Winnie-the-Pooh :小熊維尼的由來－from and to

(photo from Flickr若侵權即刪除)
還記得這個每次遇到問題時都會歪著腦袋敲敲頭，肚子餓了就會摸著圓鼓鼓的肚子的黃色小熊嗎?
先回顧一下這個影片吧: )

The History of Winnie the Pooh

(看更詳細→Wikipedia:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnie-the-Pooh) (按我看中文版簡史)

Milne named the character Winnie-the-Pooh after a teddy bear owned by his son, Christopher Robin Milne, who was the basis for the character Christopher Robin. His toys also lent their names to most of the other characters, except for Owl and Rabbit, who were probably based on real animals, and the Gopher character, who was added in the Disney version. Christopher Robin's toy bear is now on display at the Main Branch of the New York Public Library in New York.^[1]

Christopher Milne had named his toy bear after Winnie, a bear which he often saw at London Zoo, and "Pooh", a swan they had met while on holiday. The bear cub was purchased from a hunter for $20 by Canadian Lieutenant Harry Colebourn in White River, Ontario, Canada, while en-route to England during the First World War. He named the bear "Winnie" after his hometown in Winnipeg, Manitoba. "Winnie" was surreptitiously brought to England with her owner, and gained unofficial recognition as The Fort Garry Horse regimental mascot. Colebourne left Winnie at the London Zoo while he and his unit were in France; after the war she was officially donated to the zoo, as she had become a much loved attraction there.^[2] Pooh the swan appears as a character in its own right in When We Were Very Young.

In the first chapter of Winnie-the-Pooh, Milne offers this explanation of why Winnie-the-Pooh is often called simply "Pooh": "But his arms were so stiff ... they stayed up straight in the air for more than a week, and whenever a fly came and settled on his nose he had to blow it off. And I think - but I am not sure - that that is why he is always called Pooh."

Crotchford Farm, Milnes' home in Ashdown Forest in East Sussex, England, was the basis for the setting of the Winnie-the-Pooh stories. The name of the fictional "Hundred Acre Wood" is reminiscent of the Five Hundred Acre Wood, which lies just outside Ashdown Forest and includes some of the locations mentioned in the book, such as the Enchanted Place.^[3]

The origin of the Poohsticks game is at the footbridge across a tributary of the River Medway near Upper Hartfield, close to the Milnes' home at Posingford Farm. It is traditional to play the game there using sticks gathered in nearby woodland. When the footbridge required replacement in recent times the engineer designed a new structure based closely on the drawings (by E.H. Shepherd) of the bridge in the original books, as the bridge did not originally appear as the artist drew it. There is an information board at the bridge which describes aspects of how to play the game.

簡單來說，小熊維尼的名字其實是根據身為父親的A.A.Milne送給兒子Robin的玩具熊生日禮物而取得的靈感。
一開始這隻玩具熊的名字是 Edward Bear，但有天小男孩到倫敦動物園裡面看見這隻從加拿大來的 Winnie bear，就把這隻玩具熊改名為 Winnie了；至於 Pooh 是小男孩的天鵝寵物名字。就因為小孩的童言童語，替這個玩偶命名，成為現今人見人愛的小熊維尼(Winnie-the-Pooh)。

Winnie的小故事

Winnie是在1914年時，由一位叫做Harry Colebourn的軍職人員在搭火車前往加拿大兵營報到的途中，在安大略的白河 (White River) 火車站，向一位獵人購買了這頭的小黑熊，並依自己的出生地 Winnipeg(加拿大緬尼托巴省的首都)替這頭熊取名 Winnie。而 Winnie 也成了部隊裡的幸運神，跟著部隊渡海到英國輾轉出征，跑遍整個英格蘭南部的索爾伯利戰場。後來，部隊轉征到法國，Colebourn 便把 Winnie 寄養在英國的倫敦動物園，並在1919年12月，正式把 Winnie 送給了動物園。往後，Winnie 成了動物園裡最具吸引力的明星，並一直活到1934年。
雖然Winnie是一個女孩的名字，但在故事裡，Winnie the Pooh (小熊維尼) 卻是一頭雄性的小熊喔。

