A.A. Milne’s much-loved bear celebrates the centenary of his first storybook, but his global fame has also brought censorship, political satire and even a bloody horror-film makeover.
Winnie-the-Pooh, the honey-loving bear known for his simple wisdom and fondness for food, turns 100 this year. First introduced to readers in a collection of stories published on October 14, 1926, the character has become one of the world’s most recognisable literary figures.
Yet Pooh’s seemingly harmless appeal has not protected him from controversy. Over the past century, the bear has been censored for political reasons, targeted by religious campaigners and criticised for his sentimental language. In recent years, he has even been transformed into a horror-film character.
A bear too close to China’s president
Pooh became an unlikely symbol of political dissent in China after internet users began comparing President Xi Jinping to the bear in 2013. An image of Xi walking alongside then-US president Barack Obama was widely shared, with the two leaders likened to Pooh and Tigger.
Chinese censors subsequently restricted the circulation of the images. Similar memes comparing Xi to Pooh and other political figures to characters from the stories also attracted attention from authorities. The 2018 film Christopher Robin was not released in China.
The comparisons later spread beyond mainland China. Pro-democracy demonstrators in Hong Kong wore Pooh-themed masks, while Taiwanese military pilots displayed patches depicting a Formosan black bear punching the fictional bear.
Piglet falls foul of Turkish television
In 2006, Turkey’s public broadcaster TRT reportedly banned the Walt Disney Winnie the Pooh cartoon because one of its central characters, Piglet, was a pig — an animal considered unclean in Islam.
The broadcaster was said to have considered removing Piglet’s scenes but concluded that the character appeared too frequently. Disney had also left Piglet out of its first Pooh animation, Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree, released in 1966, replacing him with Gopher. Piglet returned in later productions.
Religious objections to talking animals
Pooh also faced opposition in the United States. In 2006, a Christian group in Kansas reportedly called for Winnie-the-Pooh and E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web to be removed from school libraries because both books feature animals that speak and behave like humans.
The campaigners argued that giving animals human abilities conflicted with their religious understanding of creation. The controversy added the children’s classics to a broader list of books that have faced challenges from American school communities.
From Soviet favourite to extremist imagery
In the Soviet Union, Pooh enjoyed a successful second life through a series of animated films directed by Fyodor Khitruk between 1969 and 1972. The adaptations omitted Christopher Robin and became popular enough to feature on Soviet postage stamps.
Decades later, the character appeared in a very different context in Russia. The Moscow Times reported that an image of Pooh wearing a T-shirt bearing a swastika was included on a list of extremist material that could lead to penalties. The image had reportedly been found at the home of a man convicted on extremist charges.
A playground debate over Pooh’s clothes
In 2014, councillors in the Polish town of Tuszyn considered Winnie-the-Pooh as a possible mascot for a children’s playground. The proposal reportedly met resistance over the bear’s lack of trousers.
Some officials considered his appearance inappropriate for children, while others questioned the character’s gender. The town ultimately opted not to use Pooh as its mascot.
A critic’s dislike of ‘hummy’ language
Not everyone has been charmed by Milne’s writing. American critic Dorothy Parker mocked the books’ sentimental tone, particularly a scene in which Pooh adds the word “hummy” to a poem to make it sound more pleasing.
Writing in The New Yorker under the name Constant Reader, Parker famously described the word as the point at which she could no longer stomach the story. Her dislike of Milne was also fuelled by a publisher’s description of her poetry collection as the work of “America’s A.A. Milne”.
From children’s classic to horror franchise
Pooh’s most dramatic reinvention came after the expiration of the US copyright on Milne’s original work in 2022. Filmmaker Rhys Frake-Waterfield used the opportunity to turn the bear and his companions into killers in Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey.
The low-budget horror film imagines the animals taking revenge after being abandoned by Christopher Robin. Despite a hostile critical reception, it reportedly earned almost £6 million at the box office on a budget of less than £40,000. A sequel followed in 2024, and a third film is in development.
A century after his literary debut, Pooh remains a cultural phenomenon — one whose innocent image has been repeatedly reshaped by politics, social attitudes and commercial reinvention.
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