Green Eggs and Ham facts for kids
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| Author | Dr. Seuss |
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| Illustrator | Dr. Seuss |
| Cover artist | Dr. Seuss |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | Beginner Books |
| Genre | Children's literature |
| Publisher | Random House |
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Publication date
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August 12, 1960 |
| ISBN | 978-0-394-80016-5 |
| OCLC | 184476 |
| Preceded by | One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish |
| Followed by | The Sneetches and Other Stories |
Green Eggs and Ham is a children's book by Dr. Seuss. It was published by the Beginner Books imprint of Random House on August 12, 1960. The book follows Sam-I-am as he follows an unnamed man, repeatedly asking him if he would like to try some green eggs and ham before the man eventually tries it and likes it.
Seuss began writing Green Eggs and Ham after his editor Bennett Cerf bet him $50 (equivalent to $495 in 2022) that he could not write an engaging children's book with a vocabulary of 50 words. Finding the challenge difficult, Seuss used notes, charts, and checklists to keep track of his progress. The book covers themes of conflict between individuals, though Seuss has said that it lacks any deeper meaning.
Green Eggs and Ham was widely praised by critics for its writing and illustration, and the challenge of writing a book in 50 words is regarded as a success. The book has been the subject of multiple adaptations, including a television series of the same name in 2019.
Contents
Plot
Sam-I-am offers an unnamed man a plate of green eggs and ham, but the man tells him that he hates the food. Sam continues to follow the man, asking him to eat the food in various locations and with various animals for dining partners. Finally, when the man agrees to try the dish Sam-I-am has offered, he realizes that he does, in fact, like green eggs and ham and he thanks Sam-I-am.
Writing and release
Green Eggs and Ham was written by Theodor Seuss Geisel under his pen name Dr. Seuss. He wrote the book after his editor at Random House, Bennett Cerf, bet him $50 (equivalent to $495 in 2022) that he could not write an engaging children's book using a vocabulary of only 50 distinct words. The bet was a response to Seuss's previous success, The Cat in the Hat, which was written using 236 distinct words. Seuss took extensive notes to work out how to best use 50 words, creating different charts and checklists. By the time he finished arranging the words, he had memorized many of the statistics of how he used them.
Green Eggs and Ham only uses 50 words: 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, and you. Of these words, not appears the most frequently, used a total of 82 times. Anywhere is the only word in the book to have more than a single syllable.
Seuss found the restriction especially challenging, and he rewrote many pages before he was satisfied with the rhymes. The drafts were typed on rice paper, which Seuss attached to his illustrations. His wife Helen Palmer sometimes placed his discarded drafts back on his desk in the hope that he would approve of them after looking at them a second time, though he rarely did.
Early drafts had the unnamed man speak more aggressively to Sam-I-am. When the two characters were in a car atop the tree, he was originally written as saying, "Sam-I-am. You let me be. Not in a car. You let me be!" Seuss changed this to "I would not, could not in a tree. Not in a car! You let me be", making the outburst less direct and moving the exclamation point away from the command. In another example, he is written as saying "I do not like you, Sam-I-am". The drafts also described the subject as green ham and eggs instead of the final wording, green eggs and ham.
Dr. Seuss finished writing Green Eggs and Ham in the early spring of 1960. A reading was scheduled for April 19 in the office of Louise Bonino at Random House. These readings were often attended by the entire staff, but Cerf was out of the office that day, so a dinner party was arranged for the reading. The reading ended with applause, but Seuss remained self-critical and scrutinized pages that he felt did not get the reaction he had hoped. Phyllis Cerf had intended to announce Green Eggs and Ham with two other children's books, Are You My Mother? and Put Me in the Zoo, and a publicist was sent to request that reviewers postpone reviews after advance sheets had been distributed early.
Green Eggs and Ham was published on August 12, 1960. At the time, approximately three million Dr. Seuss books had already been sold.
Impact and legacy
In 1967, Green Eggs and Ham ranked as the best-selling children's book. At the end of 2000, it had sold 8,143,088 copies, making it the most popular book by Dr. Seuss and the all-time fourth best-selling hardcover children's book in the United States.
At Dr. Seuss's alma mater, Dartmouth College, it became an inside joke that the book's title was a reference to the breakfast food served in the on-campus cafeteria. When Dr. Seuss received an honorary doctorate from Princeton University in 1985, the graduating class rose and recited Green Eggs and Ham in its entirety for him. Dr. Seuss reportedly spent the rest of his life enduring gifts of green eggs and ham, which he described as "deplorable stuff". Later in life, he said that Green Eggs and Ham was the only book of his that still made him laugh.
The Green Eggs and Ham Cafe opened in the Seuss Landing island at the Universal Islands of Adventure theme park in 1999. It closed in 2015 before reopening in 2019. The cafe serves the titular green eggs and ham as well as other foods featured in Dr. Seuss books.
U.S. District Court Judge James Muirhead referenced Green Eggs and Ham in his September 21, 2007, court ruling after receiving an egg in the mail from prisoner Charles Jay Wolff, who was protesting against the prison diet. Muirhead ordered the egg destroyed and rendered his judgment in the style of Seuss. Senator Ted Cruz read the book on the floor of the United States Senate during his filibuster over the funding of the Affordable Care Act. Musician will.i.am has stated that his moniker is inspired by the story.
Many parodies of Green Eggs and Ham have been created, including a rap song by Moxy Früvous and a sketch on Saturday Night Live featuring the minister Jesse Jackson reading the book during a sermon.
Green Eggs and Ham has been adapted into stage and television versions. In 1973, it was adapted as an animated television special alongside The Sneetches and The Zax. Originally titled Dr. Seuss on the Loose, the special was later renamed Green Eggs and Ham and Other Stories. The book was adapted as a video game for the Game Boy Advance, Dr. Seuss' Green Eggs and Ham, published by NewKidCo and released on November 17, 2003. A television adaptation was released by Netflix in 2019, also titled Green Eggs and Ham. It stars Adam DeVine as Sam-I-Am, a wildlife protector, and Michael Douglas as the unnamed man, a failed inventor who is given the name Guy-Am-I for the series. The show introduces new characters, settings, and plots independently from the book. A graphic novel Green Eggs and Ham Take a Hike, released on January 7, 2025, is written and illustrated by James Kochalka. In the graphic novel, the unnamed man's name is Walter.
See also
In Spanish: Huevos verdes con jamón para niños
