jessie_pea90 's review for:

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

2.0

dark slow-paced

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

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A children’s classic that most people would be familiar with, took me by surprise but not in a good way. 

Peter Pan received the Disney treatment in 1953 and I feel most people will know the story from that film adaptation, however the book is very different. 

Akin to traditional fairy-tales, Peter Pan is in actuality a dark and pretty heartless story. There is a lot of talk and instances of killing the lost boys and the stabbing of pirates. Pan is selfish, manipulative and a bully. A mother is no longer a symbol of love and care you see in Disney but is reduced to setting rules (particularly around bedtime and taking medication), mending clothes and cleaning. Obviously there is the outdated language regarding the Native Americans too, but unlike when reading other classics this somehow still felt so out of place for its time. 

The idea of Pan’s innocence formed from ‘a child who will never grow up’ comes across as more stubbornness of not wanting to accept consequences and simply wanting to do as one pleases regardless of how it affects others - seen mostly in his bullying of the lost boys and his forgetting of Wendy and co. in the trip to Neverland.

Tink is probably the only saving-grace in the book being her jealous and sassy self with the ‘I do believe in fairies’ scene a classic among a few adaptations (“Hook” anyone?). 

The language is tricky to grasp, seemingly over formal and it was pretty confusing and convoluted at times that I would not recommend this children’s classic to children anymore.

A disappointment to be sure, I think I’ll stick to the films.