This post reminds me I need to honor my 12-year-old daughter's request for poetry tea-time. We used to do them weekly, but life just feels so chaotic right now.
I didn't grow up with Milne's poetry. I had a very little set of miniature books with highly abridged versions of some of the Pooh stories. And of course the Disney cartoon. But in college one of my friends gifted me with a lovely hardbound set: one of the volumes had the complete Pooh and the other had the combined When We Were Very Young and Now We Are Six. Those are the volumes I raised my children on.
My oldest was absolutely obsessed with Pooh when she was about 2 or 3 and we ran through that volume on repeat-- daily-- until I had them practically memorized. Not that I complained. Milne was probably the only author of books for children who I could have borne reading with that kind of obsessive frequency.
We got into the poems a little later, but they became constant companions as well, if not with QUITE the same obsessive frequency. Mary Jane was always one of my favorites. And it became even more apt as two of my autistic children had very stereotypical rigidity about food. But Milne's verse is much more pleasant to read than being the adult trying to coax a fussy child to just try the thing. I may or may not have employed the poem in some of my misguided attempts at coaxing. I certainly used it to mock myself.
I raised my children on Winnie-the-Pooh, my children raised my grandchildren on them, and I have sent sets of the books for the great-grandchildren. I think part of the charm is that the poems seem to come from the perspective of the child. _We_ all know an adult can get to the end of town by herself, but the child has to make himself important in his mother's life as she is in his. The problem today is that the trope is often not funny, because there's a serious message that adults _really are_ stupid and children _really are_ much smarter. But we all know that's only rarely the case (and yes, I may or may not have occasionally been clueless about a child's temper :) ) so that it's fun and funny to see a kind of turnabout. Anyway, thanks so much for this delightful poem; I shall have to pull out my own Pooh books and revisit tomorrow!
E.H. Shepard’s illustrations enhance Mr. Milne’s poems and prose. Thank you for including the illustration with this post.
I am so glad that I was introduced to Winnie-the-Pooh as a child. The rhythm, repetition, meaning, and of course the accompanying illustrations engage the reader no matter our age. Your explanation of the poem’s structure makes our enjoyment more robust. Halfway Down is another favorite example.
I am deeply delighted that you featured this poem, and the analysis was spot-on. I think Milne’s children’s poems have become my absolute favorites, as an adult. We will always read Stevenson on repeat, but I am always thrilled when my child’s hand moves to Milne sometimes instead. (Also, I just love the book itself, small enough so that it fits in the hand just right, with its unobtrusive yet wonderfully suggestive pen-and-ink drawings!!)
I do not feel sorry for this child. Of all the milk puddings, rice is the least bad. Semolina, for example, is plain awful. One of the milk puddings in my school was rightly called frog spawn, and for good reason. It was not the rice. Even my school rice pudding was OK, and my own homemade, with Spanish paella rice, is delicious. If one has to have a plain pudding on repeat, one could do worse than rice.
No accounting for taste. I was one of those weird children who loved any kind of milky pudding --- I don't think I've ever had semolina pudding (although I happily ate Cream of Wheat for breakfast), but my mother used to make tapioca pudding, and I also consumed that with delight. Now I look at tapioca in its raw, pearl form and think, hm --- though I did use it in a Norwegian fruit soup at Christmas last year.
But again, I was one of those children who would eat anything happily, just because it was in front of me. My brother was the opposite. I've never asked him how he feels about rice pudding . . .
Oh happy memory. When I was very young, I loved this book and the illustrations. That bent stubborn head and the flying shoe - funny then and once you grow up to become that clueless mother, funny again.
This post reminds me I need to honor my 12-year-old daughter's request for poetry tea-time. We used to do them weekly, but life just feels so chaotic right now.
I didn't grow up with Milne's poetry. I had a very little set of miniature books with highly abridged versions of some of the Pooh stories. And of course the Disney cartoon. But in college one of my friends gifted me with a lovely hardbound set: one of the volumes had the complete Pooh and the other had the combined When We Were Very Young and Now We Are Six. Those are the volumes I raised my children on.
My oldest was absolutely obsessed with Pooh when she was about 2 or 3 and we ran through that volume on repeat-- daily-- until I had them practically memorized. Not that I complained. Milne was probably the only author of books for children who I could have borne reading with that kind of obsessive frequency.
We got into the poems a little later, but they became constant companions as well, if not with QUITE the same obsessive frequency. Mary Jane was always one of my favorites. And it became even more apt as two of my autistic children had very stereotypical rigidity about food. But Milne's verse is much more pleasant to read than being the adult trying to coax a fussy child to just try the thing. I may or may not have employed the poem in some of my misguided attempts at coaxing. I certainly used it to mock myself.
I raised my children on Winnie-the-Pooh, my children raised my grandchildren on them, and I have sent sets of the books for the great-grandchildren. I think part of the charm is that the poems seem to come from the perspective of the child. _We_ all know an adult can get to the end of town by herself, but the child has to make himself important in his mother's life as she is in his. The problem today is that the trope is often not funny, because there's a serious message that adults _really are_ stupid and children _really are_ much smarter. But we all know that's only rarely the case (and yes, I may or may not have occasionally been clueless about a child's temper :) ) so that it's fun and funny to see a kind of turnabout. Anyway, thanks so much for this delightful poem; I shall have to pull out my own Pooh books and revisit tomorrow!
E.H. Shepard’s illustrations enhance Mr. Milne’s poems and prose. Thank you for including the illustration with this post.
I am so glad that I was introduced to Winnie-the-Pooh as a child. The rhythm, repetition, meaning, and of course the accompanying illustrations engage the reader no matter our age. Your explanation of the poem’s structure makes our enjoyment more robust. Halfway Down is another favorite example.
I’ve come back to read this several times since you shared it this morning, and it’s made me laugh every time! It’s perfect!
I am deeply delighted that you featured this poem, and the analysis was spot-on. I think Milne’s children’s poems have become my absolute favorites, as an adult. We will always read Stevenson on repeat, but I am always thrilled when my child’s hand moves to Milne sometimes instead. (Also, I just love the book itself, small enough so that it fits in the hand just right, with its unobtrusive yet wonderfully suggestive pen-and-ink drawings!!)
Yes, the Milne poem books are among my favorite too. I had not thought about how the book fits nicely in my hand.
I do not feel sorry for this child. Of all the milk puddings, rice is the least bad. Semolina, for example, is plain awful. One of the milk puddings in my school was rightly called frog spawn, and for good reason. It was not the rice. Even my school rice pudding was OK, and my own homemade, with Spanish paella rice, is delicious. If one has to have a plain pudding on repeat, one could do worse than rice.
No accounting for taste. I was one of those weird children who loved any kind of milky pudding --- I don't think I've ever had semolina pudding (although I happily ate Cream of Wheat for breakfast), but my mother used to make tapioca pudding, and I also consumed that with delight. Now I look at tapioca in its raw, pearl form and think, hm --- though I did use it in a Norwegian fruit soup at Christmas last year.
But again, I was one of those children who would eat anything happily, just because it was in front of me. My brother was the opposite. I've never asked him how he feels about rice pudding . . .
Probably best don't, ask your brother that is.
Oh happy memory. When I was very young, I loved this book and the illustrations. That bent stubborn head and the flying shoe - funny then and once you grow up to become that clueless mother, funny again.
Yes, I love the flying shoe! And yes, as a clueless mother, I . . . might or might not . . . have witnessed scenes like this upon occasion.