Political Subtext of Winnie the Pooh

House at Pooh Corner

Paula T. Connolly makes the point about A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner that the escapism of the text is, in its own way, inherently political: to posit the existence of an Edenic locus amoenus like the Hundred Acre Wood necessarily implies the existence of a world that requires escaping from. We can see an interesting demonstration of the dynamics Connolly describes in the short poem offered by Pooh and Piglet in the chapter "Tigger Has Breakfast" in The House at Pooh Corner. I hope to demonstrate by a close reading of this short lyric that indeed the construction of the Edenic ideal in Milne's work is necessarily aware of the darker possibilities it intends to shut out.

The basic joke of the chapter "Tigger Has Breakfast" is fairly self-evident: Tigger behaves precisely like a willful child, in claiming that a certain food is "what Tiggers like best" then immediately rejecting it as unsuitable once it is offered. However part of the humor depends upon the young reader's knowledge that, for example, thistles -- which are painful to touch -- do not really make a suitable meal for humans. However, Tigger's repeated rejection of the food that he is offered (honey, "haycorns" or acorns, and thistles) eventually gives rise to Pooh's thoughtful poem about the situation:

What shall we do about poor little Tigger?

If he never eats nothing he'll never get bigger.

He doesn't like honey and haycorns and thistles

Because of the taste and because of the bristles.

And all the good things which an animal likes

Have the wrong sort of swallow or too many spikes. (182)

Piglet's ultimate objection -- that Tigger is quite big enough, and thus doesn't need feeding -- then gives rise to an additional final couplet by Pooh:

But whatever his weight in pounds, shillings, and ounces,

He always seems bigger because of his bounces. (183)

It is worth inquiring of this poem in what ways it illustrates Connolly's basic thesis about Milne. For a start, it is worth noting that the humor of the poem in many ways depends upon sticking to the linguistic surface of the words: the triple negative of the second line, for example, violates grammatical rules that child readers would recognize, but also manages to make sense. And the description of eating the "foods" which any child would recognize as not food also makes sense: "bristles" and "spikes" are both obvious facts about thistles, and thus give a good reason for Tigger's rejection of the food. Finally, the obvious pun in the coda -- confusing pounds sterling (like shillings) or pounds avoirdupois (like ounces) -- hinges upon a confusion that children should recognize.