The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up
Peter Pan comes from the later part of the Golden Age of Children’s Literature. Like Lewis Carrol’s Alice in Wonderland the eventual literary tale emerged from stories told to children in the author’s life.
The Scottish writer J.M. Barrie created the character of Peter Pan and the story of Peter and Wendy Darling. Though the character first appeared in chapters from The Little White Bird (1902) and was subsequently published as “Peter Pan in Kensington Garden”(1906), it was in Barrie’s 1904 play Peter Pan, Or the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up, that the character and story fully took place.
The play premiered in London and was such a big hit that a year later, it also opened in New York. This was quickly followed by many films, musicals, and adaptations of the play.
Barrie continually tinkered with the play’s text, the character of Peter, and the overall story over the years, subsequently publishing the novel version of Peter and Wendy, now generally known as Peter Pan, in 1911.
The script of the play was eventually published in 1928.
In this module, we will be looking at the original Barrie text of the play and novel and will explore various interpretations of this story and character and consider how this story, like Alice in Wonderland, became a staple of children’s literature and popular culture.
Where have you encountered Peter Pan before? What do you remember of the story?
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