“His Terrible Masterpiece”

J.M. Barrie & Peter Pan

Sir James Matthew Barrie9 May 1860 – 19 June 1937Father a weaverMother assumed household

responsibilities at age 8 after death of own mother

9th out of 10 childrenOnly grew to 5’3”

Asexual?Impotent?Psychogenic Dwarfism?

Childhood

At 6 years, next-older brother David died two days before his 14th birthday in an ice-skating accidentMother devastated, Dave had been the favorite Barrie tried to fill David's place

wearing David's clothes whistling in the same manner

Mother thought ghost of dead son had come to visit her, she asked, “is that you”. Barrie replied “No, it's no' him, it's just me.”

Barrie's mother found comfort in the fact that her dead son would remain a boy forever, never to grow up and leave her

Later Barrie and his mother entertained each other with stories of her brief childhood and books such as Robinson Crusoe.

Successful before and after Peter Pan, many plays and novels (Finding Neverland misdirects on this point)

Possibly of interest:Sentimental Tommy, The Story of His Boyhood

(1896)Margaret Ogilvy (1896)Tommy and Grizel (1900)

The Tommy plays are about a boy and young man who clings to childish fantasy, Barrie’s own sexual issues may be hinted at

Margret Ogilvy is about mom

Career

Met actress Mary Ansell in 1891 he asked friend for a pretty

actress to play a role The two became friends she joined his family in

caring for him when ill in 1893 and 1894

Married on 9 July 1894, shortly after Barrie recovered

Mary retired from the stage

The relationship was reportedly sexless no children

Marriage

Barrie possibly eluded to his own troubles in his story "Tommy and Grizel" tells of a devastated

marriage. published six years into

marriage to Ansell. "Grizel, I seem to be

different from all other men; there seems to be some curse upon me. . . . You are the only woman I ever wanted to love, but apparently I can't."

Beginning mid 1908, Mary had an affair with Gilbert Cannan (an associate of Barrie‘s) Visited together to Black Lake

Cottage, known to the house staff Barrie learned of the affair in July

1909 Demanded that she end it, she

refused To avoid scandal, he offered legal

separation if she agreed not to see Cannan again, she still refused.

Barrie sued for divorce on the grounds of infidelity, which was granted in October 1909. Most historians sympathize with

Mary Her marriage to Barrie had been an

unhappy one partly because Barrie gave much of his attention to another family

The Arthur Llewelyn Davies family played an important part in Barrie's literary and personal life. parents:

Arthur (1863–1907) Sylvia (1866–1910)

five sons: George (1893–1915)John (1894-1959) Peter (1897–1960) Michael (1900–1921) Nicholas (1903–1980).

Grizel of the Crooked Smile

Barrie became acquainted with the family in 1897, meeting George and Jack (and baby Peter) with their nurse (nanny) Mary Hodgson in London's Kensington Gardens.

He lived nearby and often walked his Newfoundland dog Porthos in the park, and entertained the boys regularly with his ability to wiggle his ears and eyebrows, and with his stories.

He did not meet Sylvia until a chance encounter at a dinner party

Barrie did not first meet Sylvia Llewelyn Davies (portrayed by Kate Winslet in Finding Neverland) in the park at Kensington Gardens. He met her in 1897 at a dinner party

Barrie was seated next to Sylvia he would later refer to as "the most

beautiful creature he had ever seen," with "a tip-tilted nose, wide, grey eyes....and a crooked smile."

Barrie began a conversation with Sylvia after he noticed her tuck a few desserts under her coat.

She explained that they were for her son Peter.

The two began talking and eventually realized a common connection, Sylvia's son George whom Barrie had entertained several times in the park.

Barrie became a regular visitor at the Davies household and a common companion to the woman and her boys, despite the fact that they were each married.

Unlike in the movie Finding Neverland, Sylvia's husband Arthur was still alive when J.M. Barrie befriended the family. Imagine you’re in the hospital

and Michael Jackson starts moving in on your family.

Arthur Llewellyn Davies observed Barrie's affection for Sylvia and the children for nearly ten years, until he died from cancer of the jaw in 1907.

Arthur often resented Barrie's interference with his family.

In 1901, Barrie invited the Davies family to Black Lake Cottage, where he produced an album of captioned photographs of the boys acting out a pirate adventure, entitled The Boy Castaways of Black Lake Island. Barrie had two copies made, one of which he gave to

Arthur, who “misplaced it” on a train. Hey, check out this photo album I made of your half naked

waterlogged kids!Barrie included Arthur in the dedication at the start of

"Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens", which read, "To Sylvia and Arthur Llewellyn Davies and their boys (my boys).”You’re hospitalized, deformed, dying of cancer, and

Barrie sends you this as a gift?

After her husbands death, Sylvia welcomed Barrie's financial and emotional support, both for herself and for her boys.

