The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss: Prose Class with Helen Hagemann

The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss
Friday, 29^th  May @ 10.00am in the Flax Room of the Grove Library.
This class will combine “Writing for children” as well as finding rhythm for your prose.  We will be reading the whole book of The Cat in the Hat written by Theodor Seuss Geisel in order to discover the poetic meters of children's literature. Writers will have a choice in writing exercises to try their hand at short verse or prose exercises to engage in prose rhythm. 

PLEASE NOTE CHANGE OF VENUE + TIME (the FAC is closed this week for roof renovations).
The Grove Library: 1 Leake Street, Peppermint Grove (It's actually, cnr Leake St and Stirling Highway, Cottesloe)

The Cat in the Hat was first published in 1957. Three years after its debut, the book had already sold over a million copies, and in 2001 Publishers Weekly listed the book at number nine on its list of best-selling children's books of all time. The book's success led to the creation of Beginner Books, a publishing house centred on producing similar books for young children learning to read. In 1983, Geisel said, "It is the book I'm proudest of because it had something to do with the death of the Dick and Jane primers." The book was adapted into a 1971 animated television special and a 2003 live-action film.

POETIC METERS: Geisel wrote most of his books in anapestic tetrameter, a poetic meter employed by many poets of the English literary canon. This is often suggested as one of the reasons that Geisel's writing was so well received.

Anapestic tetrameter consists of four rhythmic units, anapests, each composed of two weak syllables followed by one strong syllable (the beat); often, the first weak syllable is omitted, or an additional weak syllable is added at the end. An example of this meter can be found in Geisel's "Yertle the Turtle".

    "And today the Great Yertle, that Marvelous he

    Is King of the Mud. That is all he can see."

Theodor Seuss Geisel 1904 –1991) was an American writer and cartoonist. He was most widely known for his children's books, which he wrote and illustrated under the pseudonym Dr. Seuss. He had used other pen names such as Theo LeSieg and Rosetta Stone. Geisel published 46 children's books, often characterized by imaginative characters, rhyme, and frequent use of anapestic meter. His most-celebrated books include the bestselling Green Eggs and Ham, The Cat in the Hat, The Lorax, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins, Fox in Socks, The King's Stilts, Hop on Pop, Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose, Horton Hatches the Egg, Horton Hears a Who!, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas!. His works have numerous adaptations, including 11 television specials, four feature films, a Broadway musical and four television series. He won the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award in 1958 for Horton Hatches the Egg and again in 1961 for And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street.