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Identifying with “Uncool” Characters: Why I Love The Jungle Book’s Bagheera

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Identifying with “Uncool” Characters: Why I Love The Jungle Book’s Bagheera

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Identifying with “Uncool” Characters: Why I Love The Jungle Book’s Bagheera

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Published on January 31, 2018

Screenshot: Disney
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The Jungle Book 1967
Screenshot: Disney

When I was a kid (like a kid kid who was under the age of ten), I had a very specific pet peeve regarding the entertainment that I consumed. It centered around the inevitable bashing of any character who showed an inclination toward logic, pragmatism, and worry. My thirst for adventure—oddly—developed gradually, over time. As a very small human, I had an overly-developed sense of caution about the world, and so I was drawn to characters who looked before leaping, who made plans, who considered dangers.

What I’m trying to say is, I hated Disney’s The Jungle Book because no one listened to Bagheera.

I loved worriers and voices-of-reason as a kid. When I was five, C-3PO was the best part of Star Wars. It caused me acute physical distress to watch Pinocchio ignore the words of Jiminy Cricket. My favorite character in Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers was Alpha 5, Zordon’s assistant robot who watched in constant terror as the Power Rangers got their butts kicked, his sandwich cookie head wobbling whenever something went wrong. Alice in Wonderland used to upset me because I hated how everyone snapped at (or tried to murder) Alice for attempting to make sense of her illogical surroundings and not knowing the rules. These were the folks who comforted me—they did what I would do in their given situations. I was too young to understand that these were generally not the characters who moved a story, who made things happen. Even if I had known, it’s doubtful that I would have cared much. Six-year-olds generally don’t.

The Jungle Book 1967

For me, The Jungle Book was one of the greatest offenders of this set. It began with a wonderfully pragmatic, caring guide for Mowgli, then proceeded to make him look like a grumpy, boring drip to the audience. Baloo was the cool one. Baloo had the cool song, and a cool voice, and he let Mowgli do whatever he wanted. That’s what kids want, right? Of course they do. They want to hang out with someone who will gladly give them cake for breakfast. Who will let them stay up as late as they want. Who will throw the rulebook into the river and watch it float away while they eat their weight in sweet berries and burp the alphabet.

Except I liked doing things by the book. As a kid, I was an awful teacher’s pet. To this day, I still break out in a cold sweat if someone asks me to blatantly break a rule. No idea where it comes from, genetics-wise—my parents are both musicians. They certainly didn’t play by rules. Maybe my engineer grandpa? It doesn’t matter, the point is, Baloo was the enemy to my mind. Baloo was chaos, Baloo was time wasted, Baloo probably got you to try drugs for the first time and I had already been taught to SAY NO.

Yeah, I was kind of an intense child, I guess.

The Jungle Book 1967

There are plenty of movies with characters like Bagheera, who fulfill the same function and foil within the narrative. But The Jungle Book goes a step farther than usual by painting him in a supremely unflattering light. This is because they use the character as a deliberate roadblock to everything fun that would happen in the film. Kids want Mowgli to stay in the jungle, they want to watch him try to be an elephant for a day, they want him to stop Shere Khan. Bagheera wants him to do the smart thing, and get out of mortal danger by living with his own kind. But if Mowgli did that, there would be no movie, so the two have a fight and Bagheera throws his paws in the air and has done with it. Then Mowgli meets Baloo, the cool guy, who agrees to keeps him around with the added benefit of no structure ever and infinite beach volleyball days.

There’s also a bit where Baloo pulls on Bagheera’s tail while the panther is sitting comfortably in a tree, and it makes me want to drop a rock on that carefree dude every time I see it. The action reads to me like nails on a chalkboard, but for eyes. Squeaky eyeball pain.

The Jungle Book 1967

Then Mowgli gets kidnapped by monkeys, and Bagheera—who only pretended to be done with this whole circus because he cares—and Baloo rescue the kid. Bagheera finally explains who is after Mowgli, and tells Baloo that he has to convince the man-cub to go live with people. So Baloo tries, and Mowgli runs away from him, and because this eventually leads the kid right into Shere Khan’s clutches, it makes the very practical panther appear more at fault than anyone. If he hadn’t spoiled Baloo’s forever party, maybe it all would have turned out fine.

