h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I first came across Dr Seuss when my eldest niece was two or three and I was about seventeen. My brother had a copy of Green Eggs and Ham, and I was immediately hooked. What I liked was the way he allowed children credit for a sense of humour; every other children's book seemed po-faced beside his.

I didn't particularly like the cat in the hat, who makes a very awkward role model, but I do love still his poems like "Too Many Daves" (which I have memorised).

Did I ever tell you that Mrs. McCave
Had twenty-three sons and she named them all Dave?

Well, she did.

[Rest of poem deleted by Post Editor.]

His moralising can be heavy, but things like "What Was I Scared Of" are just terrific.

Hence the caveat that this is the opinion of MY inner child, not anybody else's.

I hope that poem is out of copyright.

Feel free to delete most of it. I copied it from a website...

Done!

I didn't like "Cat in the hat."

I liked Seuss's musical rhythm and rhyme. It influenced my own verse and songs.

Remember, though, that he wrote in the same era as Thurber, whose Walter Mitty had a vivid imagination. The world was a theater of the absurd. Gracie Allen was demolishing received wisdom and logic. My generation grew up when the absurd was, well, different.

I haven't thought about Dr. Seuss in a while. I still like the Grinch, though. unless he's one of the ones that were tossed.

Am I allowed to like something that has been deleted? Well, it's a free site. But I'd have to explain, and I can stick my foot in my mouth pretty easily.

The publishing company didn't have any problems with the Grinch. It stopped publishing six books because the drawings in there weren't something their customers want little kids to see.

I remembered the Chinese man in Mulberry Street. I knew that as why the book was withdrawn as soon as I heard of its removal.

I picked up one of those Chinese hats when I was in Taiwan, but haven't worn it for thirty years