The Complete Tales of Winnie-the-Pooh Language and Communication Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Book Title.Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #4

"Well, then," said Owl, "we write out this notice, and we put it up all over the forest." (Winnie-the-Pooh.4.47)

Winnie-the-Pooh shows us the value of literacy over and over and over again. In this case, when a problem arises, the first thing Owl can think of is writing a solution. For young readers, the intended audience of this book, seeing so many characters relying on reading and writing is a great motivator. 

Quote #5

They began to talk in a friendly way about this and that, and Piglet said, "If you see what I mean, Pooh," and Pooh said, "It's just what I think myself, Piglet," and Piglet said, "But on the other hand, Pooh, we must remember," and Pooh said, "Quite true, Piglet, although I had forgotten it for the moment." (Winnie-the-Pooh.5.9)

Milne's characters are highly aware of what conversations are supposed to sound like, so once in a while they just speak to each other in stock phrases like these. Now imagine this is Christopher Robin, putting words in his toys' mouths. Doesn't it sound like your kids playing? It's an exercise in conversational language—conventional aspects of social interaction that end up being pretty important.

Quote #6

"We say 'Aha!' so that Kanga knows that we know where Baby Roo is.'Aha!' means 'We'll tell you where Baby Roo is, if you promise to go away from the Forest and never come back.'" (Winnie-the-Pooh.7.27)

This time, Rabbit is pretty explicit about all the meaning that can be packed into a single word. How much of that meaning do you think Kanga would actually get, though?