Milne, A(lan) A(lexander) 
1882 - 1956. 
English writer. 

His books for children were based on the teddy bear and other toys of his son Christopher Robin ( Winnie-the-Pooh 1926 and The House at Pooh Corner 1928). He also wrote children's verse (When We Were Very Young 1924 and Now We Are Six 1927) and plays, including an adaptation of Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows as Toad of Toad Hall 1929. Milne was educated at Westminster and Cambridge, where he studied mathematics. At the age of 24 he was assistant editor of Punch magazine. Some critics have seen in the Pooh series a parallel with Milne's rejection of Christianity, in that Pooh and Piglet take comfort by belief in a god, Christopher Robin, who the reader knows to be a thoughtless child who cannot even spell.