Following Barrie's divorce, he and Sylvia remained close, but did not marry.

She became ill with an inoperable cancer in her chest, and died in 1910.

Shortly before her death, she wrote that she wanted her boys' nurse Mary Hodgson to continue caring for her children, and that she wanted Barrie, along with her mother, brother, and Arthur's brother as their guardians. She wanted all of Barrie’s letters to her burned and buried

with her and her husband.Following Sylvia's death in 1910, Barrie claimed that

they had been engaged to be married.Her will indicated nothing to that effect Jack and Peter later expressed skepticism of this report.

In the years that followed, several tragedies befell the Davies boys

On March 15, 1915, 21-year-old George Llewelyn Davies was killed in battle during a WWI advance on the Germans at St. Eloi Gunshot to the head

in 1921, the second youngest Davies boy Michael drowned with a friend, Rupert Errol Victor Buxton, while he was away at Oxford University as an undergraduate. The two inseparable friends

were found clinging together it was speculated that they

had been lovers who had made a suicide pact.

Barrie died of pneumonia on June 19, 1937 He left the bulk of his estate (excluding the Peter Pan

works, which he had previously given to Great Ormond Street Hospital) to his secretary Cynthia Asquith.

On April 5, 1960 63-year-old Peter committed suicide by throwing himself under a train as it was pulling into the station at Sloan Square, London. It is not known why Peter Llewelyn Davies took his own

life. A coroner's jury ruled that he had killed himself "while

the balance of his mind was disturbed".Nico, the youngest of the brothers, flatly denied that

Barrie ever behaved inappropriately. 'I don't believe that Uncle Jim ever experienced what one might call "a stirring in the undergrowth" for anyone — man, woman, or child,’

The Boy Castaways of Black Lake Island (1901)http://

beinecke.library.yale.edu/digitallibrary/castaways.html

It’s CreepyThe Little White Bird (1902)

Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens (1906)

Peter Pan (Play) (1904)Peter and Wendy (Novel)

(1911)

Peter Pan

The Little White BirdThe book attained prominence and

longevity due to several chapters written in a softer tone than the rest of the book, in which it introduced the character and mythology of Peter Pan.

Those chapters were later published separately as Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens as a children's book.

The Peter Pan story began as one chapter of a longer work and during the four years that Barrie worked on the book prior to publication, grew to an "elaborate book-within-a-book" of over one hundred pages.

At first, the play was a Harlequinade

It eventually evolved into the play we’re familiar with today, of which the novel you’re reading is an adaptation

Finding Neverland presents the play much more like the finished product it would eventually become and less like it likely was at the time

Harlequin comedian and romantic male lead. love interest of Columbine. everlasting high spirits

Columbine Female lead, wore cap and apron, girl next door type

Pantaloon devious, greedy He is taken in readily by the various tricks and schemes of Harlequin. costume usually includes red tight-fitting vest and breeches, slippers,

a skullcap, an over-sized hooked nose, and a grubby grey goatee. Pierrot

comic servant character, often Pantaloon's servant. His face was whitened with flour. stupid and awkward, a country bumpkin with oversized clothes.

Harlequinade Stock Characters

Transformed WorldAudience ParticipationBell and stage light fairiesElaborate stage machinerySkin PartsCross Gendered CastingDouble Casting

Harlequinade Influences

Peter Pan: or, The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up

Poster by Charles Buchel, advertising the first production of Peter Pan in December 1904.

Pauline Chase as one of the twins in the pillow dance

Nina Boucicault as Peter Pan in the first London production

The final Napoleonic tableaux from the first production of Peter Pan in December 1904. Peter - dressed as Napoleon and played by Nina Boucicault, poses after the celebrated painting by Orchardson.

Critical TheoryA Preview

The focus on author biography and historical context is left over from 19th century approaches to literature.

The Formalist movement of the early 20th century is a response to this. A focus on the text itself instead of outside material

SymbolismAmbiguityIronyTensionParadox

The above ideas all come from Formalism

Humanism and Formalism

StructuralismFocus not on individual texts but

systems of texts and the rules (poetics) that govern them.Could Lucy of I Love Lucy ever

have an abortion on the show?Binaries – we tend to think of

the world in terms of opposite pairs

DeconstructionNone of those binaries are realAll meaning is slippery

Structuralism and Deconstruction

Psychosexual DevelopmentOedipal Complex

The Subconscious MindIdEgoSuperego

Psychoanalytic Criticism

England was a major imperialist power in the 19th century

Any text generated during this period is going to bear traces of its influence

As colonialism faded, people began to study the falloutMimicryHybridity“the other”WorldingOvercharging

Peter Pan can show us a great deal about English imperialist attitudes during the time and the consequences of them

Post Colonialism