Editing Captain Hook (section)

==Creation of the character==
Hook did not appear in early drafts of the play, wherein the capricious and coercive [[Peter Pan]] was closest to a "villain", but was created for a front-cloth scene (a cloth flown well downstage in front of which short scenes are played while big scene changes are "silently" carried out upstage<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.theatrecrafts.com/|title=Theatrecrafts.com|website=www.theatrecrafts.com}}</ref>) depicting the children's journey home. Later, Barrie expanded the scene, on the premise that children were [[Pirates in the arts and popular culture|fascinated by pirates]], and expanded the role of the captain as the play developed. The character was originally cast to be played by [[Dorothea Baird]], the actress playing [[Mary Darling (fictional character)|Mary Darling]], but [[Gerald du Maurier]], already playing George Darling (and the brother of [[Sylvia Llewelyn Davies]]), persuaded Barrie to let him take the additional role instead,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.jmbarrie.co.uk/introduction.html |title=Jmbarrie.co.uk – introduction to the yale edition (2003) |access-date=2007-12-08 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080102032812/http://www.jmbarrie.co.uk/introduction.html |archive-date=2 January 2008 |df=dmy }}</ref> a casting tradition since replicated in many stage and film productions of the Peter Pan story.

According to [[A. N. Wilson]], Barrie "openly acknowledged [that] Hook and his obsession with the crocodile was an English version of [[Captain Ahab (Moby-Dick)|Ahab]]",<ref>[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/anwilson/3563080/Moby-Dick-a-modern-tragedy.html A.N. Wilson. "Moby-Dick – a modern tragedy." The Telegraph, 27 October 2008.] Retrieved 25 March 2014.</ref> and there are other borrowings from [[Herman Melville|Melville]].<ref>{{cite journal | url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/460839 | jstor=460839 | doi=10.2307/460839 | title=Hook and Ahab: Barrie's Strange Satire on Melville | last1=Williams | first1=David Park | journal=PMLA | date=1965 | volume=80 | issue=5 | pages=483–488 | s2cid=163344199 }}</ref>