Green Eggs and Ham

Category:Groiler Beginner Book Series
Category:Dr. Seuss's Beginner Book Collection
Category:Beginner Books Read-Along and Cassettes
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 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 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.
Green Eggs and Ham was also used in the Beginner Book Video Series along with The Tooth Book and Ten Apples Up On Top!.
== Plot ==
Sam-I-am rides an animal back and forth in front of a grumpy unnamed man, holding signs saying "I am Sam" and "Sam I am". Sam-I-am offers the man a plate of green eggs and ham (depicted as two sunny-side-up eggs with green yolks and a green leg of ham), but the man says that he does not like them. Sam-I-am continues to offer the man a plate of green eggs and ham as they come across different places and things, including a mouse in a house, a fox in a box, a car, a tree, a train, a dark tunnel, the rain and a goat on a boat. After the car and train crash into the boat, all of the people and animals they encountered float in the water with them, and Sam-I-am once more offers the man a plate of green eggs and ham. The man gives in so Sam-I-am will stop asking, and upon tasting them he realizes that he does like green eggs and ham. He announces that he will eat them anywhere - with the animals, in the places, and the like - and, in the end, 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 $515 in 2023) 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.
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.
== Analysis and themes ==
Dr. Seuss believed that children's books had more power to do good or evil for society than any other medium, and Green Eggs and Ham was the first of Seuss's Beginner Books to carry a lesson for children. Despite this, Dr. Seuss has said that there is no deeper meaning in the book, insisting that "the only meaning was that Bennett Cerf, my publisher, bet me fifty bucks I couldn't write a book using only fifty words".
Green Eggs and Ham reverses the traditional structure of an adult trying to convince a child to try new foods. It is one of many Dr. Seuss books about a defiance of norms—in this case, the persistence of Sam-I-am after his offer of green eggs and ham is rejected. It explores the underlying social connection between individuals set in opposition to one another, but it does so in a way that appeals to the interests of children. Both characters refuse to move from their decision throughout the book until the adult finally gives in at the end.
Green Eggs and Ham uses a vocabulary of only 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, anywhere is the only one to have more than one syllable. The different words are combined for a total length of 681 words, and the most common words are not and I, which are used 82 and 81 times, respectively.
The narrative of Green Eggs and Ham is told in a question-and-answer structure. Consistent use of the name Sam-I-am instead of simply Sam allowed Seuss to maintain meter when rhyming it with the titular green eggs and ham. The title of Green Eggs and Ham is a play on the common phrase ham and eggs, inverting it to draw the reader's attention.
Literature professor Donald E. Pease described Sam-I-am as "a young Grinch-like creature". One academic, Tim Wolf, argued that Sam-I-am has no distinguishing gender or sex and could be read as male or female.
It has been reported that the book was banned in China from 1965 to 1991 because it supposedly contained themes of "early Marxism"— that is to say, Soviet-style socialism (which was at odds with Chinese socialism). Allegedly, the breakfast was interpreted as a metaphor for Soviet socialism, with many initially rejecting it but eventually coming to enjoy it after "trying" it.
== Reception and cultural impact ==
Green Eggs and Ham was published on August 12, 1960. By 2001, it had become the fourth-best selling English-language children's hardcover book yet written. As of 2014, the book has sold 8 million copies. In 1999, the National Education Association (NEA) conducted an online survey of children and teachers, seeking the 100 most popular children's books. The children ranked Green Eggs and Ham third, just above another Dr. Seuss book, The Cat in the Hat. The teachers ranked it fourth. Teachers ranked it fourth again in a 2007 NEA poll. Scholastic Parent & Child magazine placed it #7 among the "100 Greatest Books for Kids" in 2012. That same year, it was ranked number 12 among the "Top 100 Picture Books" in a survey published by School Library Journal – the first of five Dr. Seuss books on the list.
The book teaches young children a valuable lesson about not automatically refusing something new or unfamiliar without trying it out first to actually see if they will like it or not. It has become sufficiently ingrained in the cultural consciousness that 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.
On September 28, 1991, following Dr. Seuss' death earlier that week, Jesse Jackson recited an excerpt of Green Eggs and Ham on Saturday Night Live during a special tribute segment.
