Books By Dr Suess- My Favorite Author

When I was four years old I learned how to read. Mom started collecting books for my brothers and I and even shared the books that gave her pleasure in her youth. She made sure we always had books. Reading was very important to my Mom. Reading and being read to was my favorite activity to share.

Dr. Suess has always been the favorite author on our book shelf. Dr. Suess who was named Theodore Suess Geisel who was born in 1904. His mother was a daughter of a baker and his Dad and grandfather were brewmasters. They were German speaking immigrants who came to this country for a better life, and had their children here in the U.S.

After college at Dartmouth and graduate school in Oxford University,, Theodore Geisel, later named Dr. Suess, became a magazine editor, a cartoonist and a writer. He also tried to be a teacher at Oxford where he was attending. As he grew up with his sister in Springfield, Massachusetts, this future talented author met challenges due to his German heritage, especially the way they spoke. Dr. Suess continued to write and he lived until 1991. Every year, March 2nd is celebrated as Dr. Suess Day because of his birthday.

Our Mom made sure we had all the Dr. Suess books: The Cat in the Hat, The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, Horton Hears A Who, Yertle the Turtle, How The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, Green Eggs and Ham, Hop on Pop, The Book About Me, and the Cat in the Hat Beginner's Dictionary- These were some of the names of Dr. Suess' titles that I can recall. They are all of my favorites, not one of them can be singled out because they are all so good!

The poetic license that this author used to create unusual characters and their names and with their unique drawings, I found that these books were also an inspiration to me to read, but also to write.

When I became a Mom and started reading these books to my own children, I began to realize that there was an educational benefit to these books. They help a child to learn how to express themselves, and they improve on their speech, especially when you get them to read out loud.

The stories have good plots, and they show a child how to come up to solutions to problems. There is conflict in Dr. Suess' stories and the characters even show emotion. A prime example of this is Horton, the elephant, and his plight to save all the Whos in a little speck of dust on a clover flower. If only we all had the compassion of Horton. In the Sequel, Horton Hatches the Egg, Horton becomes a Missionary in his own right, because "A promise is a promise"; He is truly faithful for doing his duty while "Maisy" goes off on vacation after asking Horton to incubate her egg by sitting on it in all kinds of weather.

Green Eggs and Ham was an easy favorite, and I liked the way it kept repeating the same lines over and over. "I will not eat them on a boat, I will not eat them with a goat, I will not eat them on a train, I will not eat them in a plane. I will not eat green eggs and ham, I will not eat them Sam, I am."

In the Cat in the Hat, my favorite characters were Thing One and Thing Two. They were the solution to the problem. Their habits were very unorthadox, and they made sure to have lots of fun by making a mess out of cleaning a mess.

How The Grinch Who Stole Christmas is the best Christmas story for children ever written. My favorite characters in this story are the dog, who becomes the Grinch's only assistant and Little Cindy Lou Who, an innocent child that changed the Grinch's heart forever. The dog, who is dressed up like a reindeer, to me, is one who is like the innocent child who believes in a commercialized Christmas. The little girl, Cindy Lou Who, is like the Christ child who changes the Grinch's Heart. The part of the story when the Who's in Whoville are celebrating without Christmas trees, decorations and presents should let us know that Christmas is within us and not in the outward appearance.

I would recommend all parents around the world to read Dr. Suess books to their children because they are fun, imaginative, teach grammar, imagination building, and help children learn how to solve problems. I look forward to reading the same books to my grandchildren someday.