The Butter Battle Book

The Butter Battle Bookis achildren's bookwritten byDr. Seussand published byRandom Houseon January 12, 1984. It is an anti-war story: specifically, a parable about arms races in general, mutual assured destruction and nuclear weapons in particular.The Butter Battle Bookwas aNew York TimesNotable Book of the Year.
This book was written during theCold Warera and reflects the concerns of the time, as well as his own, regarding the perceived possibility that humanity could be destroyed in a nuclear war.It can also be seen as asatiricalwork, with its depiction of a deadly war based on a senseless conflict over something as trivial as a breakfast food.
Plot elements of the book were adapted forWarner Bros. Animation'sGreen Eggs and Ham: The Second Serving.
The Yooks and the Zooks live on opposite sides of a long curving wall. The Yooks wear blue clothes; the Zooks wear orange. The primary dispute between the two cultures is that the Yooks eat their bread with the butter-side up, while the Zooks eat their bread with thebutter-side down. The conflict between the two sides leads to an escalating arms race, which results in the threat of mutual assured destruction.
The race begins of with a Zook patrolman named Van Itch slingshots the Yook patrolman's "Tough-Tufted Prickly Snick-Berry Switch" (a many-pronged whip). The Yooks then develop a machine with threeslingshotsinterlinked, called a "Triple-Sling Jigger". This works once; but the Zooks counterattack with their own creation: The "Jigger-Rock Snatchem", a machine with three nets to fling the rocks fired by the Triple-Sling Jigger back to the Yooks' side.
The Yooks then create a gun called the "Kick-A-Poo Kid", loaded with "powerful Poo-A-Doo powder andants' eggs andbees' legs and dried-friedclam chowder", and carried by aspanielnamed Daniel. The Zooks counterattack with an "Eight-Nozzled Elephant-Toted Boom Blitz", a machine that shoots "high-explosive sour cherry stone pits". The Yooks then devise the "Utterly Sputter": a large blue vehicle intended "to sprinkle blue goo all over the Zooks". The Zooks counterattack with a Sputter identical to the Yooks'. Eventually, each side possesses a small but extremely destructive redbombcalled the "Bitsy Big-Boy Boomeroo", and neither has any defense against it.
No resolution is reached by the book's end, with the generals of both sides on the wall poised to drop their bombs andwaiting for the other to strike. The Yook patrolman's grandson (who had followed his grandfather to the wall) asks, "Who's gonna drop it? Will you, or will he?" To which he replies, "Be patient. We'll see. We will see..."
There was ananimatedTV specialby animator and filmmakerRalph Bakshi, narrated byCharles Durningand produced by and aired onTNTon November 13, 1989.The special followed the book quite closely, notably in its preservation of its original cliffhanger ending, with the addition of a title card that reads, "To Be Continued..." at the conclusion of the story. Seuss himself called the short the most faithful adaptation of his work.
The book serves as the basis for the second season ofGreen Eggs and Ham, subtitledThe Second Serving. Here, it is established that Yookia and Zookia are ruled by a "Dooka" and "Dookess", respectively; residents of both nations are relatively harmless, yet are convinced that the other is evil. Sam-I-Am and Guy-Am-I end up on opposite sides of the conflict.The Bitsy Big-Boy Boomeroo is omitted in favor of a conflict over "Moo-Lacka-Moo", the substance said to serve as the Boomeroo's core in the book, which is acquired by the Yooks while the Zooks hire Guy to build a machine due to his habit of creating inventions that explode. Unlike the book, the conflict is resolved when the respective weapons destroy the wall, due in part to Sam-I-Am and his mother Pam's meddling, and Guy's step-daughter E.B. and the Dooka's son Looka share a butter sandwich with everyone watching.
The Butter Battle Bookwas removed from the shelves of some Canadian public libraries during the Cold War because of the book's controversial position regarding the arms race.The book was initially criticized over its dark moral nature being too much for the eyes and minds of children. Dr. Seuss himself was unsure ifThe Butter Battle Bookwas for adults or children when he approached Random House to have it published.
An article in the July 27, 1984, issue of the conservative magazineNational Reviewfound it plausible that the book was not more popular because of Seuss' promotion of a theme of "moral equivalence", where the difference between theSoviet Unionand theUnited Stateswas equivalent to a disagreement over the proper side on which to butter bread.On the other hand, Roger S. Clark, a professor atRutgers University School of Law, argued in an article in theNew York Law School Law ReviewthatThe Butter Battle Bookstood out to him when it first came out because of its timing and context. Further, he noted the fact that Dr. Seuss portrayed an arms race during the time period in which the book was published made Seuss's intentions clear.
Dr. Seuss wroteThe Butter Battle BookwhileRonald Reaganwas in office, envisioning the potential of nuclear war with Russia. Reflecting back on his time in Europe in 1926, he remembered theGuelphs and Ghibellinesfrom northern Italy that fought over their differing opinions on the Pope. Dr. Seuss distinctly recalled one group cutting their apples horizontally while the other cut them vertically.This concept of a war based on toast is similar to the war betweenLilliput and BlefuscuinJonathan Swift's 1726 satireGulliver's Travels, which was nominally based on an argument over the correct end to crack an egg oncesoft-boiled.