== Adaptations ==
=== TV, film, and stage ===
In 1973, Green Eggs and Ham became the third of the three Theodor Geisel stories, joining The Sneetches and The Zax, to be adapted into the television special Dr. Seuss on the Loose, which featured a connecting narration by The Cat In The Hat. The cartoon was voiced by Paul Winchell. The book was also released as a Beginner Book Video on VHS which included The Cat In The Hat in 1994, and re-released with The Tooth Book and Ten Apples Up on Top in 1997.
The story was featured as one of the segments brought to life in stage-play fashion in the 1994 TV-film In Search of Dr. Seuss.
Sam-I-Am appeared as a recurring character in season two of The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss, performed here by John Kennedy. In one episode of the show, Sam assists the Cat in the Hat and his Little Cats with their indoor picnic by preparing his special jumbo green ham and cheese sandwich.
It is adapted as part of Seussical as a number during curtain call.
In the 2008 American computer animated adventure comedy film Horton Hears a Who!, the food Green eggs and Ham are seen and eaten by Mayor McDodd (voiced by Steve Carell), Sally (voiced by Amy Poehler) and their 99 daughters and their son JoJo (voiced by Jesse McCartney).
A 2D hand-drawn animated television series based on the book, Green Eggs and Ham premiered on Netflix in November 2019. It was produced by Warner Bros. Animation and A Very Good Production and distributed by Warner Bros. Television. The cast features Michael Douglas as Guy-Am-I (the unnamed character in the original book) and Adam DeVine as Sam-I-Am, with Ellen DeGeneres serving as executive producer. The fox (named Michael and voiced by Tracy Morgan), mouse (nicknamed Squeaky by Sam and voiced by Daveed Diggs), and goat (simply named The Goat and voiced by John Turturro) appear as secondary recurring characters. Each episode is narrated by Keegan-Michael Key.
=== Parodies ===
The Animaniacs episode "The Warners and The Beanstalk" parodies both Green Eggs and Ham and Jack and The Beanstalk. After Ralph T. Guard in the role of a giant captures Yakko, Wakko, and Dot, the Warners try to get him to eat 'gold eggs and meat', but the giant refuses each time, saying, "I does not like gold eggs and meat. It's you who I would like to eat". The opening lines are spoofed by Ernest Hemingway as "I am sad. Sad, I am. I would not eat blue figs and lamb" in "Papers for Papa".
The Johnny Bravo episode "Cookie Crisis" has Little Suzy as a Buttercup Scout trying to get Johnny to buy her cookies. Johnny is on a strict diet and attempts to avoid her, but she keeps following him at every turn.
The Green Eggs & Sham live album by English punk rock band Sham 69, released in 1999, parodies the book title itself.
The Regular Show episode title "Pam I Am" is a pun on the character Sam-I-Am, but not the story itself.
== Restaurant ==
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.
== Video games ==
Dr. Seuss: Green Eggs and Ham is a single-player video game for Game Boy Advance based on the 1960 book of the same name, and was published by NewKidCo and released in November 2003. The book was also made into a Living Books adaptation for the PC in 1996, and there were similar differences to reflect the new media such as Sam-I-Am sings his opening lines.
== Selected translations ==
* לֹא רָעֵב וְלֹא אוֹהֵב (Lo ra'ev ve-lo ohev, 1960s, Hebrew ISBN 9789652294661)
* Huevos verdes con jamón (1960s, Spanish, ISBN 1880507013)
* Groene eieren met ham (1960s, Dutch, ISBN 9024002966)
* 火腿加綠蛋 (Huǒ tuǐ jiā lǜ dàn, 1992, Chinese, ISBN 9573211254)
* Prosciutto e uova verdi (2002, Italian, ISBN 880902446X)
* Virent ova! Viret perna! (2003, Latin, ISBN 0865165556)
* Kto zje zielone jajka sadzone? (2004, Polish, ISBN 8372781249)
* Les œufs verts au jambon (2009, French, ISBN 9781569756881)
* Grünes Ei mit Speck (2011, German, ISBN 9783596854417)
*Ovos Verdes e Presunto (2016, Portuguese, ISBN 9789898831989)
*Grønne egg og Skinke (March 2021, Norwegian)
== Anniversary editions ==
* 40th Anniversary (2000): This edition has an updated cover, removing the Beginner Books logomark. The back cover features information on the book.
* 50th Anniversary (2010): This "Party Edition" features a metallic red-orange cover.
* 60th Anniversary (2020): All that year, every print of the book featured a "60th Anniversary" sticker on the cover.