Barrie's working titles for it included The Great White Father and Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Hated Mothers. The original draft of the play was entitled simply Anon: A Play. In 1906, the chapters of The Little White Bird that featured the character of Peter Pan were published as the book Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, with illustrations by Arthur Rackham.īarrie then adapted the play into the 1911 novel Peter and Wendy, often now published simply as Peter Pan. : 47 The character was next used in the stage play Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, which premiered in London on 27 December 1904 and became an instant success. The Peter Pan character first appeared in print in the 1902 novel The Little White Bird, written for adults. If Margaret Ogilvy drew a measure of comfort from the notion that David, in dying a boy, would remain a boy for ever, Barrie drew inspiration.' : 3–5

According to Birkin, the death was 'a catastrophe beyond belief, and one from which she never fully recovered. : Chapter 5 Andrew Birkin has suggested that the inspiration for the character was Barrie's elder brother David, whose death in a skating accident at the age of fourteen deeply affected their mother. The character's name comes from two sources: Peter Llewelyn Davies, one of the boys, and Pan, the mischievous Greek god of the woodlands. Llewelyn Davies's death from cancer came within a few years after the death of her husband Barrie was a co-guardian of the boys, and unofficially adopted them. In 1929, Barrie gave the copyright of the Peter Pan works to Great Ormond Street Hospital, a children's hospital in London.īarrie created Peter Pan in stories he told to the sons of his friend Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, with whom he had forged a special relationship. In the U.S., the original version has also been supplanted in popularity by the 1954 musical version, which became popular on television. The play is now rarely performed in its original form on stage in the UK, whereas pantomime adaptations are frequently staged around Christmas. Since its original production, the story has been adapted as a pantomime, a stage musical, a television special, a live themed ice-skating show in the mid-1970's, and several films, including a 1924 silent film, a 1953 Disney animated film, and a 2003 live action film. This version was later illustrated by Mabel Lucie Attwell in 1921. The novel was first abridged by May Byron in 1915, with Barrie's permission, and published under the title Peter Pan and Wendy, the first time this form was used. Bedford (whose illustrations are still under copyright in the EU). The original book contains a frontispiece and 11 half-tone plates by the artist F. The novel was first published in 1911 by Hodder & Stoughton in the UK, and Charles Scribner's Sons in the US. This was also the first illustrated version of the story. Prior to the publication of Barrie's novel, the play was first adapted into the 1907 novelisation The Peter Pan Picture Book, written by Daniel O'Connor and illustrated by Alice B.

Barrie continued to revise the play for years after its debut until publication of the play script in 1928, under the name Peter Pan or, The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up. It was later revived with such actresses as Marilyn Miller and Eva Le Gallienne. A Broadway production was mounted in 1905 starring Maude Adams. The play debuted at the Duke of York's Theatre in London on 27 December 1904 with Nina Boucicault, daughter of the playwright Dion Boucicault, in the title role. The play and novel were inspired by Barrie's friendship with the Llewelyn Davies family. The Peter Pan stories also involve the characters Wendy Darling and her two brothers John and Michael, Peter's fairy Tinker Bell, the Lost Boys, and the pirate Captain Hook. Both versions tell the story of Peter Pan, a mischievous little boy who can fly, and has many adventures on the island of Neverland that is inhabited by mermaids, fairies, Native Americans, and pirates. Barrie, in the form of a 1904 play and a 1911 novel titled Peter and Wendy, often extended in Peter Pan and Wendy. Peter Pan or, the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, often known simply as Peter Pan, is a work by J.

Peter pan fear of growing up