People Are Just Realising Stuart Little Isn’t A Mouse, And I Need To Lie Down

In the books, Stuart Little is a human 

The film Stuart Little is based on the book Stuart Little by EB White (also the author of Charlotte’s Web). 

And I sincerely regret to inform you that the first chapter of that cursed tome novel, “In The Drain,” begins in this haunting manner: 

“When Mrs Frederick C. Little’s second son arrived, everybody noticed that he was not much bigger than a mouse. The truth of the matter was, the baby looked very much like a mouse in every way. He was only about two inches high; and he had a mouse’s sharp nose, a mouse’s tail, a mouse’s whiskers, and the pleasant, shy manner of a mouse. Before he was many days old he was not only looking like a mouse but acting like one, too – wearing a grey hat and carrying a small cane. Mr and Mrs Little named him Stuart, and Mr Little made him a tiny bed out of four clothespins and a cigarette box.

So, while publisher Harper Collins markets the children’s book as a “classic novel about a small mouse… born to a family of humans,” the perhaps less invested Britannica is more alive to its body horror realities. 

It is, they point out, about a “two-inch-tall boy who resembles a mouse”. 

Which begs the question: A24 Stuart Little remake when?

People had… thoughts 

In response to the recent X post, one netizen called the news “disturbing”. 

Another pointed to the historical myth of sooterkins. These were believed to be the rat-like afterbirth of some Dutch women (great! Normal!).

But it is not the first time innocent internet users have become aware of the fact. 

A post shared to Reddit’s r/todayilearned pointed out the “mouse”’s true species in 2018. 

“He also tries to get frisky/date a girl who is tiny like him and looks like a human,” wrote u/Atoning_Unifex.

Yup, that’d be Harriet Ames, who does not look like a mouse. Stuart got the hots for her after hearing that she was a little “shorter” than him, and after a shopkeeper “gave [him] a most favourable report of [her] character and appearance”. 

They did not work out. But notably, Stuart Little began a letter to her by saying, “I am a young person of modest proportions” (italics mine). 

All in all, I’m with u/MattheJ1: “If I were Mr Little, I’d be asking some questions”.

Additional thumbnail credits: Sony Pictures Releasing