This is a classic story of the power of love. At first the
Rabbit is new and
smart as he waits in the Christmas
stocking to be
discovered by his new
owner, a small boy. As with many new toys, he is played
with for a while,
and then tossed into the cupboard with the rest of the
out-of-favour
toys.
He gets to know the others and soon learns that he is
really very lowly
compared to them. Velveteen toys aren’t as good as
mechanical toys, painted toys or expensive or
handcrafted toys.
The wise old Skin Horse befriends him. The Skin Horse
explains
about magic and being Real. Being Real isn’t how you
are made or how
much you cost, but about being loved so much by a child
that you just,
simply, become Real. The Skin Horse has been left in
the nursery from a
previous owner who had loved him and so he had became
Real, and
though not a favourite now, once Real, you are always
Real.
Being Real is something that the Velveteen Rabbit wants
to become.
Unfortunately there is no sign of the boy even
remembering the Rabbit’s
existence. But things can change. One night, the boy’s
nurse gives him
to the boy to cuddle, and from then on the boy hugs him
and talks and
plays with him, and the Rabbit grows to like this new
friendship. He gets
left outside and is by now torn, dirty and wet, but
when the boy declares
he is Real, and the Velveteen Rabbit is happier than
ever.
In the nearby woods the Rabbit meets two woodland
rabbits. They want
him to come and play but he can’t because he is not
real in the way that
they are. The boy takes him home, but now he is feeling
sad.
The boy becomes ill, and his room is disinfected. The
Rabbit is tossed in
a sack with other worn-out and torn things and the sack
is dumped
outside. Remembering happier times, a tear trickles
down the Velveteen
Rabbit’s toy nose and a fairy comes, and takes him to
play with the
rabbits in the woods, where he discovers that she has
made him real like
them. He has fur instead of velveteen and legs that
jump and run, and
he makes new friends. Best of all, the boy sees him on
a visit to the
woods, and even thinks he looks a bit like his own, old
toy rabbit.
The story suggests an allegory of life, and of growing
old and worn but
with love. It has a poignancy and charm which has
maintained its huge
popularity since publication in 1922. The Velveteen
Rabbit was the first
and perhaps the best known of the author’s thirty books
written for
children.