Dr. Seuss Essay, Research Paper

Theodore Seuss Geisel was born in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1904. Adopted before he started publishing his books, the pseudonym, Dr. Seuss, was used by Geisel in many of his works. Dr. Seuss lived until 1991 when he died from throat cancer in LaJolla, California. Geisel married to Helen Palmer Geisel, a friend whom he met in his graduate studies at Oxford University. After Helen s death in 1967, he remarried to a longtime friend, Audrey Stone Dimond. Audrey and her daughter were both alive for Geisel s death in 1991.

In school, Geisel was a very talented child who was recognized by most as being a bright student. After attending high school in his hometown, Springfield, he went on to receive his Liberal Arts Degree from Dartmouth College. Geisel was interested in literature, but what captured his heart even more was his love of drawing funny pictures. He went on to graduate school in English literature at Oxford University, but quit after only two years. Geisel moved back to the states while his wife to be stayed and finished her degree in Oxford. Now living back in Illinois with his parents, Geisel was out of a job and did not know where to turn.

Geisel did not let himself be discouraged, however. His biggest support came from his parents. As Geisel grew up in his Springfield home, both of his parents encouraged his talents and urged him to put them to use. Geisel s father worked for his grandfather in a brewery previous to his education; however, when prohibition went into effect in 1920, the brewery went out of business. Luckily, Geisel s father had a job to fall back on as administrator to the Forest Park Zoo and his grandfather welcomed an early retirement. When Geisel moved back to the states from Europe, much of his inspiration to draw came from the Forest Park Zoo animals.

After marrying to Helen and moving to New Jersey, Geisel started drawing cartoons for a few different newspapers. One of the cartoons he drew for a paper mentioned the brand name, Flit – a popular insect repellent. The advertising administrator for Flit saw Geisel s drawing and immediately hired him full time onto the advertising staff. Geisel was thrilled with his new position and was now financially secure enough to support Helen and himself. The two moved into a more upscale housing and Geisel stayed with the job for twelve years.

During his long advertising job for Flit, Geisel s imagination got to stirring once more and he began drawing cartoons and adding simple rhymes to them. He checked his contract with Flit, and found that it did not prevent him from writing and publishing childrens’ books; and so, Geisel made writing books his new intention. After finding publishers to publish a few of his novels, Geisel, at age 33, was confident enough to leave the advertising job at Flit and make authoring his new career.

Geisel went on to publish some 48 titles under his pseudonym, Dr. Seuss, and became world renown in so doing. At the time of his death in 1991, Geisel s books had sold over 200 millions copies, and touched the hearts of many more.

In the lifetime of Theodore Geisel, many years passed. He was alive for each of the decades in the 20th century, and he published his works throughout most of them. Geisel s lifetime was a diverse span of change after change. He lived to see both World Wars, the development of television, the first landing on the Moon, the widespread of political influences from the likes of Joseph McCarthy to Ronald Regan, and the dawn of the technological computer age.

At the time of Geisel s birth in 1904, the American economy was gaining a sense of stabilization. He witnessed many great leaders propel the country toward greatness such as Theodore Roosevelt and John Kennedy, and also got a sense of opposing influence placed by the likes of Communist nations around the globe. All aspects of American society, from economy to pop culture, underwent a great change from the time of Geisel s birth in 1904 to the time of his death in 1991.

One of the most significant events during Geisel s time was the Stock Market Crash. This was a very crucial time in Geisel s life, for this was when he made the transition to adulthood; luckily he was not phased by crash for he had a secure job that paid well throughout the depression. Another event that failed to ruin Geisel and his family was the Prohibition Act in 1921. Geisel s grandfather owned and operated a brewing company; when the prohibition was put into action, the company was forced to shut down.

World War II also had an impact on Geisel s life. When the war broke out in the 1940 s, Geisel took a position as a writer for instructional films for soldiers, for which he won coveted awards for. After the war ended, America was again changing and evolving, reinforcing and reinstating itself as the world s number one power. Events that promoted the sense of majesty came in the forms of winning the space race and keeping the Cold War cold with Russia. Political climate and economy also reached higher new grounds over many other nations.

During the 20th century, Geisel himself is arguably the most international influential literary figure. His wild rhymes and patterns were totally original and swallowed whole by readers around the world. Seuss became one of the most prominent authors of his period and undoubtably a great influence upon himself as well as many other writers that observed his works.

There were many other people and events during Geisel s lifetime that changed America a great deal. Yet no amount of Wright Brothers Airplanes or theories of relativity will leave the life of Theodore Geisel in the shadows. He was a man who made a difference on a global scale.