Saturday, March 1, 2008

Scrambling Super Dr. Seuss

Little Dee's favorite book right now is a little-known Dr. Seuss book called Scrambled Eggs Super!

The book is a shaggy dog story, but in my eyes it is the Invisible Cities of the Seuss oeuvre. In Seuss' version, published in 1953, Peter T. Hooper is Marco Polo, describing the strange and fantastic eggs to Ghenghis Khan, a little girl named Liz, perched up high upon a stool.

I don't like to brag and I don't like to boast,
Said Peter T. Hooper, but speaking of toast...

And so his tall tale begins.

Seuss shows his hand to parents as Peter T. Hooper peppers Scrambled Eggs with "sort of"s and "kind ofs," letting us know that this is, how should we call it, speculative fiction.

Of course, the book is full of such Seussian (Seussical) names as the Grickily Gractus (who lays eggs on a cactus) and the crazy-looking Stroodel (the combination of a stork and a poodle).

The book features and international cast of characters, the folks of Fa Zoal (near the North Pole) and his friend brave Ali.

When Peter T. Hooper gets in the kitchen to make his Scrambled eggs Super-dee-Dooper-dee-Booper (sic) Special de luxe a-la PTH, he shows his true genius, adding gobs of horseradish, beans, and spices to his eggs.

And how do they taste? Well, it's a shaggy dog story, so they taste -- well, exactly as you might expect -- for that cagey Seuss is the Cat sans Hat.

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