Winnie-the-Pooh: Exploring a Classic

Delightful exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum looking at the Winnie-the-Pooh books, how they were written and their legacy.

I thought this show got the balance right between having interactive things for children and not dumbing down the story and the content for adults. I loved the tea table, the slide and the Pooh Sticks bridge although I could have lived without the bell on Pooh’s house!

The show felt slightly odd at first as it looked at the legacy before the books but with hindsight it meant that it got mechanising, Disney and songs out of the way early so that the rest of the show could slowly work through how the books came about. Equal importance was given to A.A. Milne and E. H. Shepherd and there was lots of detail on how they worked together.

I watched the lovely film “Goodbye Christopher Robin” which was out recently and the show was a bit like walking through that. It was wonderful to see some of the photographs that recreates, like the picture of Christopher Robin with Winnie the bear at London Zoo.

I loved the section which concentrated on how the words and pictures came together to tell the story and particularly how the text and pictures sat on a page. In one case they put the sketch, pen and ink final drawing, zinc printing plate, book proof and the printed version together.

I was fascinated to see that the paperback edition didn’t appear until 1965 and so was the familiar blue Puffin book from which I discovered the stories.

Closes on 8 April 2018

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