Book #118: Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie

I don't know that I've ever read Peter Pan, but I think I have at least once. It was very familiar, but that's because the Disney movie follows the plot of the book pretty closely, so I can't tell for sure. But I really enjoyed reading this classic--it was short and sweet and really funny at parts. I loved how Neverland so perfectly encapsulated a boy's dream world, with fighting Indians and pretending to be pirates and swimming all day, and how Wendy's Neverland involved her pretending to be the Lost Boys' mother and basically playing house all day, forcing the boys to nap after lunch and darning socks. I also loved the tongue-in-cheek tone throughout the book, and the personality of the nameless narrator (he at one point says he wants to say bad things about Mrs. Darling, but he won't, and eventually admits that she is his favorite, etc.). I loved the little hilarious details that made the London part kind of ridiculous, like Nana being a dog (I totally would have thought Disney made that one up) and Mr. Darling staying in the kennel constantly after the children disappear and even going to work in his kennel. That really was funny. I found out after reading that it was originally the play first--which makes the part about "I do believe in fairies" make more sense (which I know is part of the play, but it didn't flow very well in the book).