加拿大安大略省地圖，紅色部分為White River(白河)小鎮的所在地
Winnie就這麼千里迢迢的從加拿大來到了英國
(看更詳細→GoogleMap給你查:http://maps.google.com/)

Pooh

在小熊系列故事的第一本《Winnie-the-Pooh》序中提到，Pooh曾是維尼的主人羅賓為一隻天鵝起的名字；
(收錄在When We Were Very Young一書中，點我看Wiki的介紹，點我看TIME的介紹←我還蠻喜歡這篇文章，尤其是他的前兩句話)
另一說是因為小熊維尼在吹走停在他鼻子上的蜜蜂時，嘴裡會發出Pooh、Pooh的聲音而來。 (好可愛)

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Notes from Sara's class

由於弟弟跟我相差9歲的關係，所以在弟弟小的時候，我都會陪他一起看電視和玩玩具、念童書給他聽，所以電視台的卡通人物或書中的一堆故事角色我一點也不陌生；記得有一陣子每天都會跟著弟弟一起準時收看迪士尼萬年固定班底-小熊維尼的卡通(到現在都還在播放)，每天看看到角色都背起來了，雖然隨著弟弟長大之後我們已經不會再看那些節目了，但現在回想起來還是覺得很有趣！我最喜歡的角色就是跳跳虎了，除了他的萬能彈跳尾巴之外，他的笑聲永遠令人莞爾一笑(WOO~WOO~WOO~然後尾音要提高,haha~)

上了莎莎公主的課之後，讓我對這些故事中的架構和人物分析有了更深一層的認識。像是小孩子常認為很多事情都是Take it for granted，認為爸爸媽媽本來就該買玩具給他們玩、他們想吃什麼好吃的就應該買給他們吃…這些對小孩子而言再也正當不過的現象亦可從小熊維尼的故事裡一窺究竟：故事中的維尼熊最喜歡做的事情就是吃蜂蜜，有一天當他看到蜜蜂、找到蜂窩時，他歪著腦袋想了又想的結果是：喔~蜜蜂釀蜂蜜是為了要給我吃！(然後想完之後就非常開心，哈)，小孩子不是也是這樣嗎? 看到你手上的棒棒糖，就以為是你要拿給他吃的，但他們發現真相不是如此時，隨之而來的反應是失望、難過或是鬧脾氣，這是因為這跟他們理所當然的"理念"不合。但對大人而言，大多數的時候他們都需要一個正當的理由去解釋他們的各種行為，沒有什麼事是理所當然的，蜜蜂釀蜂蜜當然是為了給自己吃囉，小孩跟大人之間如此天壤地別的想法，或許這就是兩者之間永遠最不一樣的地方吧！(噢，這讓我突然想到了幾米的我的錯都是大人的錯和小王子的故事)

此外，西方國家的小孩在小學階段都不會特別強調拼單字的能力，所以在拼字上往往錯誤百出，是很正常的現象。(難怪老媽以前常拿童書跟我說這字怪怪的叫我解釋，真是恍然大悟) 故事裡的袋鼠媽媽（Kanga）和小孩小荳（Roo），其實合起來就是袋鼠Kangaroo的意思；因為小主人翁羅賓還不太會拼音，把音節太長的一個字拆成了兩個字，結果就變成Kanga 和 Roo了(我還以為作者有什麼創意的想法咧，果然多上課長知識~~)
還有跳跳虎（Tigger）和 蜂蜜（Hunny）也是小孩子拼錯音的結果呢

故事裡一直掉尾巴的憂鬱驢子 咿唷（Eeyore），他的尾巴則是來自美國小學三年級前的學童會玩的一種遊戲(類似東方文化的"瞎子摸象")，因為通常這類的遊戲上面貼的動物圖案都是以驢子為主，所以在所有動物中，就是Eeyore一直掉尾巴囉！(然後羅賓會拿槌子把尾巴釘回去) Eeyore聳著肩膀頹然嘆氣一聲的形象，剛好反映著現實生活中小小孩覺得沒有人會理他的那種落寞的神情，看老師上課豐富的表情都把小熊維尼演活了，讓我回去想再把小熊維尼看好幾遍了(想當年我也是看小熊維尼長大呀...)