It’s Dr. Suess’ birthday! Which Book is Your Favorite?

In honor of Dr. Suess’ 107th birthday, I tried to figure out which of his children’s books is my all-time favorite, but it was a harder choice than I had first imagined. I love the Sneetches, the Grinch, The Cat in the Hat, Fox in Socks, the 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins… and so on. I’m not sure there’s any way to choose!

One of my fondest “Suessian” memories was my attempt to share my love of Suess’ Cat in the Hat with my daughter. She absolutely HATED it. She also despised Curious George, Eloise, Pippi Longstocking and so many other traditional children’s books. Why? Because the main characters make bad choices. If you want to see my sweet uber-rule-following daughter’s hair stand on end, just try to read her a book (or show her a movie) where the main character disobeys. Her favorite movie character was always the Little Mermaid, but she would make me skip over the part where she disobeys her father. Her favorite book character was Madeline–probably something about those neat, orderly lines in which the girls walked.

I haven’t figured out why this bothers her so much, but it has since she was a teeny-tiny thing. I guess that’s good for us as her parents. And yet, so many chilren’s books focus on characters who make mistakes and learn from them. It’s a relatively painless way for us to teach our kids (and ourselves) why its important to make good choices. Well, painless unless you’re my daughter, I suppose.

Are there book characters that make you uncomfortable? And what’s your favorite Dr. Suess book?