The Tale of Peter Rabbit is a British children's book written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter that follows mischievous and disobedient young Peter Rabbit as he is chased about the garden of Mr. McGregor. He escapes and returns home to his mother who puts him to bed after dosing him with camomile
tea. The tale was written for five-year-old Noel Moore, son of Potter's
former governess Annie Carter Moore, in 1893. It was revised and
privately printed by Potter in 1901 after several publishers' rejections
but was printed in a trade edition by Frederick Warne & Co. in 1902.
The book was a success, and multiple reprints were issued in the years
immediately following its debut. It has been translated into 36
languages and with 45 million copies sold it is one of the best-selling books of all time.
The book has generated considerable merchandise over the decades
since its release for both children and adults with toys, dishes, foods,
clothing, videos and other products made available. Potter was one of
the first to be responsible for such merchandise when she patented a
Peter Rabbit doll in 1903 and followed it almost immediately with a
Peter Rabbit board game.
The story focuses on a family of anthropomorphic rabbits, the widowed
mother rabbit cautioning her young against entering a vegetable garden
grown by a man named Mr. McGregor, who had baked her deceased husband
into a pie. Whereas her three daughters obediently refrain from entering
the garden, her rebellious son Peter defies his mother by trespassing
into the garden to snack on some vegetables,
losing his clothes along the way. While there, Peter is seen by Mr.
McGregor and loses his clothes trying to escape. He finds difficulties
in wriggling beneath the opening in the fence through which he'd managed
to slide past earlier to invade the garden, and later finds that his abandoned clothing articles were used to dress Mr. McGregor's scarecrow.
After returning home, a sickened Peter is bedridden by his mother
whereas his well-behaved sisters receive a sumptuous dinner of milk and
berries as opposed to Peter's supper of chamomile tea.
Through the 1890s, Potter sent illustrated story letters to the children of her former governess,
Annie Moore, and, in 1900, Moore, realizing the commercial potential of
Potter's stories, suggested they be made into books. Potter embraced
the suggestion, and, borrowing her complete correspondence (which had
been carefully preserved by the Moore children), selected a letter
written on 4 September 1893 to five-year-old Noel that featured a tale
about a rabbit named Peter. Potter had owned a pet rabbit called Peter
Piper.
Potter biographer Linda Lear explains: "The original letter was too
short to make a proper book so [Potter] added some text and made new
black-and-white illustrations...and made it more suspenseful. These
changes slowed the narrative down, added intrigue, and gave a greater
sense of the passage of time. Then she copied it out into a
stiff-covered exercise book, and painted a colored frontispiece showing
Mrs. Rabbit dosing Peter with camomile tea".
More Related Content:
- The Tale of Peter Rabbit at Project Gutenberg
- The Tale of Peter Rabbit Audio Book at Project Gutenberg
- The Tale of Peter Rabbit Digital Book at The University of Iowa Libraries (Flash)
- World of Peter Rabbit: A website maintained by Potter's first publisher Frederick Warne & Co.
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