Peter Rabbit hops into the noughties with new style

Scandal. Predictable outbursts have greeted news that some of Beatrix Potter’s characters, including Peter Rabbit, are being redrawn by Penguin division Frederick Warne’s in-house team.

‘Is nothing sacred?’ cries The Daily Telegraph. ‘It was bad enough when Disney transformed Winnie the Pooh,’ adds Country Life. What these bastions of forward-thinking fail to realise is that, ‘as Potter did in her own lifetime, we need to innovate’ and ‘be mindful of trends in the contemporary marketplace’, says a Frederick Warne spokeswoman.

Oh, and old Mr Rabbit ‘does not reproduce well on fabric or plastic, nor work with contemporary design’. Hmmm.

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