I have recently read ‘Peter Pan and Wendy’. It is the story everybody knows that Peter Pan visits the bedroom of Wendy and her two brothers and then they fly to Neverland and fight with Hook the captain of Pirates. It is actually published by following the story of ‘Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens’ and also the Play script ‘Peter Pan (The Boy Who wouldn’t Grow Up)’. Of course I knew the story but when I saw the book in library I thought “Hum, I have never actually read it. How much do I know about the characters?” so I borrowed the book.

Now I have finished reading the story and can tell you I discovered several new factors about the story. The biggest surprise was Peter Pan’s age. Okay, he is a boy and also old, because he never grows up and lives forever, which means he is very old. But do you know how old he was when he left his parents’ house? He says in the story “Wendy, I ran away the day I was born”.(+o+)(=ﾟωﾟ)ﾉ😵! It means he is not even 1day old!! Even in the story of ‘Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens’ he was 7 DAYS OLD!! I don’t know why but the author J. M. Barrie changed when Peter decided to leeve his parents’ home but one thing I can tell you is that he is not even a toddler. He is a newborn baby. Realistically he cannot speak or even stand up?! OK, it is a fictious story so anything is possible.

Anyway, after he left his parents he started living in Kensington Gardens. When I had time in central London I suddenly wanted to see where Peter Pan spent time so I visited Kensington Gardens.

Kensington Gardens

I have been there several times before but haven’t done so recently.

Kensington Gardens is one of the big Royal Parks that is located in the central London.

It spreads out onto a wide area and has the Kensington Place at west side and the Serpentine (canal) from the Italian Water Gardens in the North to South East where Hyde Park is.

This Serpentine has an Island and this is the place where Peter Pan lived right after he escaped from his parents’ home.

He wanted to go to the land but he could not swim, so he tried to learn how to swim from ducks. It was not successful so he asked birds to build a big nest with mud. He placed a sail made with a branch and his baby nightgown (He was wearing this when he left home) on the nest to cross the water. He could not control the nest boat well and almost crashed into the bridge.

By the side of the Serpentine there is a statue of Peter Pan. He is surrounded by many fairies and what he is doing is playing a flute made with a rolled leaf.

Certainly Peter in this statue seems so much bigger than the image in the original book.

Peter Pan also played in the Round Pond in the book. He thought he was playing games exactly like real boys did but he actually didn’t and he was sailing his hoop on the Round Pond and so on.

Kensington Gardens is a vast park not just with the water feature but it has planted space too. The book says that when the closing time of the park has suddenly changed that would be the fairies’ trick. They want to get rid of humans and want to hold a party. Have you seen a a fairy ring with small mushrooms in a garden? They are actually the seats fairies were sitting on during the ball and forgot to remove.

I had a long walk in this park. It occasionally rained suddenly but when I left there it was sunny and the silhouette of a rowing boat looked rather romantic.