J.M. Barrie

Novelist and playright.

He was awarded Knight Bachelor of the Order of the British Empire in the 1913 Kings Honours List for his services to literature. In the 1922 Kings Honours List, he was awarded the Order of Merit for his services to literature.

Awarded honorary degrees by the Universities of St Andrews (1898), Edinburgh (1909), Oxford (1926) and Cambridge (1930).

After the death of two of Barries close friends, Arthur and Sylvia Llewelyn-Davies, he adopted their five sons: Peter, Jack, George, Michael and Nicholas. Barrie was very close to all the boys, and was heartbroken when Michael drowned in 1921 and George was killed in battle in 1915 during World War I. Their brother, Peter Llewelyn-Davies, committed suicide on April 5, 1960.

From 1928 onward all royalties from the sales of "Peter Pan" were donated to the Great Ormond Street Hospital. In 1987 (50 years after Barries death), when normally royalty rights would have expired, by a special act of Parliament royalties were allowed to continue going to the hospital in perpetuity.

The son of a weaver, educated in Scotland.

Based the character of Captain Hook on a minister in East Sussex named Rev. John Maher, who was later revealed to have been a vicious pirate and had a hook for a hand.

His manager and close friend Charles Frohman was among those who died on the SS Lusitania when it was struck by a torpedo and he refused a lifeboat. When faced with his demise, he paraphrased Barries character Peter Pan and said, "Why fear death? It is the most beautiful adventure that life gives us".

George Bernard Shaw was his neighbor in London.

He founded an amateur cricket team for his friends. The people who played on the team at various times included such luminaries as H.G. Wells , Rudyard Kipling , Arthur Conan Doyle , P.G. Wodehouse , Jerome K. Jerome , G.K. Chesterton , A.A. Milne , E.W. Hornung , A.E.W. Mason , Walter Raleigh, E.V. Lucas, Maurice Hewlett , Owen Seamons , Bernard Partridge , Augustine Birrell, Paul Du Chaillu, Henry Herbert La Thangue, George Cecil Ives, his adopted son George Llewelyn Davie and the son of Alfred Lord Tennyson. The team was called the Allahakbarries, under the mistaken belief that "Allah akbar" meant "Heaven help us" in Arabic (rather than "God is great").

His family initially tried to get him to become a minister.

When he was six years old his next-older brother David, whom he knew was his mothers favorite, died two days before his 14th birthday in an ice-skating accident. This left his mother devastated, and Barrie tried to fill Davids place in his mothers attentions, even wearing Davids clothes and whistling in the manner that he did. Barries mother found comfort in the fact that her dead son would remain a boy forever, never to grow up and leave her. This undoubtedly influenced James most famous character, Peter Pan.

Played by Johnny Depp in Marc Forster s Finding Neverland (about the creation of "Peter Pan"), which also starred Kate Winslet as Sylvia Llewellyn-Davies and Dustin Hoffman as Charles Frohman. By coincidence, Hoffman had played Capt. Hook in Steven Spielberg s Hook , which depicted an adult Peter Pan.

[on accomplishment] Every man who is high up loves to think he has done,it all himself; and his wife smiles, and lets it go at that.

Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from,themselves.

Stars are beautiful, but they must not take an active part in anything,they must just look on forever. It is a punishment put on them for,something they did so long ago that no star now knows what it was.

The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking,what one does.

To die will be an awfully big adventure.

You know that place between sleep and awake, that place where you still remember dreaming? That’s where I’ll always love you. That’s where I’ll be waiting.

All the world is made of faith, and trust, and pixie dust.

Life is a long lesson in humility.

The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another; and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it.

Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.

When the first baby laughed for the first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies.

The secret of happiness is not in doing what one likes, but in liking what one does.

Peter was not quite like other boys; but he was afraid at last. A tremour ran through him, like a shudder passing over the sea; but on the sea one shudder follows another till there are hundreds of them, and Peter felt just the one. Next moment he was standing erect on the rock again, with that smile on his face and a drum beating within him. It was saying, "To die will be an awfully big adventure.

When she expressed a doubtful hope that Tinker Bell would be glad to see her, he said, ‘Who is Tinker Bell?’ ‘O Peter,’ she said, shocked; but even when she explained he could not remember. ‘There are such a lot of them,’ he said. ‘I expect she is no more. ’ I expect he was right, for fairies don’t live long, but they are so little that a short time seems a good while to them.

We are all failures- at least the best of us are.

Build a house?" exclaimed John. "For the Wendy," said Curly. "For Wendy?" John said, aghast. "Why, she is only a girl!""That," explained Curly, "is why we are her servants.

Nothing is really work unless you would rather be doing something else.

If you cannot teach me to fly, teach me to sing.

The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it.

Fairies have to be one thing or the other, because being so small they unfortunately have room for one feeling only at a time.

It is frightfully difficult to know much about the fairies, and almost the only thing for certain is that there are fairies wherever there are children.

Peter was not with them for the moment, and they felt rather lonely up there by themselves. He could go so much faster than they that he would suddenly shoot out of sight, to have some adventure in which they had no share. He would come down laughing over something fearfully funny he had been saying to a star, but he had already forgotten what it was, or he would come up with mermaid scales still sticking to him, and yet not be able to to say for certain what had been happening. It was really rather irritating to children who had never seen a mermaid.