All Bagheera is really guilty of is making smart choices to keep the boy safe. But in the world of beloved fictional characters, the majority of the population aren’t going to cuddle the stuffed animal of a character who makes reliable decisions. They’re going to cuddle the one that says things like, “Let me tell you something, little britches,” and “He’s had a big day. It was a real sockeroo.” Baloo gets all the glory by getting swatted down by Shere Khan before the big dust up, and once the tiger’s run off, Bagheera goes to the trouble of eulogizing the guy while Mowgli stands by sniffling, but the point is that Baloo is funny, so he listens to Bagheera go on about how great he is before jumping up and shouting PSYCH I AM SO NOT DEAD. Because it’s hilarious to let people think they’ve lost you, and get them to mourn over your live body, all so you can pop up with a one-liner. That’s what cool guys do. They also give you incredibly original nicknames like “Baggy,” wait—what is actually going on here, why do people like this?

And then the reprise of “Bare Necessities” at the end of the film has Bagheera joining in, as though the movie is now reassuring the audience—it’s okay, the panther’s cool now, too! He gets it!

Bagheera doesn’t need to get it. He is perfectly lovely just as he is.

The Jungle Book 1967

I just never really understood what the movie was trying to convey to me. And it didn’t help that the whole thing did eventually end with Mowgli going to the Man-Village after dispatching Shere Kahn. Like… the point is Bagheera was right, but too much of a stick-in-the-mud to for anyone to take him seriously? Is that the actual moral of the story? That’s a terrible moral. It’s not even a moral, really, it’s just the plot resolving awkwardly as a ten-year-old boy decides to change his entire outlook on existence because he saw a girl for the very first time. It’s an ending that no rational human being can buy unless we actively engage with the idea that Mowgli has somehow figured out human social constructs in the space of thirty seconds, and is aware that this girl is someone he might want to get it on with in several years. It’s not “just a crush” when you decide to abandon the only life you understand for a song about water-carrying, is what I’m saying.

Because of my natural aversion, I was determined to steer clear of the live-action Jungle Book rendition, despite the fact that I liked all the actors involved and typically enjoy Jon Favreau as a director. Then a bunch of friends whose opinions I respect seemed to like it, so I took a chance. I was holding my breath against the expected two-ish hours of semi-aggravated boredom, when something magical happened. Bagheera was… awesome. He was a complete character beyond narrative function, whose cautiousness was not depicted as lamentable, whose concern for Mowgli was out of sheer love, who was never treated like a wet blanket or a stuffy control freak. He was the Bagheera I’d been shouting about since childhood, the one who took it upon himself to care for a infant human boy because he was noble and majestic, dammit, and everyone in the jungle knew it.

The Jungle Book 2016

Perhaps storytelling simply outgrew the trends that made the Jungle Book cartoon so difficult for me to watch as a little one. Maybe we’ve moved beyond the idea that being dependable and sensible are “boring” or “uninteresting” attributes, and realized that children can handle more complex characterizations. It does seem to be the trend for these live-action Disney revamps, and while they’re not particularly risky offerings, they can be more engaging than their predecessors in more ways than one.

All I know is, in the new film, Baloo tells Bagheera that Mowgli is a special kid, and when the panther replies “I know—I raised him,” I was all thanks movie, gonna cry now, and I didn’t even want to like you.

The film did me the extra favor of not showing good old Baloo in a favorable light the whole way through either—we get to see his selfish side, and his fear, and his excessive laziness isn’t depicted as a positive. He has his own journey to make, and he comes out better for it. He and Bagheera arrive at a mutual respect in their efforts to protect the kid. In fact, with their strengths combined, Bagheera and Baloo make excellent co-parents to Mowgli. Yes, I am advocating gay cross-species jungle dads. It’s a great idea. Way better than that Talespin cartoon.

The Jungle Book 2016

There’s nothing quite like having six-year-old you vindicated. While I did eventually come to love characters who moved and shook and committed great acts, I will always have the deepest of soft spots for those pragmatic warriors, the angels on our shoulders. Because being that good usually doesn’t win you any prizes, and it never wins you as many accolades as the cool guy. But the Bagheeras of the world always mattered to me. I always saw them, heeded them, clung to every considered word.

The little worriers of the world need heroes, too. And sometimes those heroes are busy telling you the twenty-one ways you might die today, urging you to retreat when you want to press on. It may not make much sense to the rest, but that solid dose of truth can be far more comforting than a rousing speech or a smooth song any day of the week.

An earlier version of this article was published in April 2016.

Emmet Asher-Perrin thinks this probably explains a lot of why she loved Spock, too. You can bug her on Twitter and Tumblr, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.

