Still Looking After That Bear

HarperCollins in the UK has announced that it will publish a new Paddington Bear novel by Michael Bond, the first in thirty years. As The Bookseller reports, Paddington Here and Now will come out next year, fifty years after Bond's first Paddington novel introduced the character.

Of course, Paddington hasn't really been gone since 1978. He's simply been transfered from novels into picture books, cartoons, figurines, plush toys, and other manifestations. The page on the official Paddington website showing how the Peruvian-British bear has been portrayed over the years puts the books' several illustrators on an equal footing with depictions by "FilmFair," "Cinar," and, of all things, "Merchandising."

I rather liked the FilmFair TV series, which was created in the 1970s using stop-motion animation. Paddington and his props were three-dimensional while all the other characters were flat cut-outs--which had the nifty effect of making Paddington look more real. The more recent cartoon series has used standard drawn animation, and I've never found it special enough to watch.