Paddington Bear

Paddington Station-Bronze of Paddington Bear

Paddington Bear is a fictional character in children's literature. He first appeared in 1958 and was subsequently featured in several books written by Michael Bond and first illustrated by Peggy Fortnum. The polite immigrant bear from Darkest Peru, with his old bush hat, battered suitcase and marmalade sandwiches has become a classic English children's literature icon. Paddington books have been translated into thirty languages across seventy titles and sold more than 30 million copies worldwide. Over 265 licensees, making thousands of different products across the UK, Europe, USA, Southeast Asia, Japan, Australia and South Africa all benefit from the universal recognition of Paddington Bear.

Paddington is an anthropomorphised bear. He is always polite (always addressing people as "Mr.", "Mrs." and "Miss" and very rarely by first names) and well-meaning (though he inflicts hard stares on those who incur his disapproval), likes marmalade sandwiches and cocoa, and has an endless capacity for getting into trouble. However, he is known to "try so hard to get things right".

History

Origin

Bond based Paddington Bear on a lone teddy bear he noticed on a shelf in a London store near Paddington Station on Christmas Eve 1956, which he bought as a present for his wife. The bear inspired Bond to write a story, and in ten days, he had written the first book. The book was given to his agent, Harvey Unna. A Bear Called Paddington was first published on October 13, 1958, by William Collins & Sons (now Harper Collins).

The Toy Paddington Bear

The first Paddington Bear was created by Gabrielle Designs in 1972, a small business run by Shirley and Eddie Clarkson, with the prototype made as a Christmas present for her children Joanna and Jeremy Clarkson (English broadcaster and writer). Shirley Clarkson dressed Paddington in Wellington boots to help the bear stand upright. This is the origin of the addition of Wellington boots to Paddington's attire. The earliest bears wore small children's boots manufactured by Dunlop until they could not keep up with production. Gabrielle Designs then produced their own boots with paw prints moulded into the soles.

Storyline

This gentle bear was found at Paddington railway station in London. In the first story, he is found there by the Brown family sitting on his suitcase (bearing the label "WANTED ON VOYAGE"), with a note attached to his coat which reads, "Please look after this bear. Thank you." Bond has said that his memories of newsreels showing trainloads of child evacuees leaving London during the war, with labels around their necks and their possessions in small suitcases, that prompted him to do the same for Paddington. [1]

He has arrived as a stowaway coming from "Darkest Peru", sent by his Aunt Lucy (his only known relative, aside from an unnamed uncle who gave Paddington his hat), who has gone to live in the Home for Retired Bears in Lima. He claims, "I came all the way in a lifeboat, and ate marmalade. Bears like marmalade." He tells them that no one can understand his Peruvian name, so the Browns decide to call him Paddington after the railway station in which he was found. Bond originally wanted Paddington to have "travelled all the way from darkest Africa", but his agent advised him that there were no bears in darkest Africa, and thus it was amended to darkest Peru, home of the spectacled bear.

They take him home to 32 Windsor Gardens, off Harrow Road between Notting Hill and Maida Vale. The stories follow Paddington's adventures and mishaps in England.

This is somewhat akin to the manner in which Jack Worthing in The Importance of Being Earnest was found at Victoria railway station.

When he gets annoyed with someone, he often gives them one of his special "hard stares" (taught to him by Aunt Lucy), which causes the person to become flushed and embarrassed.

Characters

There is a recurring cast of characters, all of whom are in some way implicated by Paddington's misadventures. These include:

• Mr. Brown: A friendly and often ineffective city worker.
• Mrs. Brown: Mr. Brown's equally friendly wife.
• Jonathan and Judy: The energetic and friendly Brown children.
• Mrs. Bird: The Browns' stern, but ultimately friendly, housekeeper.
• Mr. Gruber: Owner of an antique shop on the Portobello Road, with whom Paddington has his elevenses every day.
• Mr. Curry: The Browns' mean and bad-tempered next-door neighbour, who addresses Paddington simply as "Bear!"

Books

A Bear Called Paddington was first published in 1958 and was followed by ten more books. In order of publication, the titles are:

• A Bear Called Paddington (1958)
• More About Paddington (1959)
• Paddington Helps Out (1960)
• Paddington Abroad (1961)
• Paddington at Large (1962)
• Paddington Marches On (1964)
• Paddington at Work (1966)
• Paddington Goes to Town (1968)
• Paddington Takes the Air (1970)
• Paddington on Top (1974)
• Paddington Takes the Test (1979)

Author Michael Bond was also a BBC TV cameraman who worked on the popular children's television programme Blue Peter. After this was revealed in 1965, a special Paddington story – in which he got mixed up in the programme itself – appeared annually in the Blue Peter Annuals for many years. They were collected in the novel-length Paddington's Blue Peter Story Book in 1973. A second book based around Blue Peter is Paddington on Screen.

