Whisper Who Dares?

I see from a message posted by Monica Edinger on the childlit listserv that the Mouse that roars has new plans for the Hundred Acre Wood, replacing Christopher Robin with an as-yet unnamed but confirmedly red-headed girl. The Disney Channel's Nancy Kanter says "we hope people will fall for this new tomboyish girl. The last thing we want to be is the ones who brought the franchise down." Heavens, not that. Sometimes you do see the Mouse chew with its mouth open and it's not pretty.

Christopher Franceschelli, publisher of Handprint Books and former publisher of Dutton Children's Books, the U. S. publisher of Milne, once told me that relations between the Milne Pooh and the Mouse Pooh (oops) were exceedingly complex. He made it sound as if nations might have fallen the day the baker proudly delivered, for a Winnie-the-Pooh birthday party Dutton was hosting, a cake gorgeously designed to look like The Other One.