Bambi, A Life in the Woods

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Bambi, ein Leben im Walde (Bambi, A Life in the Woods) is a book by Felix Salten, first printed in 1923. Bambi is the name of the main character, a male roe deer beginning life as a fawn, then an adolescent spike, and finally a buck.

Felix Salten was the pen-name of Siegmund Salzmann, who was born in Budapest, Hungary but grew up in Vienna, Austria.

The book and resultant movies have made the name Bambi grow in popularity, although it is nowhere close to common.

The book was translated from German into English by Whittaker Chambers, who needed to supplement his income while working at a Communist newspaper.

Adaptations

The story was made into an animated film by Walt Disney Productions first released in the United Kingdom on August 8, 1942. The company took the liberty of changing the species into a white-tailed deer, and of putting him into an American forest. Additionally, the tone of the story was significantly lightened; the original book was much darker and more brutal.

In 1969, a short film spoofing the Disney film, Bambi Meets Godzilla, was released.

Two movies based on this book, Detstvo Bambi (Bambi's Childhood) and its sequel Yunost Bambi (Bambi's Youth), released in the USSR in 1985 and 1986 respectively. These movies were made as an allegory, with human actors playing animal parts without make-up or costume and minimal suggestion of animal species. For instance, the deer characters wore circlets and short capes, suggesting nobility but nothing of the actual animal's appearance.

Text

Salten, Felix. Bambi; a life in the woods, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1928.
Salten, Felix. Bambi, Aladdin; Reprint edition (July 1, 1988), ISBN 067166607X

External links

The Big Cartoon DataBase entry for [Bambi]
[Bambi, the Austrian deer], article by Paul A. Schons published in Kulturecke by the Germanic-American Institute, September, 2000

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