Many other picture books and other publications have since featured Paddington.

Television

The BBC television series Paddington, produced by Michael Bond and London-based animation company FilmFair, was first broadcast in 1975. This series had an extremely distinctive appearance: Paddington was a stop-motion puppet moving in a three dimensional space in front of two-dimensional backgrounds (which were frequently sparse black-and-white line drawings), while all other characters were 2D drawings—in one scene, a character hands Paddington a jar of marmalade that becomes 3D when Paddington touches it. Animator Ivor Wood also worked on The Magic Roundabout and Postman Pat. The series was narrated by Michael Hordern. In the United States, episodes aired on PBS, on Nickelodeon as a segment on the program Pinwheel and on USA Network as a segment on the program Calliope in the 1980s, as well as in between preschool programming on the Disney Channel throughout the 1990s. The series also aired on HBO in between features, usually when they were airing children's programs. The series won a silver medal at the New York Film and Television Festival in 1979 — the first British animated series to do so.

A second television series, produced by Hanna-Barbera, debuted in 1989 as part of The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera. This series was traditional two-dimensional animation and featured veteran voice actor Charles Adler as Paddington and Tim Curry as Mr. Curry. The character of an American boy named David, Jonatahan and Judy Brown's cousin who arrived in London on the same day as Paddington was added to the stories in the 1989 cartoon.

The most recent series, produced by Cinar Films, was first broadcast in 1997 and consisted of traditional two-dimensional colour animation.

Episode Listing

• Please Look After This Bear
• A Bear in Hot Water
• Paddington Goes Underground
• A Shopping Expedition
• Paddington and the Old Master
• A Spot of Decorating
• A Family Group
• Paddington Makes a Bid
• Do-It-Yourself
• A Disappearing Trick
• Something Nasty in the Kitchen
• Trouble at the Launderette
• Paddington and the Christmas Shopping
• Too Much Off the Top
• A Visit to the Dentist
• Paddington Cleans Up
• Trouble at No.32
• Mr Curry Takes a Bath
• Paddington Turns Detective
• Paddington and the Cold Snap
• Trouble at the Wax Works
• Paddington Makes a Clean Sweep
• A Sticky Time
• Paddington's Christmas
• Paddington Hits the Jackpot
• Paddington Hits Out
• A Visit to the Hospital
• Paddington Recommended
• Fortune Telling
• An Unexpected Party
• Paddington in Court
• Paddington Bakes a Cake
• A Picnic on the River
• Paddington's Patch
• In and Out of Trouble
• Paddington at the Tower
• A Visit to the Bank
• Paddington Clears the Coach
• Picture Trouble
• Paddington in the Hot Seat
• Paddington Weighs In
• Paddington Takes a Snip
• A Visit to the Theatre
• Paddington Buys a Share
• Trouble in the Bargain Basement
• Paddington in Touch
• Comings and Goings at No.32
• Paddington Dines Out

Special

• Paddington goes to the Movies (1983)

A 21-minute special in which Paddington goes to the movies. On leaving, in the street outside complete with umbrella, he performs Gene Kelly's famous dance routine from Singing in the Rain.

Film adaptation

In September 2007, Warner Bros. and producer David Heyman announced a live action film adaptation of Paddington Bear. Hamish McColl, who penned Mr Bean's Holiday, will write the script. The film will not be an adaptation of an existing story, but "will draw inspiration from the whole series" and will feature a computer generated Paddington Bear interacting with a live-action environment.

Advertising

Paddington Bear features in the Marmite UK TV advertisement (broadcast on 13 September 2007) , in which he tries a marmite and cheese sandwich instead of his traditional marmalade sandwich. The UK TV campaign includes the re-broadcast of the 1975 stop-motion animation television series.

Trivia

• Paddington Bear's Gold Record, an album of fifteen songs based on incidents in the Paddington books, was released in 1984.
• Street traders on the Peruvian shores of Lake Titicaca now offer tourists home-made finger puppets of Paddington. There is also a stall at Paddington station selling Paddington Bear merchandise.
• Paddington was featured on the Royal Mail 1st class stamp in the Animal Tales series released on January 10, 2006.
• In 2000, David Goodman Olney was a winner on the American version of the TV program Who Wants to Be a Millionaire for correctly answering the million-dollar question that Paddington Bear came from Peru.
• In 1988, Australian politician Mick Young resigned from Parliament after being caught importing a Paddington Bear without paying duty. This became known locally as the Paddington Bear Affair.

External links

• Paddington Bear - The Official Webite
• Paddington at IMDb
• Michael Bond Biography
• wiseGEEK - Who Is Paddington Bear?