Refusing to Clap for Tinkerbell

[ursulav]

It’s the 100th anniversary of the publication of Peter Pan, or something like it, and I spent an hour this morning listening to panelists on NPR sing its praises.

I would like to take a moment now to say that I hated Peter Pan as a child.

Still am not a big fan, honestly. I have mellowed and can appreciate it as a piece of literature of the era,

Comments

[hydrolagus]

I didn't have any particular opinion on Peter Pan, but I wasn't in a tremendous hurry to grow up either. Especially as I got older--nothing magic had happened to me yet and it was becoming increasingly clear that it wasn't going to, and I was going to turn out to be one of the boring stodgy kind of grown-ups instead of one of the kind that could participate in the wondrous.

[shadowsong]

That is totally how I felt too.

[six_crazy_guys]

Kinda my thought as I was reading this. Not wanting to grow up is not a trait of childhood, it's a trait of teenagehood and young adulthood. It's that stage when you can relish in the fact of not being a child, but are mature enough to know the responsibilities involved in adulthood--and often want nothing to do with them.

[tallymark]

YES. This is exactly how I felt. I got increasingly depressed as each birthday passed and nothing magical happened yet--if I got to be an adult before I gained my magic powers, I'd NEVER gain them!

And I never did. Sigh.

[inkytwist]

I just read this blog post aloud to my Mom and sister and had them nearly collapse in giggles! I love reading your blog <3

[allthelivesofme]

Peter Pan himself always creeped me out as a kid-- he took kids away from their home, brought them back, promised he'd come back for them and then never did. And I got so mad for Tinker Bell's sake; she was so devoted to Peter and then just got forgotten. Always saw Peter as more of a selfish creep than a hero, and so could never quite understand why Hook had to be the villain; he didn't like Peter Pan either so child-me figured there had to be a good reason.

Found a couple of friends who agree with me, and now we're working on Faerietale. :-)

[wren_chan]

I do in fact love Pan and still do, and I always clapped for Tink because I believe in stage magic, but I must admit that I rather dismissed him as the ... the Ferris Bueller, shall we say. It wasn't ABOUT him for me, it was about Tink and the Boys and Wendy and Moira. And Hook. Always Hook. I grew up on the Mary Martin musical-pantomime, and so I dreamed of stalking about in a beautiful curly wig and demanding my pirate minions play for me ... a TARANTELLA. ('A Tarantella!')

...also I figured that the Lost Boys weren't Logan's Run'd (Logan's Ran?) so much as they just 'fell out' of Neverland and back into grown-up worlds. And I refuse to acknowledge any other possibility, because the fountains in Ft Worth where they had everyone emerge from were closed long ago. So there. XD

But yeah, the memory thing bugged me a lot. But not seeing Peter as the person with whom I should associate helped.

[wren_chan]

Well, I'm glad they're back. They're gorgeous, in a kinda creepy way.

[tamnonlinear]

I never read the book. I grew up with a fairly strong lack of Disney, which I suspect was fairly intentional. My mother had definite ideas about me not watching too much that tried to tell me that my major accomplishment in life would be getting rescued by a prince and getting married (I played a lot of Zork and reread Alice's Adventures). Also, watching musicals tended to lead to singing, which was not a good outcome for anyone within earshot. When I did watch Peter Pan, I'm fairly sure my response was something along the lines of "Why does the girl have to take care of all the boys? That's stupid