Peter Pan: by J.M. Barrie (Everyman's Library CHILDREN'S CLASSICS)

Barrie, Sir James Matthew

ISBN 10: 1857159020 / ISBN 13: 9781857159028

Published by Childrens Classics, 1992

About this Item

Most items will be dispatched the same or the next working day. A copy that has been read but remains in clean condition. All of the pages are intact and the cover is intact and the spine may show signs of wear. The book may have minor markings which are not specifically mentioned.

Seller Inventory # rev2390637326

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Peter Pan: by J.M. Barrie (Everyman's Library CHILDREN'S CLASSICS)
• Publisher: Childrens Classics
• Publication Date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1857159020
• ISBN 13: 9781857159028
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: Good
• Weight: 440 grams

About this title

Synopsis

A timeless children's classic in a beautiful binding from Everyman's Library. Sure to delight for generations to come.

Review

"All children, except one, grow up." Thus begins a great classic of children's literature that we all remember as magical. What we tend to forget, because the tale of Peter Pan and Neverland has been so relentlessly boiled down, hashed up, and coated in saccharine, is that J.M. Barrie's original version is also witty, sophisticated, and delightfully odd. The Darling children, Wendy, John, and Michael, live a very proper middle-class life in Edwardian London, but they also happen to have a Newfoundland for a nurse. The text is full of such throwaway gems as "Mrs. Darling first heard of Peter Pan when she was tidying up her children's minds," and is peppered with deliberately obscure vocabulary including "embonpoint," "quietus," and "pluperfect." Lest we forget, it was written in 1904, a relatively innocent age in which a plot about abducted children must have seemed more safely fanciful. Also, perhaps, it was an age that expected more of its children's books, for Peter Pan has a suppleness, lightness, and intelligence that are "literary" in the best sense. In a typical exchange with the dastardly Captain Hook, Peter Pan describes himself as "youth... joy... a little bird that has broken out of the egg," and the author interjects: "This, of course, was nonsense; but it was proof to the unhappy Hook that Peter did not know in the least who or what he was, which is the very pinnacle of good form." A book for adult readers-aloud to revel in--and it just might teach young listeners to fly. (Ages 5 and older) --Richard Farr