Observations placeholder
Dr Seuss - Green Eggs and Ham
Identifier
028258
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
Green Eggs and Ham was first published on August 12, 1960. It is one of Seuss's "Beginner Books", written in a very simple vocabulary for beginning readers. The vocabulary of the text consists of just 50 different words and was the result of a bet between Seuss and Bennett Cerf (Dr. Seuss's publisher) that Seuss (after completing The Cat in the Hat using 236 words) could not complete an entire book without exceeding that limit. The 50 words are: a, am, and, anywhere, are, be, boat, box, car, could, dark, do, eat, eggs, fox, goat, good, green, ham, here, house, I, if, in, let, like, may, me, mouse, not, on, or, rain, Sam, say, see, so, thank, that, the, them, there, they, train, tree, try, will, with, would, you.
A character known as "Sam-I-Am" pesters another man who also serves as the story's narrator, to try a dish of green eggs and ham. He refuses, responding, "I do not like green eggs and ham. I do not like them, Sam-I-Am." He continues to repeat this as Sam follows him, encouraging him to eat them in eight locations (House, box, car, tree, train, dark, rain, boat), all to which he still refuses, responding, "I do not like them here (Current location) or there (Previous location). I do not like them anywhere." Finally, he gives in to Sam's pestering and samples the green eggs and ham, which he does like after all in the end and happily responds, "I do so like green eggs and ham. Thank you. Thank you, Sam-I-Am."
As of 2001, according to Publishers Weekly, Green Eggs and Ham was the fourth best-selling English-language children's book of all time.
A description of the experience
