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    Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens
    Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens
    Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens
    Ebook79 pages1 hour

    Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens

    By J. M. (James Matthew) Barrie

    4/5

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    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateJan 1, 1970

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    Reviews for Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens

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    • 4/5
      1926 American edition. Love, love, love these illustrations!
    • 3/5
       W...T...H? Parts of it made very interesting set-ups for the canon of Peter Pan, but parts of it were definitely not appropriate for children; the last chapter deals greatly with children dying (falling out of their prams, being left to starve/freeze in the gardens, etc.) and Peter burying their dead bodies. It also mentions the "bad fairies" slaughtering children that get discovered in the gardens after closing time. This, to me, is the reason that you can't just /trust/ that a children's book is appropriate for its intended audience (this and the original Little Mermaid).
    • 4/5
      This was written after Peter Pan but is a prequel. There is lots of information and anecdotes about Kensington Gardens in London as well as the story of Peter Pan and how he came to be the boy who never grew up. There is a story about how prospective parents ask the birds for a child and that is why children think they can fly as they were born as baby birds.Not all of the stories feature Peter Pan, the first half is a series of short tales about the different sights in the gardens and some of the children who have visited. It also talks about Barrie’s visits with the children to the gardens and I am ashamed to admit that while I have been living by London for nearly 10 years I still haven’t been to the gardens. I really must go and see if the monuments and sights have changed much since Barrie’s time.This was beautifully illustrated by Arthur Rackham with over 50 full colour illustrations plus many pen drawings and this was how I found the book even existed. It was funny, sweet and makes a lovely collection to anyone’s library.
    • 4/5
      I actually wasn't sure if I would like this story or not. But, I was pleasantly surprised. I did enjoy it much more than I thought I would. This is the story of how Peter Pan came to be.Peter left his mother, when he was a baby, to be a bird. That didn't work to well for him. So, the fairies decided to take him. They taught him to play like other children. Although they didn't teach him right, he still enjoyed himself. One day, they told Peter that they would give him one big wish. But, he took two small wishes instead. One was to go back to his mother. After he saw her, he returned to the fairies to spend some more time with them before he went back to his mother. But, when he was ready to go back, the window he flew out of was barred. That was when Peter made up his mind to live with the fairies.
    • 5/5
      I loved this book. This is truly a classic book that everyone should read twice in their life, once as a child and once as an adult.

    Book preview

    Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens - J. M. (James Matthew) Barrie

    Project Gutenberg's Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, by J. M. Barrie

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

    almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

    re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

    with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

    Title: Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens

    Author: J. M. Barrie

    Release Date: August 27, 2008 [EBook #1332]

    Last Updated: January 22, 2013

    Language: English

    *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PETER PAN IN KENSINGTON GARDENS ***

    Produced by Ron Burkey, and David Widger

    PETER PAN IN KENSINGTON GARDENS

    By J. M. Barrie

    Contents

    Peter Pan

    If you ask your mother whether she knew about Peter Pan when she was a little girl she will say, Why, of course, I did, child, and if you ask her whether he rode on a goat in those days she will say, What a foolish question to ask, certainly he did. Then if you ask your grandmother whether she knew about Peter Pan when she was a girl, she also says, Why, of course, I did, child, but if you ask her whether he rode on a goat in those days, she says she never heard of his having a goat. Perhaps she has forgotten, just as she sometimes forgets your name and calls you Mildred, which is your mother's name. Still, she could hardly forget such an important thing as the goat. Therefore there was no goat when your grandmother was a little girl. This shows that, in telling the story of Peter Pan, to begin with the goat (as most people do) is as silly as to put on your jacket before your vest.

    Of course, it also shows that Peter is ever so old, but he is really always the same age, so that does not matter in the least. His age is one week, and though he was born so long ago he has never had a birthday, nor is there the slightest chance of his ever having one. The reason is that he escaped from being a human when he was seven days' old; he escaped by the window and flew back to the Kensington Gardens.

    If you think he was the only baby who ever wanted to escape, it shows how completely you have forgotten your own young days. When David heard this story first he was quite certain that he had never tried to escape, but I told him to think back hard, pressing his hands to his temples, and when he had done this hard, and even harder, he distinctly remembered a youthful desire to return to the tree-tops, and with that memory came others, as that he had lain in bed planning to escape as soon as his mother was asleep, and how she had once caught him half-way up the chimney. All children could have such recollections if they would press their hands hard to their temples, for, having been birds before they were human, they are naturally a little wild during the first few weeks, and very itchy at the shoulders, where their wings used to be. So David tells me.

    I ought to mention here that the following is our way with a story: First, I tell it to him, and then he tells it to me, the understanding being that it is quite a different story; and then I retell it with his additions, and so we go on until no one could say whether it is more his story or mine. In this story of Peter Pan, for instance, the bald narrative and most of the moral reflections are mine, though not all, for this boy can be a stern moralist, but the interesting bits about the ways and customs of babies in the bird-stage are mostly reminiscences of David's, recalled by pressing his hands to his temples and thinking hard.

    Well, Peter Pan got out by the window, which had no bars. Standing on the ledge he could see trees far away, which were doubtless the Kensington Gardens, and the moment he saw them he entirely forgot that he was now a little boy in a nightgown, and away he flew, right over the houses to the Gardens. It is wonderful that he could fly without wings, but the place itched tremendously, and, perhaps we could all fly if we were as dead-confident-sure of our capacity to do it as was bold Peter Pan that evening.

    He alighted gaily on the open sward, between the Baby's Palace and the Serpentine, and the first thing he did was to lie on his back and kick. He was quite unaware already that he had ever been human, and thought he was a bird, even in appearance, just the same as in his early days, and when he tried to catch a fly he did not understand that the reason he missed it was because he had attempted to seize it with his hand, which, of course, a bird never does. He saw, however, that it must be past Lock-out Time, for there were a good many fairies about, all too busy to notice him; they were getting breakfast ready, milking their cows, drawing water, and so on, and the sight of the water-pails made him thirsty, so he flew over to the Round Pond to have a drink. He stooped, and dipped his beak in the pond; he thought it was his beak, but, of course, it was only his nose, and, therefore, very little water came up, and that

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