'Winnie the Pooh' - at Bonhams

An original sketch of favourite A A Milne character Winnie the Pooh has fetched £31,200 at auction. The pencil drawing of the bear dipping a paw in a honey pot was bought by a German collector.

It was sold by the family of the artist, E H Shepard, at Bonhams auction rooms in London and easily exceeded its estimated price of £15,000-20,000. The oval drawing of Pooh, also showing Tigger and Piglet, is an enlarged and expanded version of the illustration "Tiggers don't like honey" used in The House at Pooh Corner.

A sketch for Kenneth Grahame's story The Wind in the Willows made £7,440. The pencil drawing showing Rat and Mole having a picnic on a river bank, was expected to make around £10,000. It appeared in the published book with the caption "Now pitch in, old fellow! And the Mole was indeed very glad to obey".

Two pencil sketches by Shepard for Milne's poem 'Buckingham Palace' made £840 for the pair. In one, Christopher Robin salutes a palace guard; the other shows him holding hands with Alice.

The sale also featured archive material from children's illustrator Beatrix Potter. A signed first edition of The Tailor of Gloucester plus correspondence between Beatrix and her friends, Elizabeth and Edith Todhunter, fetched £3,840.

Report from Ibookcollector newsletter no.136

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