About the Author

Emmet Asher-Perrin

Author

Emmet Asher-Perrin is the News & Entertainment Editor of Reactor. Their words can also be perused in tomes like Queers Dig Time Lords, Lost Transmissions: The Secret History of Science Fiction and Fantasy, and Uneven Futures: Strategies for Community Survival from Speculative Fiction. They cannot ride a bike or bend their wrists. You can find them on Bluesky and other social media platforms where they are mostly quiet because they'd rather talk to you face-to-face.
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LordVorless
7 years ago

While I will grant that Phil Harris has a great voice, Sebastian Cabot ALSO has one.   

And the only less awesome thing about Talespin is that they didn’t find a way to have Bagheera in it.

 

Avatar
7 years ago

There’s also a bit where Baloo pulls on Bagheera’s tail while the panther is sitting comfortably in a tree, and it makes me want to drop a rock on that carefree dude every time I see it.

Yeah, that is just bullying. I agree with you, and I bet that Baloo might be fun to hang with for an afternoon, but his schtick would get real old real fast if you had to live it all the time. He’s like the 45 year old slacker who still acts like he is in high school, a loser. I’d rather hang with Bagheera too, he’d have us doing something actually interesting and educational.

sdzald
7 years ago

Yep I admit it, the Jungle Book was one of my favorite Disney films as a kid.  I will say it was because of the music more so than the story.  What Disney film doesn’t have a main character that doesn’t throw reason to the wind and goes off on a great adventure?  Most of them and they wouldn’t be much of a story if they listened to reason in the first place and played it safe :)

Avatar
7 years ago

@3/sdzald: “What Disney film doesn’t have a main character that doesn’t throw reason to the wind and goes off on a great adventure?” 

I think you employed a double negative there, but no matter – The Rescuers?

palindrome310
7 years ago

Good point about the moral.

I liked the songs of this film, but I will find odd that he went with the humans for a girl that carried water. 

wintermute
wintermute
7 years ago

According to my parents, I expressed plans to marry Bagheera after watching the film for the first time. I was about four.

Even after I got over that furry-period, Bagheere has always remained my favorite.

And of cause C-3PO was the best thing about Star Wars.

 

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7 years ago

@5/palindrome310: I’m afraid the moral is that everyone should stick with their own kind.

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Lisa Conner
7 years ago

I’m surprised you weren’t ticked off by what Disney did to Baloo as well. He wasn’t a big, goofy slacker in Kipling, he was the teacher of the cubs of the Seonee wolf pack, drilling the Laws of the Jungle into their young heads. Mowgli was the slacker, constantly playing pranks and ignoring his teacher. He was the one who would have been yanking on tails and whiskers. Despite this, he actually knew how to live in the jungle, at least. Disney Mowgli was as clueless as though he’d arrived in the jungle just yesterday.

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7 years ago

My two older brothers, as in 6 and 8 years older, called me “Grandma” because I was born with common sense and a lot of worry.  I spent my childhood saying “are you nuts?” to characters in movies and books.  Not to my brothers because I already knew they were nuts.  In other words, I feel your pain.  

I also have way too much empathy about embarrassing situations.  I never understood why people laughed at I LOVE LUCY because I cringed in sympathy at Lucy’s foolish behavior.  

sdzald
7 years ago

I am sorry about that, I can’t spell (thank God for the modern spell checker) I flunked 6th grade English and it was down hill form there :)  I love to read and I give much honor to those who have the talent to write and to bring us great literature but I am certainly not one capable of doing so myself.

@2 Yea Baloo would not be high on my list of characters I would enjoy hanging with. but I would enjoy hearing him sing.

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7 years ago

@10/sdzald: No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pointed that out. It isn’t important, and besides, I make grammar mistakes myself.

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Brett
7 years ago

I’ve heard that the ending of the animated movie came about because they had no idea how to end it, and simply went with a cop-out (Mowgli even does the whole shrug gesture before going into the village). The live-action Disney film does it so much better (and is a better movie TBH even if I love the animated film).

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Pauline
7 years ago

One reason I hate the Disney version of The Jungle Book is that it reversed Kipling’s characterizations. In the book, Baloo is the disciplinarian, the teacher, the master; Bagheera is Mowgli’s buddy, the cat he can curl up with to sleep on a carefree warm afternoon. Chuck Jones’ animated TV special “Mowgli’s Brothers” was much more faithful to the book.

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7 years ago

I agree with you on the overall premise of this article – the “normal character” is often screwed over by the narrative of the story in which they are participating. A couple of examples for me:

1. In Reality Bites the main character ends up with the “artist” who kind of treats her poorly rather than the guy who makes a good living and treats her very well. Because he’s too boring or whatever.

