Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie

I picked up this book at some used bookstore or other awhile ago out of curiosity, and when I finally got around to reading it, I felt like I'd been missing out on something my whole childhood. My exposure to Peter Pan is all through its later cultural incarnations - the Disney movie (and Disneyland ride), Hook, Finding Neverland, and so reading the book inevitably called to mind images from all these sources, but also made me appreciate them anew.*

But I also fell in love with the story itself, and with the telling of the story. I thought the book was rich and nostalgic and wise and innocent, and even funny. I really loved it. It turns out that children's stories told for the kids on one level, and the parents on another, are not a new phenomenon. Peter Pan is definitely written for children, but it's also very definitely written by an adult looking back on childhood, and as I read I felt like maybe I didn't actually miss out in childhood, because it is a book best appreciated by people who have already been children and are no longer. That felt very appropriate to Peter Pan.


* I know a lot of people don't like Hook, but it's a late-childhood favorite of mine, and reading Peter Pan just made me like it more for its surprisingly faithful interpretation of the story and setting.