This is my wild-card pick. I love how Barrie treats his characters as living, breathing entities whose movements he’s simply recording rather than directing. Captain Hook at Eton is evidence of this. Written in the form of an address (intended for the titular boys’ school, of course), it delves into the fearsome foe’s life in English high society before he took to the seven seas. It was published in 1927, fourteen years after Peter Pan; considered alongside earlier works such as the Peter Pan play and “Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens,” it’s a testament to the way the same stories can have a hold over us for years, changing as we do. Admittedly, this bit of apocrypha might not be particularly interesting to you if you’re not a certified Pan fan… but I place myself firmly in that camp, so en garde. Although my work tends to lean toward darker topics, I would love to weave a tale that conjures up a Barrie-esque sense of childlike wonder someday.
Published in The Times, July 1927
A Personal Anthology 