As promised, post one of a three part Seussercize series in honor of Theodore Geisel's birthday!
Frequent
readers of Theodore Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss, his preferred
pseudonym, know that his imagination ran wider than the English
language. He often created creatures out of nonsense words. Ever meet
the Zizzer-Zazzer-Zuzz? How about the Fiffer-Feffer-Feff? Some of his
characters have become so well-known in English that they require no
illustration. Think of the Lorax or the Grinch, even the Sneetches.
Prior to Seuss, none of these animals existed, but thanks to his
creativity and vision, we accept them as a part of our modern-day lexicon.
Today,
I invite you to create a creature of your own. You may introduce your
creature in literary form with a poem or short story, or you may choose
to name your character and illustrate it instead. Please leave me a
comment or a link to your own page so that I can see your fabulous
imagination at work!
writercize: Create a brand new
creature out of a non-sensical word. Think about what you want your
character to look like, what it likes and dislikes, how it behaves!
Click
"read more" for a character named the Hiccurpeeze that's been living in
your writercizer's brain since her early days as a babysitter. This is
but a small snippet of who he is. Poor guy has been lying dormant for
about 20 years, but one day, the writercizer hopes to get to know him
better and give him a story worthy of sales and illustrations.
exercises to inspire word play, hone the craft of the written word and bulldoze writer's block for authors, bloggers, poets, freelancers, teachers, students, dreamers and writers of all kind
Showing posts with label Dr. Seuss. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dr. Seuss. Show all posts
3.01.2013
Time to SEUSSercize! - Sublime Silliness Scheduled
March 2 marks 109 years since the great Theodore Geisel's birth. Who was Theodore Geisel, you may ask? I'll give you a hint. His middle name was five letters long, with three S's and he preferred to go by Doctor. Here's another hint - if you are under 50 years old, he was probably someone who taught you how to read.
If cats and hats, ham and eggs and fish in all colors of the rainbow jumped into your head, you've probably guessed it. Theodore Geisel was the real name of beloved children's author Dr. Seuss.
Dr. Seuss' books probably wouldn't be published today - his stories run long and can be very repetitive in the current world of "less is more" publishing. They certainly exceed the 1,000 word suggested max word count for picture books. He may be hard-pressed to find a publisher willing to print his 60+ page tomes for children, but ... because he is Dr. Seuss, he is printed. And he may be printed for as long as elementary school aged children learn to read. Seuss has even made the leap over to TV, movies and iPad.
When Seuss began writing for children, he was approached by a director for Houghton Publishing and asked to write a book using the top 250 words that first-graders should recognize. (Some sources claim 250, others claim he 225 of which he used 223 and 13 more. Hard to say with unreliable internet research...) Several authors at the time were doing the same time with little readers, in Dick and Jane style, but William Ellsworth Spaulding, the Houghton director, had a sneaking suspicion they were boring. He wanted Seuss to mix things up a bit, make reading fun and exciting for kids.
And so, with 236 of those 250 words, repeated many, many times, Dr. Seuss created Cat in the Hat. Never one of my favorites, I was impartial to One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish growing up, along with The Butter Battle Book. I won a read aloud contest in middle school for my dramatic rendition of Green Eggs and Ham and was awarded a Music Millennium gift card (Portland shout-out!) that eventually made its way into someone in my family with considerably more prowess in a music store. Leave me with the books ...
Now, beyond his beginning reader books, Seuss made a splash on a couple of other fronts. One was his thinly veiled dream image of a peaceful, egalitarian, environmentally aware world that existed in books like The Lorax and The Sneetches, and the other was his ability to play with words that absolutely did not exist. I'm not sure how the man who stuck to 236 common words for Cat in the Hat ended up writing about things like Whoville and Fiffer-Feffer-Feff and Zizzer-Zazzer-Zuzz, but he did.
When Seuss was writing and not illustrating, he published under the pseudonym Theo LeSieg, which is Geisel backwards.
Although he was notably a bit of a perfectionist and could spend a very long time with a book, he was unquestionably one of the most prolific authors of the past century.
So, what to do at writercize to celebrate the late, great Dr. Seuss? How about a whole week of Seuss-ercize! There will be THREE Dr. Seuss inspired writercizes this week! So stay tuned, and get ready to writercize, because there is some great stuff headed your way!
If cats and hats, ham and eggs and fish in all colors of the rainbow jumped into your head, you've probably guessed it. Theodore Geisel was the real name of beloved children's author Dr. Seuss.
Dr. Seuss' books probably wouldn't be published today - his stories run long and can be very repetitive in the current world of "less is more" publishing. They certainly exceed the 1,000 word suggested max word count for picture books. He may be hard-pressed to find a publisher willing to print his 60+ page tomes for children, but ... because he is Dr. Seuss, he is printed. And he may be printed for as long as elementary school aged children learn to read. Seuss has even made the leap over to TV, movies and iPad.
When Seuss began writing for children, he was approached by a director for Houghton Publishing and asked to write a book using the top 250 words that first-graders should recognize. (Some sources claim 250, others claim he 225 of which he used 223 and 13 more. Hard to say with unreliable internet research...) Several authors at the time were doing the same time with little readers, in Dick and Jane style, but William Ellsworth Spaulding, the Houghton director, had a sneaking suspicion they were boring. He wanted Seuss to mix things up a bit, make reading fun and exciting for kids.
And so, with 236 of those 250 words, repeated many, many times, Dr. Seuss created Cat in the Hat. Never one of my favorites, I was impartial to One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish growing up, along with The Butter Battle Book. I won a read aloud contest in middle school for my dramatic rendition of Green Eggs and Ham and was awarded a Music Millennium gift card (Portland shout-out!) that eventually made its way into someone in my family with considerably more prowess in a music store. Leave me with the books ...
Now, beyond his beginning reader books, Seuss made a splash on a couple of other fronts. One was his thinly veiled dream image of a peaceful, egalitarian, environmentally aware world that existed in books like The Lorax and The Sneetches, and the other was his ability to play with words that absolutely did not exist. I'm not sure how the man who stuck to 236 common words for Cat in the Hat ended up writing about things like Whoville and Fiffer-Feffer-Feff and Zizzer-Zazzer-Zuzz, but he did.
When Seuss was writing and not illustrating, he published under the pseudonym Theo LeSieg, which is Geisel backwards.
Although he was notably a bit of a perfectionist and could spend a very long time with a book, he was unquestionably one of the most prolific authors of the past century.
So, what to do at writercize to celebrate the late, great Dr. Seuss? How about a whole week of Seuss-ercize! There will be THREE Dr. Seuss inspired writercizes this week! So stay tuned, and get ready to writercize, because there is some great stuff headed your way!
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