On This Day – October 14th

Published on 14th October 1926, the book "Winnie-the-Pooh" is the first in a series of books about Winnie the Pooh and friends. In creating these volumes, Milne adapted stories he had originally published in Punch, St. Nicholas Magazine, Vanity Fair and other periodicals.

The first chapter, for instance, was adapted from "The Wrong Sort of Bees", a story published in the London Evening News in its issue for Christmas Eve 1925. The chapters in the book can be read independently of each other, as they are episodic in nature and plots do not carry over from one chapter to the next.
Winnie-the-Pooh was shortly followed by The House at Pooh Corner, also by Milne.

Throughout the 20th Century, and beyond, the characters became firm favourites to successive generations of children, not the least of which is the simple game of Pooh Sticks, where races between twigs in streams, usually under bridges, are held.

Strangely, Winnie himself has become a symbol of resistance against the Communist Party in China – where the any image of the character is banned!

Return to the Hundred Acre Wood, by David Benedictus was the first official post-Milne Pooh book written with the full backing of A. A. Milne's estate, which took the trustees ten years to agree to. Families!

In this book, Pooh returned with his friends Tigger, Piglet and Eeyore as well as a new companion Lottie the Otter. The illustrations are by Mark Burgess, who had also worked on reviving the Paddington Bear stories.

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