Paddington Bear

Paddington Bear (though his name is just Paddington; the "Bear" simply serves to confirm his species) is a fictional character in children's literature. He first appeared on 13 October 1958 in the children's book ''A Bear Called Paddington'' by British author Michael Bond. He has featured in twenty nine books written by Bond, the last of which, ''Paddington at St. Paul's'', was published posthumously in 2018. The books have been illustrated by Peggy Fortnum, David McKee, R. W. Alley, and other artists.

The friendly, anthropomorphised spectacled bear from "darkest Peru"—with his old hat, battered suitcase, duffel coat and love of marmalade sandwiches—has become a classic character in children's literature. Paddington is always polite—addressing people as "Mr", "Mrs", and "Miss", but rarely by first names—and kindhearted, though he inflicts hard stares on those who incur his disapproval. He has an endless capacity for innocently getting into trouble, but is known to "try so hard to get things right". After being discovered in London Paddington station by the Brown family, he was adopted and named "Paddington Brown", as his original name in bear language was too hard for the (human) Browns to pronounce.

Paddington has become one of the most beloved British fictional characters—a Paddington Bear stuffed toy was chosen by British tunnellers as the first item to pass through to their French counterparts when the two sides of the Channel Tunnel were linked in 1994, and the Bear appeared with Queen Elizabeth II in a pre-recorded comedy segment for the Platinum Party at the Palace in 2022—and the Paddington books have been translated into 30 languages across 70 titles, with a total of more than 30 million copies sold worldwide. As of June 2016, the Paddington Bear franchise was owned by Vivendi's StudioCanal, though Bond continued to own the publishing rights to his series, which was licensed to HarperCollins in April 2017.

Since its first appearance on the BBC in 1966, Paddington Bear has been adapted for television, films, and commercials. Television adaptations include ''Paddington'', broadcast from 1976 to 1980. The critically acclaimed and commercially successful films ''Paddington'' (2014) and ''Paddington 2'' (2017) were both nominated for the BAFTA Award for Outstanding British Film, and a third film in the series, ''Paddington in Peru'', began filming in July 2023. Provided by Wikipedia