Ambition: it is the last infirmity of noble minds.

For long the two enemies looked at one another, Hook shuddering slightly, and Peter with the strange smile upon his face. "So, Pan," said Hook at last, "this is all your doing. ""Ay, James Hook," came the stern answer, "it is all my doing. ""Proud and insolent youth," said Hook, "prepare to meet thy doom. ""Dark and sinister man,“For long the two enemies looked at one another, Hook shuddering slightly, and Peter with the strange smile upon his face. "Dark and sinister man," Peter answered, "have at thee.

All children, except one, grow up. They soon know that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was this. One day when she was two years old she was playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must have looked rather delightful, for Mrs Darling put her hand to her heart and cried, ‘Oh, why can’t you remain like this for ever!’ This was all that passed between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy knew that she must grow up. You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.

It was then that Hook bit him. Not the pain of this but its unfairness was what dazed Peter. It made him quite helpless. He could only stare, horrified. Every child is affected thus the first time he is treated unfairly. All he thinks he has a right to when he comes to you to be yours is fairness. After you have been unfair to him he will love you again, but he will never afterwards be quite the same boy. No one ever gets over the first unfairness; no one except Peter.

It is the custom of every good mother after her children are asleep to rummage in their minds and put things straight for next morning, repacking into their proper places the many articles that have wandered during the day. If you could keep awake (but of course you can’t) you would see your own mother doing this, and you would find it very interesting to watch her. It is quite like tidying up drawers. You would see her on her knees, I expect, lingering humorously over some of your contents, wondering where on earth you had picked this thing up, making discoveries sweet and not so sweet, pressing this to her cheek as if it were as nice as a kitten, and hurriedly stowing that out of sight. When you wake in the morning, the naughtinesses and evil passions with which you went to bed have been folded up small and placed at the bottom of your mind; and on the top, beautifully aired, are spread out prettier thoughts, ready for you to put on.

He did not alarm her, for she thought she had seen him before in the faces of many women who have no children. Perhaps he is to be found in the faces of some mothers also.

On these magic shores children at play are for ever beaching their coracles. We too have been there; we can still hear the sound of the surf, though we shall land no more.

It was not really Saturday night, at least it may have been, for they had long lost count of the days; but always if they wanted to do anything special they said this was Saturday night, and then they did it.

God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.

Always try to be a little kinder than is necessary.

It is humiliating to have to confess that this conceit of Peter was one of his most fascinating qualities. To put it with brutal frankness, there never was a cockier boy.

All her tormentings of me turned suddenly into sweetnesses, and who could torment like this exquisite fury, wondering in sudden flame why she could give herself to anyone, while I wondered only why she could give herself to me. It may be that I wondered over-much. Perhaps that was why I lost her.

He was top-heavy with conceit.

She says she glories in being abandoned,The fairies, as their custom, clapped their hands with delight over their cleverness, and they were so madly in love with the little house that they could not bear to think they had finished it.

‎She was not a little girl heart-broken about him; she was a grown woman smiling at it all, but they were wet smiles.

POLICEMAN. Good luck. (She finds it easiest just to nod in reply) I wish I was a Prince.

Off we skip like the most heartless things in the world, which is what children are, but so attractive; and we have an entirely selfish time, and then when we have need of special attention we nobly return for it, confident that we shall be rewarded instead of smacked.

Of course the Neverlands vary a good deal. John’s, for instance, had a lagoon with flamingos flying over it at which John was shooting, while Michael, who was very small, had a flamingo with lagoons flying over it. John lived in a boat turned upside down on the sands, Michael in a wigwam, Wendy in a house of leaves deftly sewn together. John had no friends, Michael had friends at night, Wendy had a pet wolf forsaken by its parents. . .

A strange smile was playing about his face, and Wendy saw it and shuddered. While that smile was on his face no one dared address him; all they could do was to stand ready to obey.

See," he said, "the arrow struck against this. It is the kiss I gave her. It has saved her life.

You need not be sorry for her. She was one of the kind that likes to grow up. In the end she grew up of her own free will a day quicker than the other girls.

Growing up is such a barbarous business, full of inconvenience. . . and pimples.

He was so much the humblest one that Wendy was especially gentle with him.

Again came that ringing crow, and Peter dropped in front of them. "Greeting, boys," he cried, and mechanically they saluted, and then again was silence. He frowned. "I am back," he said hotly, "why do you not cheer?,It may have been quixotic, but it was magnificent.

Oh, you mysterious girls, when you are fifty-two we shall find you out; you must come into the open then. If the mouth has fallen sourly yours the blame: all the meanness your youth concealed have been gathering in your face. But the pretty thoughts and sweet ways and dear, forgotten kindnesses linger there also, to bloom in your twilight like evening primroses.

Let no one who loves be called altogether unhappy. Even love unreturned has its rainbow.

But the years came and went without bringing the careless boy; and when they met again Wendy was a married woman, and Peter was no more to her than a little dust in the box in which she had kept her toys.

Life is like a cup of coffee: The more avidly you drink of it, the sooner you reach the dregs.

Courage is the lovely virtue-the rib of Himself that God sent down to His children. .