Paddington Bear Books In Order

Publication Order of Paddington Bear Books

Publication Order of Paddington Bear Picture Books

The Paddington Bear book series is a long-running series of children’s books and fiction novels written by a highly renowned British novelist named Michael Bond. This series is comprised of a total of 28 books originally released between 1958 and 2017. Every book revolves around the life of the fictional character named Paddington Bear. This series has sold over 35 million copies all over the world and its stories and characters have featured in a number of TV and film adaptations. The character of Paddington Bear has been illustrated by Peggy Fortnum and various other artists over the years. Michael Bond has described Paddington as a friendly bear hailing from Peru. He carries himself with an old hat, a battered suitcase with hidden compartments, a duffle coat. This character has become a classic in children’s literature.

The books of this series have been translated into more than thirty foreign languages across seventy titles worldwide. The fictional character of Paddington Bear is so much loved in the British culture that a soft toy resembling the character was selected by the tunnellers of England as the first thing to pass through the Channel Tunnel to France in 1994. The books depict Paddington Bear as an anthropomorphized bear, who is polite and kind-hearted. He likes to address people like Mr, Mrs, and Miss. The ones who show disapproval to his sayings get inflicted with his hard stares. Paddington has the knack of landing in trouble very often, but tries very hard to set things straight and get himself out of all the troubles. The character makes his appearance for the first time when he is discovered by the Brown family in London’s Paddington Station. The family adopts him and gives him the full name as Paddington Brown.

The franchise of Paddington Bear is owned by StudioCanal, but the publishing rights of the book series were owned by Michael Bond until his death in 2017. He had licensed the publishing rights to HarperCollins for a period of 6 years starting from 2017. The thought of creating this character came to Bond’s mind when he saw a lonely teddy bear on a London store’s shelf near the Paddington Station during the Christmas Eve of 1956. He bought the bear and presented it as a gift to his wife. Later, Bond was inspired to write a story based on the bear and he ended up writing the first novel in only 10 days. When Bond’s agent, Harvey Unna, came to know about the book, he immediately sent it to William Collins and Sons for publishing in 1958. Thus, began the hugely popular Paddington Bear stories. The first stuffed toy based on Paddington Bear was created by Gabrielle Designs in 1972. The owners, Eddie and Shirley Clarkson, first made the prototype as a Christmas gift for their kids Jeremy and Joanna Clarkson. Shirley later wrote a book describing the evolution of the Paddington toy from Christmas present to litigation subject to ultimate commercial success.

Bond’s books feature a number of interesting characters such as Henry Brown, Mary Brown, Jonathan Brown, Judy Brown, Mrs. Bird, Samuel Gruber, Reginald Curry, Aunt Lucy, Uncle Pastuzo, etc. The first TV adaptation featuring Paddington Bear was produced by an animation company called FilmFair in collaboration with Michael Bond. It was broadcast on BBC in 1975. A few other TV series followed later in 1989, 1997, and 2009 by different production houses. StudioCanal has announced that it has teamed up with Nickelodeon and David Heyman to develop a new Paddington series that will be launched in 2020. Ben Whishaw has been roped in to play the role of Paddington. David Heyman and Warner Bros have collaborated to produce the films, Paddington and Paddington 2, which have received worldwide success just like the novel series.

The debut book of the Paddington Bear series written by Michael Bond is entitled ‘A Bear Called Paddington’. It was first released in 1958. The story is set in London and features the primary characters like Mr. and Mrs. Brown, Paddington, Jonathan Brown, and Judy Brown. At the novel’s start, it is shown that Mr & Mrs Brown come across Paddington near one of London’s railway platforms. They discover the endearing bear from Peru with a note hanging around the neck that said that the finder of the bear should look after him. The Browns were already in love with the bear, so they decided to take him home. His presence in the Brown family brings many disasters that are controlled by the timely interference of the members of the Brown family. On the very first day, Paddington nearly floods the house when he goes to take a bath. From then onwards, he keeps getting involved in various troubles because of his innocence. Judy and Jonathan seem to be delighted with the funny adventures of Paddington and loved to have him around. Even Mr. & Mrs. Brown felt that their life suddenly got filled with exciting adventures by having a bear in their house. They look forward to having many more adventures as they make Paddington an inherent part of their family.

The next installment of this exciting series is known as ‘More About Paddington’. It was initially published in 1958 and later, HMH Books released it again in 1979. In this novel, Michale Bond has again captured the playfulness of Paddington. He continues to live in London with the Browns and seems to be having a talent for attracting trouble. Even though Paddington’s intentions are good, he rarely remains far from some form of disaster. While Paddington’s curious nature and independent spirit often land him in troublesome situations, he is always loved by the Brown family for bringing cheer in their lives. Paddington makes the readers laugh out loud when he tries to become a detective, a photographer, a snowbear, a house painter, and various other things. His innocence causes chaos for sales assistants, policemen, the neighbors, and others. But, all is taken in a light way because of the adorable and cute personality of Paddington. Along with describing the various adventures of Paddington, the book also educates the readers about some of the well-known traditions followed by the Britishers. Paddington is seen as a cultural ambassador due to his wholehearted enthusiasm. Just like every other novel in this series, this one was also loved and appreciated a lot by the readers throughout the world. This has resulted in the immense success of the book as well as the whole series.