Peter Pan

Peter Pan is a character created by Scottish novelist and playwright J. M. Barrie. A mischievous boy who can fly and never grows up, Peter Pan spends his never-ending childhood having adventures on the small island of Neverland as the leader of his gang, the Lost Boys, interacting with mermaids, Native Americans, fairies, pirates, and occasionally ordinary children from the world outside Neverland. In addition to two distinct works by Barrie, the character has been featured in a variety of media and merchandise, both adapting and expanding on Barrie's works. These include an animated film, a dramatic film, a TV series and other works.

Origin

J. M. Barrie first used Peter Pan as a character in a section of The Little White Bird (1902), an adult novel.

He returned to that character as the centre of his stage play entitled Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, which premiered on 27 December 1904 in London. The play was highly popular, running to 1913.

Following the success of the 1904 play, Barrie's publishers, Hodder and Stoughton, extracted chapters 13–18 of The Little White Bird and republished them in 1906 under the title Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, with the addition of illustrations by Arthur Rackham.

Captain Hook

Captain James Hook is a fictional character, the antagonist of J. M. Barrie's play Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up and its various adaptations, in which he is Peter Pan's archenemy. The character is a pirate captain of the brig Jolly Roger; Barrie describes him as Blackbeard's former bo'sun. His two principal fears are the sight of his own blood (supposedly an unnatural colour) and the crocodile who pursues him after eating the hand cut off by Pan. An iron hook replaced his severed hand, which gave the pirate his name. After getting a taste of Hook, the crocodile pursues him relentlessly, but the ticking clock it has swallowed warns Hook of its presence.

Creation of the character

Hook did not appear in early drafts of the play, wherein the capricious and coercive Peter Pan was closest to a "villain", but was created for a front-cloth scene depicting the children's journey home. Later, Barrie expanded the scene, on the premise that children were fascinated by pirates, and expanded the role of the captain as the play developed. The character was originally cast to be played by Dorothea Baird, the actress playing Mary Darling, but Gerald du Maurier, already playing George Darling (and the brother of Sylvia Llewelyn Davies), persuaded Barrie to let him take the additional role instead, a casting tradition since replicated in many stage and film productions of the Peter Pan story.