On Winnie-the-Pooh

I never loved Winnie-the-Pooh as a child. I’d never read the books — I knew him through the Disney movies and other media — and the reason I picked this up was that I’d been so impressed by The Tao of Pooh that I wanted to go back to the stories. I’m so glad I did. Milne writes with such whimsy and care that you can’t help but love his stories, and I appreciate them more now, at nearly thirty, than I ever did as a child: his use of adverbs, the zaniness of the stories, his obvious love for the subject. I’m going to pick up the second book and one of the poetry collections next, and I’m really looking forward to them.