TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/100791/1007540.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 3.8 KB | 87 lines

                                                                                MILESTONES, Page 71

The Doctor Beloved by All

Theodor Seuss Geisel: 1904-1991



    He was one of the last doctors to make house calls -- some
200 million of them in 20 languages. By the time of his death
last week at 87, Dr. Seuss had journeyed on beyond Dr. Spock to
a unique and hallowed place in the nurseries of the world.

    Actually, the title was as imaginary as the name. The
first doctorate Theodor Seuss Geisel ever earned was an honorary
one, given by his alma mater, Dartmouth. Young Theodor began
his education in the public schools of Springfield, Mass.,
where his father was a part-time zookeeper. The avid student
decided to become a professor. After college he went to Oxford,
where his attention was diverted by Helen Palmer, a fellow
American student who would remain his wife until her death 40
years later. The couple returned to the States just in time for
the Depression; Theodor fed his soul by trying to write serious
novels and filled the refrigerator by concocting an ad campaign
for a spray insecticide: "Quick, Henry, the Flit!"

    "I was successful but frustrated," he recalled. To amuse
himself he wrote a volume for the very young: And to Think That
I Saw It on Mulberry Street. In the Dick-and-Jane atmosphere of
'30s children's books, it became an instant hit. The Seuss
style was born fully developed: looping, free-style drawings;
clanging, infectious rhymes; and a relentless logic. "If I start
with a two-headed animal," he maintained, "I must never waver
from that concept. There must be two hats in the closet, two
toothbrushes in the bathroom and two sets of spectacles on the
night table." Each succeeding book was a refraction of some life
experience. If I Ran the Zoo acted out a childhood fantasy; the
postwar Horton Hears a Who! ("A person's a person no matter how
small") poignantly echoed the emotions he felt after visiting
Hiroshima.

    In the 1950s, Seuss began a one-Dr. battle against
illiteracy. For beginning readers he created an overnight
success, The Cat in the Hat, with a vocabulary of 220 words.
Best seller followed best seller; prize followed award. He was
given an Oscar for the animated cartoon Gerald McBoing-Boing,
Emmys for Grinch TV specials, a Pulitzer citation. Generations
devoured Green Eggs and Ham ("Sam! If you will let me be, I will
try them. You will see"), The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins
and Yertle the Turtle. As Geisel remembered it, "I used the word
burp, and nobody had ever burped before on the pages of a
children's book. It took a decision from the president of the
publishing house before my vulgar turtle was permitted to do
so." The childless author eventually lost interest in writing
for grownups. He believed that "adults are obsolete children,
and the hell with them."

    For the past several decades, the white-bearded, bow-tied
figure was a fixture in La Jolla, Calif., along with his second
wife Audrey. He tooled around in a car with the license plate
GRINCH and continued to work despite four cataract operations
and a heart attack. His later volumes revealed the teacher
hidden beneath the torrent of mirth. The Butter Battle Book
spoke of the dangers of the nuclear-arms race; his final work,
Oh, the Places You'll Go, took on the meaning of life.

    For Geisel, that meaning was never in doubt: "It's wrong
to talk about what's wrong with children today," he insisted.
"They are living in an environment that we made. When enough
people are worrying enough -- about war, the environment,
illiteracy -- we'll begin to get those problems solved." Reason
enough to believe:

    It was T.S. Geisel who provoked all the chortles,

    But it's old Dr. Seuss who has joined the immortals.


    By Stefan Kanfer.