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The dark story behind Bambi, the book Hitler banned

22 January 2022

9:00 AM

22 January 2022

9:00 AM

The Original Bambi: The Story of a Life in the Forest Felix Salten, translated by Jack Zipes, illustrated by Alenka Sottler

Princeton University Press, pp.192, 20

The extent of Walt Disney’s grasp of the natural world remains unclear. After the Austrian author Felix Salten sold the rights to his 1923 bestseller Bambi for a paltry $1,000, Walt is reputed to have suggested myriad unhelpful plot additions to the simple story. ‘Suppose we have Bambi step on an ant hill,’ he offered at one script meeting, ‘and then cut away to see all the damage he’s done to the ant civilisation?’

His writers knew better.

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