Is the 'Cat in the Hat' subversive?

National Review ^ | 11/21/03 | John Miller

[KantianBurke]

They're kids books.

[KantianBurke]

I did a search on this and it didn't show up. Sorry if I end up being mistaken.

[sauropod]

Wasn't the author a raving leftist in life?

[armadale]

Apparently the Cat is gay, however.

[freeeee]

He came from a family of Republicans, but turned into an FDR Democrat in the 1930s and never looked back.

Sounds like most of the people on this site.

[sauropod]

OT, but i am curious. Your screen name. Could you please explain? I went to your profile page and hence my note to you in public.

thx.

[KantianBurke]

no problem. Basically combined names of two of my favorite philosophers: Immanuel Kant and Edumund Burke.
Think I told u or Freethehostages that at a counterprotest on the Mall awhile back btw. :>

[T'wit]

If I'm not mistaken (and I'm not going to look it up), Kerensky spent his later years as a professor in California.

[livius]

Good article, and I have always felt that way about the Dr. Seuss books. The message was definitely one of mushy liberalism, at best, but I think it was just typical of the times in which it was written and the class of people among whom he lived (and probably for whom he was writing).

I didn't particularly like them when I was a child, and my kids never really liked them that much, either. The only one I remember fondly was Horton Hears a Who, with its message, "a person's a person, no matter how small."

Incidentally, the Cat in the Hat movie got a horrible review in the WSJ. Apparently the movie took this mildly anarchic but generally entertaining and positive book, and made it gross, brutish, and cynical. Somehow the movie even injected a bit of sex into it. So be warned if you're planning on taking your kids to it.

[KantianBurke]

(Ed MacMan voice) You are correct Sir.

"It was then, however, the Bolshevik Revolution began in the October of 1917. In 1940 Alexander Kerensky had immigrated into the US. He became a staff member of the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University in California."

http://www.mcps.k12.md.us/schools/forestoakms/site%20pages/Academics/Social%20Studies/Russian%20history/page13.html

[Burkeman1]

Thanks for the sanity.

[Squawk 8888]

All the critics are panning it. My own peeve is that the producers got soccer-mom-PC with the story- they threw in some adult characters because they thought it would be "irresponsible" to depict kids staying home alone. Totally destroyed the essence of the original story- the entire hook to it was that you could have fun without the involvement of adults.

[cornelis]

They're kids books

Post-modernism for kids?

[Snake65]

Somehow the movie even injected a bit of sex into it

Hey, Dr. Seuss was all about boner jokes and punch-in-the-nads humor. NOT! (as Wayne might say)

[CobaltBlue]

Dr. Seuss is marvellous. I read him to my children night and day. Both of them learned to read before they turned four. I credit it to Dr. Seuss, Mother Goose, Edward Lear and Maurice Sendak.

[shattered]

IMO, being against the destruction of the earth's forests, water and air as depicted in the the Lorax crosses party lines, or should. Dr. Suess may have been a liberal but lots of people care about preserving nature where possible.

As someone who lives where acres are routinely totally cleared to put up homes/offices etc. it strikes a nerve.

[VeritatisSplendor]

Well, the two Horton books are pro-life, pro-responsibility, pro-standing up for right even if you have to do it by yourself. Even if Seuss did not perhaps intend the pro-life message, it's there.

The Grinch cartoon is stronger on the miraculous meaning of Christmas than the book is. The Grinch film I don't want to see.

My grandfather's book collection contains a book called The Seven Lady Godivas by Geisel, illustrated in a very Seussian style, about the seven "horse truths" they discovered (never put the cart before the horse, don't close the barn door, etc). I would never have heard of its existence if we did not have the book.

Mrs VS

[CobaltBlue]

"Read to my children" meant "used to read to my children." They're teenagers now, one in college. Very smart boys, and they loved their Dr. Seuss.

I read those books so much I still have them memorized. Saving the books for the grandchildren.

[A. Goodwin]

Many (all?) of Suess' political cartoons are online here:

http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dspolitic/

[cornelis]

I never cared for Marvin K.

Aside from allusions to Nixon suggested above, the decision for Marvin to go was to me, a child of nine, unjustified, unsatisfying. And if I describe it now I'd say it was the child's version of "Waiting for Godot."