John Vine Milne was the eldest son of a Congressional minister (William Milne, who married Harriet Newell Barrett while a missionary in Jamaica in 1845) and had served in many odd jobs before settling on teaching. He had been a clerk in the counting-house of a biscuit factory, apprenticed in an engineering firm, and was an usher in various schools before he finally earned his B.A. and became a school teacher. J.V. married Sarah Maria Heginbotham (called Maria in the family) on August 27, 1878.
My only regret was that we had no daughters. But my wife used to always say, "Sons are good enough for me." (Thwaite, A. A. Milne, 6)
J.V. had said that the boys were extremely close with their mother, going to her with their troubles before seeing him and constantly spending time with her. Alan had a different opinion.
I don't think I ever really knew her. When I was a child I neither experienced, nor felt the need of, that mother-love of which one reads so much...She may...have felt that Papa was so good at playing with a child, and amusing a child, and making a child love him, that she oughtn't to interfere there...She was restfully aloof. (Autobiography, 37)
Alan was always close to his father, and more so to his brother Ken.
Father and mother had always determined that there should be no favourites in their family. The three of us were to be treated alike: to be give equal affection and equal opportunites. In practice the affections are not so easily controlled. There was never any doubt that Barry was Mother's darling and that I was Father's, leaving poor old Ken to take second place in both their hearts, and first in mine and Barry's. (Autobiography, 150)Ken would remain Alan's closest friend up until his death in 1929.
The one family member that Alan had no love for was Barry. Even from an early age, Alan felt no kindness for Barry. He would dedicate The Holiday Round to Barry and his wife, Connie, but that was about the only mention of affection between the two, and it was probably more directed to Connie than to Barry. (Alan would remain close to Connie throughout his life, even though he wanted nothing to do with Barry.) Alan had this to say on the subject:
Whoever heard...of two frogs assuming a friendliness which they did not feel, simply because they had been eggs in the same spawn. Ridiculous... (Thwaite, A. A. Milne, 204)Later, Alan's relationship with Barry would worsen. Alan watched as Connie had to suffer the infidelities of Barry. And as their father was dying, Barry convinced J.V. to change his will so that Barry ended up with the largest share of the money, drastically cutting the amount of money that J.V. had intentioned for his grandchildren and the welfare of Ken's widowed wife, Maud. Alan refused to speak to Barry for the rest of his life, refusing a plea for reconciliation as Barry was dying.
My friend...and I stood looking at this copy of The Granta, and suddenly he said, "You ought to go to Cambridge and edit that." So I said quite firmly, "I will." (Autobiography, 149)Through correspondence, Alan and Ken collaborated on light verse which was published in The Granta under the initials A. K. M., a mixture of Alan and Ken's. After about two years, Ken withdrew from the partnership, and Alan went on to writing material solo, and fulfilling his goal of being the editor of The Granta. During the years that Alan was publishing The Granta, the publication made quite a turn-around in readership, gaining a large following. Alan's greatest pleasure at the time came from light verse and the challenge of rhyme.
J.V. had set aside roughly £1000 for his sons to use after they had finished with their schooling, and Alan used this money to move to London and begin a career as an author. He calculated that he had enough to last him two years; the money ran out in sixteen months. However, Alan was earning a small amount of money writing articles freelance, which he would send to newspapers, as well as publications such as Punch. He made the most money from articles published in the St James Gazette. H.G. Wells had suggested to Alan that a series of articles he had written for the St James Gazette could be the basis for a book. In March 1905, Lovers in London was published. In 1915, Milne answered an inquiry about it:
It is out of print fortunately; I haven't even a copy myself. But I read my brother's copy the other day with mixed feelings; gladness that it was out of print, shame that I once thought it so good, pride that I had advanced so much since then. I hope you will never come across it. (Thwaite, A. A. Milne, 115)Alan would later buy back the copyright on the book for £5 to prevent a reprint of the book when he was a more well-known author.
