Yes, when my oldest son was very young, I took him to see a Disney-based Pooh cartoon and it was very sad to see what Disney had done to those beautiful characters. The beauty of Milne's work and all goods children's literature is that it doesn't condescend.

We listened to "The Chocolate Wars" on audio during a recent trip to Canada and I marveled at the quality of the work qua literature. I then heard an interview with the author in which he explained that he'd written it as he would have written any novel and only when he'd completed it had it been classified as "youth fiction". If you're read any youth fiction recently, the difference is remarkable.

Very much of what is wrong with typical children's books, IMO, is that the authors writes to entertain and patronizes to a specific audience instead of worrying first and foremost about writing a really good book, telling a really interesting story, and letting the chips fall where they may in terms of who is going to ultimately be interested in reading it. Roald Dahl's children's books also stand out in that regard -- beautiful stories that happen to be particularly entertaining for kids.