Wistful Winnie
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Wistful Winnie ✦
Art by R.W Winfield
After losing the rights to Millie Moonbeam, R.W Winfield would take several years to write anything new, coasting on his cut of earnings from merchandise, previous book sales, and his inheritance. After years of reclusive silence, he would write one final book. Wistful Winnie would feature in this book and it detailed her travels across a long dead Meadowvalley overtaken by pipes, steam and rust. It was an extremely surreal book that ended with Winnie being described as finding a writers room in an old brick building and climbing into their inkwell, traveling to other stories and worlds anew. Perhaps this book was reflecting the state that Winfields mind was in at the time, having lost his most personal and dear character. Regardless, the book did not sell very well and is fairly unknown in modern times.
In current time, Winnie serves as the face of the R.W Winfield Library, constructed during his final years. If you travel there you can see her statue in the front entrance and a wall mural of her traveling Meadowvalley with other Winfield creations.
The Imp of Meadowvalley and most popular creation of author R.W Winfield, Wistful Winnie has had an interesting life that began when he first appeared in literature through Winfields 1920’s classic “Hearth of Meadowvalley.”
In this novel, Winnie played the role of a minor villain, being an unhelpful and dangerous pixie encountered by protagonist Millie Moonbeam. She captured Millie on her adventures and sang a rhyme about fleecing flensing and eating the unfortunate bug before being tricked by Millie into jumping in her own boiling pot.
Oddly enough, this behavior did not deter children from adoring Winnie. Perhaps due to her whimsical, illustrated appearance, children would write numerous letters begging Winfield to write a sequel to the first novel, and in their letters they would mention the character of Winnie and wanting to see more of her schemes and songs. After many letters and many knocks on his door, Winfield relented and wrote a sequel to his first book that was released about two years after his first novel.
The book was a return to the world of Meadowvalley, in which large rolling machines have descended upon the garden. On her adventure to reach the central machine, Millie Moonbeam was this time aided by a remorseful, but still pernicious, Wistful Winnie much to the delight of children everywhere.
It should be noted that although more popular than Millie Moonbeam, R.W Winfield was noted as never liking Winnie that much. In fact, near the end of his life, he was recorded as saying he hated the character (although this could have been influenced by losing his ownership of Millie around the same time), and he would call her an, “awful little beast that for some reason beastly children seem to love.”