Favorites by Dr. Seuss (Theodor Geisel)

[I'm sorry this is such a long review.]

Johnny Depp is playing Dr. Seuss in an upcoming
movie--no resemblance yet, but great casting.
Yes, I will use any excuse to include a photo of
Johnny Depp in my blog, even frowny-browed
images like this one.

          I am writing these reviews of Dr. Seuss's books from La Jolla, California, the town in which Theodor "Dr. Seuss" Geisel lived and wrote. It’s a great pilgrimage for children’s literature geeks, also being the home of Frank Baum (author of The Wizard of Oz books). I am happy to be here on an amazing vacation. I can see why Dr. Seuss and Mr. Baum would live here--beautiful skies, gorgeous beaches, endless ocean, mild temperatures--a perfect setting for thinking things up. Books reviewed in this blog entry include Green Eggs and Ham; The Cat In the Hat; The Cat In the Hat Comes Back; One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish; Horton Hears a Who; and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
          A friendly biography of Dr. Seuss can be found at:  http://legendsgallerylajolla.com/bio.php?id=4 You can also find a few examples of his paintings and sketches there (see Addendum). For a better look at the paintings, sculptures, and other works, go to http://www.drseussart.com/.

Green Eggs and Ham, 1960, 62 pages

My sister and I at Legends Gallery admiring
their collection of Dr. Seuss's artwork;
they are at http://legendsgallerylajolla.com

          Green Eggs and Ham, which has fewer different words in it than this review--50, to be exact--is a true American classic--and a blast. I was fascinated by it as a child and low these 50 years later I am laughing and fascinated again. The rhyming text is captivating. The repetition of the story elements (in the drawings as well as the text) is somehow pleasing to the brain--I also find this device delightful in certain songs, such as “One Man Went to Mow” and “Hole in the Bottom of the Sea.” It makes me giggle. And this type of repetition probably has roots deep in our past as a memory training device prior to the development of written language. But I’m a book reviewer, not a linguist, so that’s just speculation.
          Green Eggs and Ham also features one of the great Refusers of all times--the unnamed main character. Kids find this character hysterically funny. He’s so emphatic, yet so polite. And kids are always forced to do things they don’t want to do--they are rooting for the Refuser. The twist at the end is pleasing and funny as the Refuser finally gives in and takes a bite. The mood of the book undergoes a sea change as the Refuser overflows with gratitude and you realize that part of you was rooting for Sam-I-Am all along.
          I remember being enthralled by the drawings in this book and how they told the story right along with the text. After I knew the text pretty well I would still look at the book and go over the details in the art. I’m still tickled with the tunnel sequence.       

The Cat in the Hat, 1957, 62 pages

          OK, The Cat In the Hat is my favorite Dr. Seuss book. That darn cat barges in on a rainy afternoon and turns everything topsy turvy. This book, like Green Eggs and Ham, has a concrete and specific vocabulary and makes terrific fun happen from simple words. Taken literally, this is an absurdist text. The door opens, stuff happens, the door slams shut. All is as it was before. Or is it? The child narrator, at the end, is considering lying to his mother. This places the book in on a shaky ethical foundation!
          I think of the stripey-hatted Cat In the Hat that lives inside me. Nowadays, the Cat inside is tamed and mostly under control, but I still have an impulse sometimes to completely TAKE THINGS APART--to completely deconstruct my world. This is another developmental issue for children--how do they become internally civilized? How did my inner Cat get trained? (OK, it was those couple of times I was almost fired!) Also, kids have fits and rages and crazinesses that come over them like thunderstorms or tornadoes. WHOOSH! Then they settle back into their regular selves. The book rings true to me.
          Poetically, the book is solid. Dr. Suess wrote this book on a dare--he could use only 220 different words. The repetitive element in Green Eggs and Ham is fully present, but only for one action stream of the book. When Thing 1 and Thing 2 appear, the book moves into straightforward action. In fact, it almost seems like two different  books smoodged together. (Spell check will not accept “smoodged.”)
          I love this book. I still love the tracking between the 220 words and the illustrations. I love the natural but exact rhyming. I love the anarchy. I love the magical clean-up machine. And I love the sly indication of secrecy. There ARE some things your mom does not need to know.

The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, 1958, 64 pages

          The Cat In the Hat Comes Back is a somewhat disappointing sequel to The Cat In the Hat. Like CITH, this book has two action streams. First, the Cat comes to the kids’ home to wreak havoc on their attempt to shovel the walks at their house. He puts a red ring on the bathtub which proves comically difficult to get out (kind of like a booger on your finger). In the second action stream, the Cat introduces his helpers, Little Cats A through Z, which emerge like nested dolls from under his hat (the hat’s purpose is thereby at last disclosed). The Little Cats introduce an alphabet-book motif and at the same time make more mess. The alphabet Cats make me long for Thing 1 and Thing 2. The narrator character and his sister Sally are much clearer in this book about their intolerance for the Cat’s anarchy and havoc. The whole second half of the book is about the clean up.
          The Cat in the Hat Comes Back doesn’t succeed brilliantly in either of its streams, although the difficulty of recovering from a mistake is certainly authentic. And I can imagine 5-8 year-olds enjoying shouting out the alphabet letters ahead of time, with glee. The illustrations and poetics do not have the zest and wackiness of others of Dr. Seuss's books.

