English Language and Literature Commons^™

Wendy's Story In J. M. Barrie's Peter Pan, Jessica Hedrick

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

Although known today as simply Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie’s classic children’s novel was originally titled Peter and Wendy. This paper explores the famous children’s story from Wendy Darling’s perspective, taking particular interest in the narrator’s contradictory stance on Wendy her agency in the original novelized text. Peter Pan may be the most well known of Barrie’s characters, but the novel’s story is Wendy’s. The relationship between a mother and her children forms the crux of the novel; without Wendy, without her relationship with her own mother and her desire to play grown-up, there is no story. Peter Pan …