though he wrote no more books for children after 1928, although he did have a success with a dramatization (for children) of The Wind in the Willows, a book he greatly admired – so much so that he tended to judge others by their response to it (Wullschlager 181).  His adult reputation died, his books went out of print, and he had little further success in adult letters.  In contrast, by 1956, over 7 million of his children’s books had been sold around the world (Dennis).
     In the 1930s and ‘40s, Milne wrote a number of religious and political books, including a famous pacifist manifesto, Peace with Honour (1934).  However, as the threat of Hitler became more clear, Milne issued a modification, War with Honour, in which he justified the new war by saying “One man's fanaticism has cancelled rational argument.” (J. Milne)  His son Christopher joined the war effort, serving as an officer with the Royal Engineers from 1942 until the end of the war. A stroke and subsequent brain surgery in 1952 left Milne an invalid for the remainder of his life (Dennis).

Winnie-the-Pooh:

     Winnie-the-Pooh was published when Milne’s son was about six. It is centered around the child’s actual toys and set in the area around the family home at Cotchford Farm.  Pooh is based on a bearat the London Zoo, a particular favorite of Christopher Robin, which led to the boy calling his toy bear by the same name.  Though the name is usually feminine, “Christopher Robin insisted his bear was a boy,” an insistence reflected in the first chapter of the book (J. Milne).  Milne himself said that he “described rather than invented” the characters (Wilson 163).  His wife, Daphne, gave the toy animals “their names, voices and personalities” (SATA 179).
    Christopher Milne has said it is hard to unravel the stories and his childhood activities: “‘Did I do something and did my father write a story around it?  Or was it the other way about, and did the story come first?’” He describes it as a kind of symbiotic relationship, in which his father was looking for story ideas and he was looking for play ideas, all at the same time.  At least one writer has suggested the possibility for extending the story through similar play:

Animal tales like these, tales about toys come to life, are especially effective with junior high students and are appropriate as part of a unit of writing for younger children with whom their stories might be shared in an elementary classroom.  Pooh or Paddington could be placed in original situations, or the students’ favorite stuffed animals given ad-ventures of their own. (Paulson)

Biography and Story:  Christopher Milne said that some of the things ascribed to him in the books and the poems were things he had done, and others things his father had done but attached to his name because “‘Christopher Robin’. . . is a wonderful name for writing poetry around.” (SATA 179)
     “Pooh reflects Milne’s own contentment” but otherwise in no way do the characters reflect their author – only his son (Wullschlager 184).  On the other hand, Lurie argues that there are indeed “some echoes from Milne’s own past” – in particular, she identifies Owl with Milne’s father (“pedantic rather than wise”) and Rabbit (“the officious organizer”) with his mother.  “It is interesting that . . . the characters most like caricatures of Milne’s own parents are also the only ones he claims to have invented himself, the live animals among the toys.” (12-13)  She also compares Roo’s arrival in the Forest to the inexplicable appearance of a younger sibling (13), conveniently overlooking the fact that neither Alan Milne nor Christopher Milne ever had such an arrival in their own lives.

Characters:  “Milne’s characters are archetypal and the books’ incidents endlessly useful as metaphors for daily life.” (Carpenter & Pritchard 576)  The book is structured on the “interplay between the real Christopher and Pooh, and their imaginary roles” (Wilson 164).  Christopher Robin is both audience and character – “important, but never the protagonist” and less distinct in his personality than the animals: “Christopher could be almost any small child, but Pooh is unique” (Wilson 164).  The animal characters have a few characteristics of the natural animals on which they are based, but mostly have human personalities.
     The characters “are generally consistent and static” which contributes to the comfort level, since our expectations are constantly met by their behavior (Wilson 166).  “Milne clearly mocks varied personality traits by isolating and then exaggerating them in individual characters” (Con-nolly 96).
     “Pooh is the child himself.  The rest have virtues and faults particular to some adults and some children; Pooh, the hero, has the virtues and faults common to all children.” (Lurie 14)  And Christopher Robin is also the child – but “the child as God. . . . He does not participate in most of the adventures, but usually appears at the end of the chapter” (Lurie 14).

Parody and Irony: Writing after WWI, Milne was unable to indulge in the straightforward cult of the child, but instead clothes these concepts in “pure escapist whimsy” (Wullschlager 178).  However, he incorporates enough irony to keep the sentimentality from becoming cloying (Wullschlager 178-79).
    The stories tend to be “circular, logical tales, which start from one premise and follow it on to absurdity,” or parodies; e.g., “Pooh’s visit to Rabbit’s house parodies the uninvited guest who comes to dinner and not only will not, but cannot leave.” (Connolly 96) the author “constantly calls attention to the absurdity of his own fantasy” (Wullschlager 190-91). The books deflate “the pretentiousness of the hero figure” by having bumbling Pooh resolve issues such as the identity of the North Pole (Connolly 98).  On the other hand, ironic attacks on adult pretensions are subverted by ironic, condescending exchanges be-tween the adult narrator and Christopher Robin (Lurie 14-15).
      The odd capitalization functions to comically deflate the importance of terms that are placed into capitals (Lurie 15).

Setting:  The Forest in this book is domesticated, a comfortable home – so the stories take place always in a protected place, watched over by the benevolent Christopher Robin; it is, in a way, an image of the nursery in which Christopher himself explored imaginatively under the supervi-sion of his nanny (Connolly 102-03).

Morality:  The books approve of good intentions, even if the outcome is less than desired (e.g., Pooh eats Eeyore’s birthday present) and disapproves of wrong actions even if the ostensible reason is good – especially attempts to exclude others (e.g., Rabbit’s plot to kidnap Roo) (Connolly 107).  Characters receive unconditional love from the god-figure, Christopher Robin (Connolly 109).

SOURCES: “A. A. Milne,” SATA 100: 175-79; Humphrey Carpenter and Mari Pritchard, The Oxford Companion to Children’s Literature, 1984; Paula T. Connolly, Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner: Recovering Arcadia, Twayne; Peter Dennis,  “Pooh Corner: Biographies: A.A. Milne” (http://www.pooh-corner.com/biomilne.html); Kuusankosken Kaupunginkirjasto, “A.A. Milne” (http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/aamilne.htm); Alison Lurie, “Back to Pooh Corner,” Children’s Literature 2 (19??) 11-16; James Milne, “The House at Pooh Corner: The Author” (http://www.pooh-corner.org/milne.shtml); Eleanor J. Paulson, “Our Readers Write: What’s a Good Children’s Book  Worth Using in a High School English Class?” English Journal 74: 3 (March 1985) 79-80; Anita Wilson, “Milne’s Pooh Books: The Benevolent Forest,” in Perry Nodelman, Ed.,Touchstones Vol. 1, 163-72; Jackie Wullschlager, Inventing Wonderland, New York: The Free Press, 1995.

On-line References for A.A. Milne:

• Winnie-the-Pooh Corner (Site created by Peter Dennis, an entertainer who does a one-man show based on the Pooh books)
• Penguin USA Authors: A. A. Milne
• A.A. Milne (biography)
• “The Page at Pooh Corner: The Author” http://www.pooh-corner.org/milne.shtml

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