The adventures of Winnie-the-Pooh, written by A A Milne and memorably illustrated by E H Shepard, have exerted a vice-like grip on generations of children. Often thought of as whimsical (they made Dorothy Parker throw up, or so she said), the books are gently satirical, even touched by melancholy. The year 2026 will mark the centenary of the time Pooh first tiddely-­pommed, and the ursine juggernaut shows no signs of slowing down. Expect a barrage of Pooh-related books and events; here are two. In his Somewhere, a Boy and a Bear, Gyles Brandreth (who set up the Teddy Bear Museum, now in North Yorkshire) builds on Ann Thwaite’s magisterial biography of Milne (1990). James Campbell’s The Men Who Created Winnie-the-Pooh is an attempt to give the illustrator his due. Campbell runs Shepard’s estate and is married to one of his descendants.

Alan Alexander Milne was born in 1882, the youngest of three brothers, and had an idyllic childhood – which he would attempt to re-create in his children’s books. His father was an unusually talented and forward-looking schoolmaster, even allowing H G Wells onto his staff (despite the latter’s professed atheism). Clever and ambitious – he would later claim that he was able to read by the age of three – Milne cut his poetic teeth by sharing verses with his brother Kenneth. He won a scholarship to Westminster; he also developed an inability to take criticism, something which haunted him all his life. 

Milne’s father wanted him to be a mathematician but by the time he arrived at Cambridge he had already decided on editing Granta, then the university’s student magazine. It made a fine launching pad into journalism. After university, Milne rattled about London writing light pieces for Punch – a magazine