One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, 1960, 63 pages

Seal and pup, La Jolla.
Some of Dr. Seuss's creatures owe their shapes to the seal.

          One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish is utter nonsense--and the most fun nonsense you’ve ever read. The world in the book is rollicking and surprising, with one entertainment after another. Meanwhile, lots of  fundamental concept words are introduced, such as color names, numbers, time, basic prepositions, and amounts. The nouns are mostly concrete everyday words.
          I dig this book as much as any child and as much as I did as a child. Made-up words and names and animals appear and the illustrations are somewhat loosened from reality. Great fun.
          I often work on a poem until it is made up primarily of one-syllable words. It makes me boil my idea down to its most basic ingredients. Here are some random examples from my poetry: (1) Let the rain lay in your heart like a lace-edged shield of dew ("Rainveil"). (2) The sky weeps rain ("Persephone"). (3) She slugged it to her slugs with a slug of Big Bear’s best-buy brew ("Choosing Pansies").

Horton Hears a Who, 1954, 60 pages

          Horton Hears a Who is a cultural treasure. The power of one person, in both the macro and micro worlds of the book, makes each one of us immediately important. One person speaking up can change the world. One person adding a voice can change the world. There is a wonderful aura of caring in this book. It’s about being bullied and sticking up for yourself, but depicted instead of preached. And that’s how kids learn best.

San Luis Rey de Francia, north of La Jolla on the coast.
Can you see in the curvy and rounded architecture shades
of Dr. Seuss's wibbly-wobbly Whoville architecture?
Surrealist Spanish Colonial.

          Horton, with his superior gift of hearing, discovers and saves a tiny town on a speck of dust that is about to blow into a pond. No one else in his community can hear the Whos from Whoville, as they inform Horton they call themselves. His macro-world friends ridicule and persecute poor Horton to the point where I was seriously distressed for him. Horton encourages the Whos to band together and make some noise to prove their existence. (All of the Who speech is befittingly set in small type.) One tiny Who puts them over the top. Whoville is heard. Whoville is saved.

           I love the illustrations in this book. The architecture of Whoville and the style of drawing are part of my own aesthetic development. It’s still funny to me to see the Whos doing all the stuff we do, but in a Whoish kind of way--like mowing their grass, tossing a football, sleeping in bunk beds. The pictures manage to be simple and complex at the same time.
          The plot of Horton Hears a Who is compelling enough to stand on its own; the rhyming text serves as a sturdy background element that provides continuity to the action and unity to the whole kit and kaboodle--plot, language, character, theme, art. And the rhyme is Dr. Seuss’s voice, his writer’s voice. It lets you know that he is there and that it is uniquely him.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas, 1957, 50 pages

This surfer statue made me wonder if the
freedom of movement of Dr. Seuss's char-
acters might be related to the popularity of
surfing at La Jolla and other local beaches. 

          Dr. Seuss packed a ton of content into the 50-page How the Grinch Stole Christmas. He must have gotten a lot of mail about Whoville from the Horton book; they are featured in this book as well. It was fun, having read both books within the same hour, to see how Seuss develops the Who world. The Grinch, like Horton, is, should, and ought to be considered one of the great stories of our time. The Whos are filled with peace and harmony (literally, with their singing), so much so that the Grinch’s heart expands. In the classic TV animation, it is physical exertion, not the singing, that works on the Grinch’s heart, but in the book, it is clear that the beautiful singing of the Whos, who have lost everything, is the cause.
          No need to review the plot of this book. Who hasn’t heard it, read it, played it, or seen a version of it? Thematically, Grinch is about love, resentment, and loneliness. It is fun to wallow in the vileness of the villain. We’ve all felt that delicious and terrible urge to take away someone else’s fun, to spoil their happiness. But if the Grinch can change, I hope we can too.

          The key feature of Grinch is language. The rhyming and word play is brilliant and a major contributor to this book more so than in the others in this review. Stuffed the tree up. Roast beast. Cindy Lou Who. Delectable.


          I am so happy that these Dr. Seuss books were on my Eager Reader children’s literature list. I don’t know what else would have gotten me to reread them. And it has been a privilege to read and review them in the town in which they were written. I can see how the potatoesque Who architecture that is featured in many of Dr. Seuss’s books draws from the architecture of the Spanish missions in this area. I can see why he would draw them in the way that he did. I can ‘t wait to learn more about him in the last few days of my vacation.

ADDENDUM: Dr. Seuss as an Artist at Legends Gallery

If you are in La Jolla, locate the Legends Gallery. They have a wonderful selection of Dr. Seuss's paintings, drawings, and sculptures. He did oils and watercolors and bronzes and maquettes. I was stunned by the variety, humor, and excellence of the pieces. I never thought of Dr. Suess as a "real" artist (oh, my snobby self). The picture of my sister and I that goes along with this review was taken at Legends. The people there were very friendly and savvy about the Dr. Seuss works. The other artists on display were also pretty terrific. Legends Gallery is at http://legendsgallerylajolla.com.


SPECIAL THANKS
Special thanks to my nephew Jake Shapiro for solving the problem of how to upload my own photos to my blog. Yes, I probably would have eventually solved this on my own, but why bother with the excellent Jake around?