“Winnie-the-Pooh” and Harry Rowohlt

Abstract

Harry Rowohlt translated Alan Alexander Milne’s children’s book Winnie-the-Pooh (1926) in 1987. The article shows the story of his work with Milne’s text, which was a story he first read in his childhood, of his task as the translator of the book, and finally of his input in the „Die Zeit” column Pooh’s Corner as well as a few letters. The presence of the Winnie-the-Pooh’s as a motif in Rowohlt’s texts as literature and projection is the main subject of this article. The connection between father and son in Milne’s and Rowohlt’s families will be analysed in the context of citations from Rowohlt’s columns and letters. The present text describes primarily Rowohlt’s „Die Zeit” column from 1996, three letters to Christopher Robin Milne from 1990, and the correspondence with a few Winnie-the-Pooh fans. Apart from Rowohlt’s picture books, which he wrote together with Rudi Hurzlmeier, Hans Zippert, Peter Schössow, or Frank Schulz, the article focuses mostly on his autobiographical texts, which go rather deep into the writing subject. The Pooh motif is thus a component of Rowohlt’s self-portrayal and should above all be viewed as an integral part of his literary and journalistic argumentation aesthetics.