A Very Famous Childhood

On August 21, 1921, Christopher Robin Milne got a stuffed bear for his first birthday. He would receive a stuffed donkey for Christmas, and he already had a small stuffed pig, a gift from a neighbor. His father wrote humorous stories about fashionable Londoners, and successful plays that ran in the West End. His mother was attractive and very chic. They lived in Chelsea. Christopher had a perfect childhood in many ways. In a few years, through no fault of his own, he would be the most famous child in the English-speaking world. None of this sounds like a recipe for unhappiness, but he hated fame. He would spend the rest of his life hiding from it. Christopher Robin appears six times in A Book of Ages.