The Te of Piglet

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The Te of Piglet is a 1992 book by Benjamin Hoff, a companion to his earlier work The Tao of Pooh. Published by Dutton Books, it spent many weeks on bestseller lists, including 21 weeks on the Publishers Weekly list and 40 weeks on the New York Times list.

In this book, Piglet from Winnie-the-Pooh explains Te, a Taoist idea that means power or virtue, especially the virtue of the small. Hoff shows that Piglet has great power because of his big heart, or tz'u, even though he is small. The book also broadens the introduction to Taoism.

Hoff uses many stories from A. A. Milne’s Pooh books to illustrate Taoist ideas. The adventures of Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, Owl, Rabbit, and Eeyore become tools for showing how people’s actions can keep them from living in harmony with the Tao.

Reception was mixed. The Palm Beach Post said The Te of Piglet doesn’t quite match its predecessor, The Tao of Pooh. The Princeton library praised the book. Kirkus Reviews called it “marshmallow laced with arsenic” but said it was worth reading. Publishers Weekly criticized Hoff for some political digressions but still found that the book distills enduring wisdom and promotes an ecological message we ignore at our peril.