Later in 1905, Punch began to regularly print Milne's pieces, and his financial situation began to get a bit more secure. However, early in 1906, Alan began to plan another novel, and wrote Owen Seaman (just taking over as editor of Punch) that he would not be sending in articles for the next few months as he would be in the country concentrating on his novel. Seaman wrote back and asked Alan to wait just a bit. It was fortunate that Alan did. He met with Seaman and was asked to become assistant editor, a full time position, with the expectation of a weekly contribution to the magazine. He began on February 13, 1906.
Ideas may drift into other minds, but they do not drift my way. I have to go and fetch them. I know no work manual or mental to equal the appalling heart-breaking anguish of fetching an idea from nowhere. (Autobiography, 225)Nevertheless, Milne always managed to complete his required article, which usually turned out to be very popular with the readers. He had some inspiration with several articles thanks to a niece that Ken had provided him. Ken had married Maud Innes in 1906. Alan spent a great deal of time with Ken's family, and Ken's first daughter, Marjorie, was the subject of many articles (although Alan insisted on spelling her name Margery). These articles would provide Alan with an insight into the mind of a child, which would help him with his future children's books years later. Other favorite topics included sports (Alan was an avid cricket player and also played a little football in school. His friend, Charles Turley Smith, got him hooked on golf.), and the Rabbits, a fictional family he created that made forty-six appearances in Punch. The Rabbits were totally middle-class, and could make enjoyment out of most any situation.
Alan augmented his constant work for Punch by publishing collections of his articles. What he would later consider to be his first book (wanting to forget about Lovers in London), The Day's Play, was published in 1910. E.V. Lucas, a friend of Alan's and also a member of the Punch table, suggested that, since Alan had parodied the title, Alan should send a copy to Kipling, the author of The Day's Work. Alan couldn't bring himself to send it to Kipling, and instead sent it to J.M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan. This was to be the start of a lifelong friendship between the two.
Owen Seaman had introduced Alan to his god-daughter, Dorothy de Selincourt (Daphne to her friends) at her coming-out dance, and the two spent a great deal of time with each other.
When I wanted a present for a sister-in-law or a new suit for myself, I would summon her to help me; when she wanted a man to take her to a dance she would ring me up. She laughed at my jokes, she had my contributions to Punch by heart before she met me, she had (it is now clear) the most perfect sense of humour in the world... (Autobiography, 242)They married in 1913. Though Daphne was perfect for Alan, she did not get along well with Ken and Maud, and Alan would visit their family by himself.
War broke out in Europe, and Milne, though a pacifist, felt that he had to do something. He believed that this war was a "war against war", to use Owen Seaman's term. He wrote to his friend from Westminster, Edward Marsh (at one time, Churchill's Private Secretary) at the Admiralty to see if he could find any work for him. Apparently, Marsh could not. Milne was determined, though, and volunteered himself on February 10, 1915.
I should like to put asterisks here, and then write: "It was in 1919 that I found myself once again a civilian." For it makes me almost physically sick to think of that nightmare of mental and moral degradation, the war. (Autobiography, 249)Not much happened until August 1915, when Alan was sent to the Southern Command Signalling School at Wyke Regis near Weymouth for a nine-week course, after which he became a signalling officer. He spent the winter on the Isle of Wight, during which time, he wrote Wurzel-Flummery, his first play. In the spring of 1916, he was sent to France.
The life of a signalling officer was a relatively safe one, and indeed, turned out to be more so for Alan. The company he was first assigned to, before he took his training as a signalling officer was mowed down on the front lines by the Germans. Even so, he managed to find himself in a few dangerous situations, and saw more than enough death and destruction.
Alan left the front lines on November 8, 1916, thanks to a fever he had contracted, and returned to England. After he recovered, he was was put in charge of a company at a new formed signalling school at Fort Southwick. He stayed there until he was released from the army on February 14, 1919.
There are too many plays written by Milne to mention them all, but he
had several successes, both in London and in New York. His first big hit
was Mr Pim Passes By. It opened in London on January 5, 1920, and
ran for 246 performances in London. It also had a successful run in New
York, opening on February 28, 1921. Within the next year, Milne had
another four plays running in London. Other notable plays include
Belinda
BaCk To MaIn PaGe
