The Te of Piglet

In The Te of Piglet, the Piglet character of the Winnie the Pooh books explains the Chinese concept of Te, meaning ‘power’ or ‘virtue’.[4] Hoff elucidates the Taoist concept of ‘Virtue — of the small’; though, he also uses it as an opportunity to elaborate on his introduction to Taoism. It is written with many embedded stories from the A. A. Milne Winnie the Pooh books, both for entertainment and because they serve as tools for explaining Taoism. In the book Piglet is shown to possess great power — a common interpretation of the word Te, which more commonly means Virtue — not only because he is small, but also because he has a great heart or, to use a Taoist term, Tz’u. The book goes through the other characters — Tigger, Owl, Rabbit, Eeyore and Pooh — to show the various aspects of humanity that Taoism says get in the way of living in harmony with the Tao.