2. I find myself agreeing more and more with Judge Smails in Caddyshack as I get older and older. Rodney Dangerfield’s character doesn’t belong anywhere near a public municipal golf course, let alone a private country club. Yes, Ted Knight does a wonderful slow-burn-directly-into-red-hot-anger, and they over-emphasize the characters “stuffy old white guy” characteristics, but in the end, if you look at his true complaints about the guy (playing pop music at full volume in the middle of a golf course, hitting on Smails’ wife, acting like a complete ass at a formal dinner party) he’s…not exactly wrong.

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7 years ago

Yep yep yep. And Ariel should have listened to her dad. XD

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7 years ago

Wow. I really identified with a lot of what you said. My mom always called me her little “worry wart,” always looking where the nearest emergency exit was, making sure we had the proper supplies on hand just in case, things like that. I always liked the characters who represented order, rather than those who represented chaos. Carried through my whole life…

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chuck
7 years ago

Choosing to give up everything he knew for the girl sounds like the kind of thing a seat of the pants, live in the moment person like Baloo would do. Influence?

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Raskos
7 years ago

In the books, Bagheera was the epitome of cool – stylish, capable, subtle, subliminally dangerous. And so damned good-lookin’.

The Jungle Books were bedtime reading for me (at a very early age – I really wonder sometimes what my mother was thinking), and I remember what a travesty the Disney film seemed to me when it first appeared, even though I was still a child. The only animal characters that weren’t transformed into buffoons or villains were the Bandar-Log, and that’s because they already were buffoons and villains. Even Shere-Khan had a bit more dignity on the page.

Disney had a magic touch with the books of my childhood. Everything they laid their hands upon turned to ordure.

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The WOL
7 years ago

I’m not surprised you didn’t like Disney’s version of The Jungle Book.  Disney infantilized and trivialized everything he touched,pulled its teeth and made it cutesy and silly — He did the same to Winnie the Pooh, Mary Poppins, The Wind in the Willows, and Alice in Wonderland, something I, too, suspected as a child.  When I came to the original texts as an adult, I was appalled at what he had done to them.  Disney has done a great deal of damage and disservice to the psyches of generations of American children and girls in particular with his toxic and pernicious “princesses.”  He and the machine he created has much to answer for.  I am inexpressibly glad he never got his sticky mitts on Kipling’s Just So Stories.

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Maac
7 years ago

I’m sorry, in what galaxy is Bagheera not the coolest MF to walk the planet??

Pardon, I’m a little emotional, I’ve crushed on Bagheera since I was FOUR. That’s (calculates) okay I’m not telling but it’s measured in decades plural. 

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Tahlia
7 years ago

I 100% had the same feelings growing up about practical characters being portrayed as stuffy, but irresponsible characters being shown as “cool”. For me, my soulmate Disney character is Rabbit from Winnie the Pooh, who is very similar to Bagheera in temperament. All the other characters, even Eeyore, have a huge fan base, but I dare you to find any t-shirt or merch devoted to Rabbit. 

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7 years ago

You had me right up until you decided to trash talk Talespin.

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LordVorless
7 years ago

21, these are the days when anybody with photoshop can make a shirt, there’s plenty of Rabbit merchandise.  

 

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7 years ago

I can enjoy the original animated film even though I love the books, because I found out that Walt Disney specifically told the people working on the movie to NOT read the books. So they basically took the concept and made something new from it. I get a kick out of the fact that they managed to get completely opposite characterization from the book – Bagheera is supposed to be the one who spoils Mowgli, Baloo is the strict teacher who’s trying to help him survive, Kaa is an ally (though a dangerous one), and Hathi is NOT a comic figure, but a formidable force.

I was reluctant to see the newer one at first, but enjoyed it as well. I was amazed that they managed to take elements from the book, and elements from the original movie, and make something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT from it!

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Hugo
7 years ago

Same thing in that movie Troy (not sure if this part is the same in the Illiad) – Why won’t anyone *listen* to Hector?

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Victoria Hannah
7 years ago

25

In the Illiad it would be more usual to question, “Why won’t anyone listen to Cassandra?  Or Laocoon?”

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Raskos
7 years ago

@19

I am inexpressibly glad he never got his sticky mitts on Kipling’s Just So Stories.

God, what a horrible thought. Some reason to be cheerful, then.

