Dr. Seuss lives again with seven "new" stories
A new gallery of Dr. Seuss characters could take their place alongside the Grinch, the Cat in the Hat, and the Lorax. Seven rarely-seen Dr. Seuss stories were published yesterday in “The Bippolo Seed and Other Lost Stories,” written and illustrated by the beloved rhyming kids’ author who died in 1991.
The book includes stories titled “Gustav the Goldfish,” “The Great Henry McBride,” and “The Bear, the Rabbit, and the Zinniga-Zanniga” as well as the titular "Bippolo Seed." The stories were originally published in magazines between 1948 and 1959 but had since dropped out of sight. They were rediscovered by a dentist, Charles Cohen, who was a Seuss fan and collector of Seuss memorabilia.
Cohen discovered the first lost tale in an old magazine he found on eBay. When he began listing magazines with Seuss content on eBay, Random House art director Cathy Goldsmith – who had worked on some of Seuss's books – spotted them, according to an article in The Atlantic magazine.
The paper copy of the book was released yesterday simultaneously with a omBook, or electronic Oceanhouse Media book that can be read on an Android or Apple device. The omBook includes the option of having voice actors read the text.
Characters in the stories include Gustav the Goldfish, a pet who grows too fast; the Great Henry McBride who dreams about his future career; and twins Tadd and Todd who try to forge their own identities.
How eager is the reading world for more such Seuss characters? Just ask a bookseller.
A bookstore buyer in La Jolla, California where Seuss lived told CBS that her bookstore had sold out their initial order of the books.
“I have doubled that order and have more books coming in today,” said Warwick’s book buyer Jan Iverson.
Molly Driscoll is a Monitor correspondent.
