Horton Hears a Who!

This article is about the book. For the 2008 film, see Horton Hears a Who! (film). For the TV special, see Horton Hears a Who! (TV special). For disambiguation, see Horton Hears a Who! (disambiguation).

Horton Hears a Who!

Author	Dr. Seuss
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Children's literature
Publisher	Random House
Publication date	August 1954
ISBN	0-394-80078-8
OCLC	470412
Preceded by	Scrambled Eggs Super! Horton Hatches the Egg (plotwise)
Followed by	On Beyond Zebra!

Horton Hears a Who! is a children's book written and illustrated by Theodor Seuss Geisel under the pen name Dr. Seuss and was published in 1954 by Random House.

It is the second Dr. Seuss book to feature Horton the Elephant, the first being Horton Hatches the Egg. The Whos would later make a reappearance in How the Grinch Stole Christmas!.

Plot

The book tells the story of Horton the Elephant, who, while splashing in a pool, hears a small speck of dust talking to him. Horton surmises that a small person lives on the speck and places it on a clover, vowing to protect it. He later discovers that the speck is actually a tiny planet, home to a community called Whoville, where microscopic creatures called Whos live. The Mayor of Whoville asks Horton to protect them from harm, which Horton happily agrees to, proclaiming throughout the book that "a person’s a person, no matter how small."

In his mission to protect the speck, Horton is ridiculed and harassed by the other animals in the jungle for believing in something that they are unable to see or hear. He is first criticized by a sour kangaroo and her little kangaroo in her pouch. The splash they make as they jump into the pool almost catches the speck, so Horton decides to find somewhere safer for it. However, news of his odd new behavior spreads quickly, and he is soon harassed by a group of monkeys. They steal the clover from him and give it to Vlad Vladikoff, a vulture (formerly a black eagle). Vlad flies the clover a long distance, Horton in pursuit, until the eagle drops it into a field of clovers.

After a long search, Horton finally finds the clover with the speck on it. However, the Mayor informs him that Whoville is in bad shape from the fall, and Horton discovers that the sour kangaroo and the monkeys have caught up to him. They tie Horton up and threaten to boil the speck in a pot of "Beezle-Nut" oil. To save Whoville, Horton implores the little people to make as much noise as they can, to prove their existence. So almost everyone in Whoville shouts, sings, and plays instruments, but still no one but Horton can hear them. So the Mayor searches Whoville until he finds a very small shirker named JoJo, who is playing with a yo-yo instead of making noise. The Mayor carries him to the top of Eiffelberg Tower, where Jojo lets out a loud "Yopp!", which finally makes the kangaroo and the monkeys hear the Whos. Now convinced of the Whos' existence, the other jungle animals vow to help Horton protect the tiny community.

Background

Geisel began work on Horton Hears a Who! in the fall of 1953. The book's main theme, "a person's a person no matter how small", was Geisel's reaction to his visit to Japan, where the importance of the individual was an exciting new concept. Geisel, who had harbored strong anti-Japan sentiments before and during World War II, changed his views dramatically after the war and used this book as an allegory for the American post-war occupation of the country. He dedicated the book to a Japanese friend.

Analysis

Horton Hears a Who! is written in anapestic tetrameter, like many other Dr. Seuss books. Unlike some of his books, however, Horton contains a strong moral message, which Thomas Fensch identifies as "universal, multinational, multi-ethnic. In a word: Equality." Fensch also contends that the Mayor of Whoville's lines, "When the black-bottomed birdie let go and we dropped,/ We landed so hard that our clocks have all stopped" is a reference to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Adaptations in other media

Television special

Horton Hears a Who! was adapted into a half-hour animated TV special by MGM Animation/Visual Arts in 1970, directed by Chuck Jones (who also directed the television version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas!), produced by Theodor Geisel, and with narration by Hans Conried, who also voiced Horton. In this direction, the Sour Kangaroo's name is Jane, while her son is named Junior. Jane was voiced by June Foray. In Russia, Alexei Karayev directed I Can Hear You in 1992, a 19-minute paint-on-glass-animated film which is based on the Russian translation of Seuss's poetry but features a very different visual style. The story, along with Horton Hatches the Egg, also provides the basic plot for the 2000 Broadway musical Seussical.

Film

Main article: Horton Hears a Who! (film)

Horton Hears a Who! was adapted into a computer-animated feature-length film of the same name in 2008, using computer animation from Blue Sky Studios, the animation arm of 20th Century Fox. The cast included Jim Carrey and Steve Carell. It was released on March 14, 2008.

According to Rotten Tomatoes, the film version got 79% on the tomato-meter and 73% on audience score, which means it got 76% on both scores. According to IMDb, the film version got 6.9 out of 10 stars. According to Metacritic, the film version got a "71" code saying "generally favorable reviews". According to CinemaScore, the film version got "A-" on an "A+" to "F" scale.

It was also a box office success. It grossed up to $297,138,014 internationally against an $85 million budget.

Influence

The central character of the book also inspired a design rule for cryptographic systems, known as the Horton Principle.

References

• The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, 3rd ed., edited by E. D. Hirsch, Jr., et al. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002
• "Ontario: Use of Seuss protested", National Post, Jan. 29, 2001.