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Mickie Dreysen
7 years ago

I agree, Bagheera the panther, in both the stories and the movies, was the character I most connected with, and the one I still do. I don’t think I ever put it in the same terms you do; I just thought he was cool. More, well, centered. And you just knew that Bagheera was the closest one around who actually could consider standing up to Khan, even if only a little more than most. 

But my favorite interpretation of Bagheera is that by Blues Traveler! Here’s a link to their song, if it’s  ok, and for anyone who hasn’t heard it: Bagheera(BluesTraveler)

 

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ajay
7 years ago

In the book, Baloo is the disciplinarian, the teacher, the master; Bagheera is Mowgli’s buddy, the cat he can curl up with to sleep on a carefree warm afternoon.

I think this is a bit over-simplified – yes, Baloo is the teacher. But he is also a bit of a comic character, and he’s pretty soft on Mowgli (maybe too soft). And Bagheera isn’t just Mowgli’s friend, he’s also a dangerous character (and he’s a disciplinarian too; he beats Mowgli for running away with the Bandar-log).

But Bagheera is the closest Mowgli has to a friend because he’s the most like Mowgli; he used to live among humans, until he broke the lock on his cage and escaped. He’s never going to be just a part of the Jungle, any more than Mowgli is. Baloo is, Kaa is, Akela is, but Bagheera and Mowgli are always outsiders.

Berthulf
7 years ago

I always loved Bagheera. My brother and I were bought the VHS when we were itty-bitty (when it was still my brother and I, not my brothers and I). We watched it pretty much on repeat until the tape literally snapped in the player (the distortions by that point were horrendous, but somewhat amusing to single digit aged me) and I always both loved and hated it.

As with all Disney films, I enjoyed the bad guy more than I was probably supposed to and I liked the music, just not as much as the music from other Disney films (Sleeping Beauty still holds top spot), or even a great deal TBH. I vaguely enjoyed most of the characters, but more because I recognised them from other Disney productions than because I genuinely liked them and, in fact, I never really thought of Disney’s Jungle Book as anything more than mediocre at best. Now, The Sword in the Stone is a different matter, not to mention the Aristocats, but I did honestly like one thing in DtJB: Bagheera.

I relate with Eeyore most of all (it’s a depression thing), but Bagheera, Rabbit and Archimedes (the owl) are, given the choice, the characters I would have chosen as friends, and as for the live-action-not-quite-remake version of DtJB’s Bagheera? I could happily marry him!

Lastly, @28, thank you, because I’d forgotten this track existed! (note to self, kick father to dig through the vinyls)

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Twigryph
7 years ago

I suppose, given I’ve read so many articles I’ve loved from you by now, I shouldn’t be surprised that you love Bagheera as well. I’ve always loved him, and watched the Jungle Book just for him. I never thought the film was against him – in fact, it always circled back to him being in the right, and the best protector of Mowgli from the very beginning. I took the two of them – Bagheera and Baloo – dancing off together at the end to be a nice coming together, a friendship created out of mutual love for Mowgli. A relationship to replace the one they’d just lost, with each supplying something the other needed. Bagheera for Baloo : a sense of responsibility, of putting others above hedonism. Baloo for Bagheera : A sense of fun, of not being afraid to look a little silly, have a good time and dance like no-one is watching with a friend who respects you regardless. I used to be annoyed by Baloo as a kid, too, but as I got older I grew to realize that the film was really about him and Bagheera and their dichotomy – they have the character arcs, more so than Mowgli, who goes from not wanting to leave the jungle to seeing a pretty girl and wandering off. The new film by Favreau was truly wonderful, and Ben Kingsley was the perfect Bagheera, nearly made me cry with how spot-on it was. 

 

I suppose it doesn’t help that my father was called Bagheera when he was a Scout Leader, heh heh.  But that my deep personal affection for the character was not disappointed in any of films has been a blessing. 

 

Also, just realizing that Disney has a lot of ‘gay couples’ in the animal kingdom…Bagheera and Baloo, Timon and Pumbaa, the antelopes in Zootopia…

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Eva
6 years ago

If I could hug this post, I would.

I watched the live-action version of ‘The Jungle Book’ before I saw the original (I know, I’m weird) and Bagheera was my favorite character.  And he’s my favorite in the animated version as well – personally, I think he’s super cool and awesome and wise and just…YES.  Baloo is awful.  Bagheera is awesome. <3

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Zonk
5 years ago

Id love to know your thoughts on the 2019 Netflix version.

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Cassidy
4 years ago

“…the majority of the population aren’t going to cuddle the stuffed animal of a character who makes reliable decisions,” I read as my stuffed Bagheera sits at my feet. 

 

Interesting article!