History Creator / DrSeuss

* ''Horton Hatches the Egg'' (1942): [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Merrie Melodies]] AdaptationExpansion of his story, directed by Creator/BobClampett.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLorax'' (1972): Produced by Depatie-Freleng Enterprises.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLorax'' (2012)

* {{Bowdlerise}}: In ''The Lorax'', the Lorax's line, "I hear things are just as bad up in Lake Erie," was removed from the book in 1985 after two research associates from the Ohio Sea Grant Program wrote to Seuss about the clean-up of Lake Erie. However, the same line is still kept in the 1972 TV AnimatedAdaptation (it is spoken by one of the Humming Fish), even in the VHS and DVD releases.

* IgnoredEpiphany: The Once-ler does this twice in the 1972 AnimatedAdaptation of ''The Lorax''. Once when the Bar-ba-Loots were sent away, and again when the Swomee Swans and Humming Fish leave. The latter instance segues into his rant from the climax of the book.

* {{Utopia}}: The protagonist's destination in ''Literature/IHadTroubleInGettingToSollaSollew'' is a paradise.
%%* WhiteAndGreyMorality / GreyAndGreyMorality

* GrassIsGreener: ''I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew''.

* CerebusSyndrome: Sometime around the late '60s/early '70s, Seuss began writing darker stories like ''I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew'' and, eventually, ''Literature/TheLorax'', which featured more abundantly heavy themes than his previous books and [[BittersweetEnding not always]] [[DownerEnding the happiest of endings]]. Not coincidentally, this began after [[RealitySubtext his first wife committed suicide]].

* {{Utopia}}: The protagonist's destination in ''I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew'' is a paradise.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

Also, [[HeAlsoDid he seems to be the guy who invented the word]] "{{nerd}}". [[note]]It first appears in ''If I Ran the Zoo'', describing a frowning {{Muppet}}-like creature that has nothing to do with the word's modern definition.[[/note]]

[[quoteright:341:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/picture_dr_seuss.jpg]]

* ''VideoGame/TheGrinch'' (2000)

* ''The Secret Art of Dr. Seuss'' (personal paintings, collages, and unusual taxidermy)

----

* HardWorkHardlyWorks: The old man in ''Did I Ever Tell You how Lucky You Are'' tells the kid about a ''lot'' of folks who work hard at crummy jobs. Ali Sard has to mow "quick-growing grass" in his stingy uncle's backyard, and paint flagpoles on Sundays to get by. Mr. Potter is an i-crosser-t-dotter who dots i's and crosses t's at an I and T factory. Then there's Professor [=DeBreeze=] who has spent 32 years trying to teach Irish ducks how to speak Jivanese. The worst example is probably the Hauch-Hauchers in Hauch-Hauch. One was told to watch a bee, but didn't do well, so another was told to watch ''him''. Then ''he'' didn't do so well, so another Haucher had to watch him, and so on, until all of them were watching each other.

Much of his work has been [[TheFilmOfTheBook movie-fied]], whether by animation or live-action. The only movie he himself made was ''Film/The5000FingersOfDrT'', a bizarre film that proved a flop. He did collaborate with various directors (most famously his close friend Creator/ChuckJones) in adapting his stories for television, but again, those were TV specials, and not feature-length. When he passed away on September 24, 1991 due to oral cancer, the rights to all his stories and characters went to his widow, Audrey, and no adaptations could be made without her permission. After the dismal 2003 adaptation of ''Film/TheCatInTheHat'' soured her for the casting of Creator/MikeMyers (whom she was strongly against) and the adult jokes that clashed with the family friendly nature of the books, she vowed never to produce any future live-action adaptations of her husband's works for the rest of her life. Audrey herself died on December 19, 2018, at the age of 97, shortly after Warner Bros. obtained exclusive adaptation rights to all of Dr. Seuss's work.

** His very first attempt at a children's book was a simple alphabet primer with animals shaping themselves into letters. It was rejected by every publisher he sent it to and eventually disappeared en route to yet another and has never been found.

* NothingIsScarier: The vug under the rug from ''Literature/TheresAWocketInMyPocket''. It is never shown, appearing only as a lump under a rug in a dark room, and the only detail the reader knows about it is that it's the only creature the narrator is afraid of. This character, along with the red under the bed, was scary enough to be scrapped from the 1996 reprint.

* KarmaHoudini: The makers of the ''Horton Hears A Who'' film note in the commentary that he "wasn't in the comeuppance business." In fact, with the exception of ''Yertle the Turtle'', the unwelcome guests in ''Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose'' and the Kwuggerbug in ''Horton and the Kwuggerbug'', it's rare that ''any'' villain in any book gets what's coming to him or her. (Sylvester [=McMonkey=] [=McBean=] gets no comeuppance for conning the Sneetches. Of course, doing so would likely distract readers from the overall message.) His exception seemed to be [[HoistByTheirOwnPetard characters responsible for their own undoing]], such as Mayzie in ''Horton Hatches The Egg'' and Yertle The Turtle. {{Heel Face Turn}}s where characters repent and amend their actions also occur, most iconically the Grinch.

* TheGreatPoliticsMessUp: The animated version of ''The Butter Battle Book'', a Cold War allegory with a UsefulNotes/BerlinWall expy, aired four days after the real Berlin Wall fell.

* TheMovie: ''How the Grinch Stole Christmas'' (twice), ''The Cat In The Hat'', ''Horton Hears A Who!'', ''The Lorax''

* ''WesternAnimation/GeraldMcBoingBoing'' (1950): A short that he wrote for [[Creator/ColumbiaCartoons UPA]] productions.

* ParentalBonus: The entirety of ''You're Only Old Once!''

* ANaziByAnyOtherName: Well, ''Yertle the Turtle'' clearly wasn't one (and he wasn't truly evil, he was just greedy), but as [[WordOfGod Seuss himself said in an interview]], he ''was'' meant to be an allegorical stand-in for UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler and those of similar philosophical bent.

* ''Literature/{{Daisy-Head Mayzie}}'' (1995)

* OnlySixFaces: Even though the good Doctor is very good at defining characters, some of his male protagonists look remarkably similar to each other and to other characters, such as Herman "Butch" Stroodel of ''Daisy-Head Mayzie'' to the protagonist of ''Literature/TheresAWocketInMyPocket''.

* OldShame: As mentioned previously, he felt pretty bad about his political cartoons demonizing the Japanese in the years after the fact. This regret likely extended to several of his other cartoons and ads mocking Jews and people of color years before he drew World War II propaganda. With the advent of World War II, many of the cartoons that he produced around that time decrying antisemitism, racism against African Americans, and bigotry in general -- anti-Japanese sentiments aside -- and he likely recognized that his old work perpetuated the problems that he would later take a stance against.

Besides his children's work, Seuss was a political cartoonist, most notably for the now-defunct magazine ''PM''. He was a committed New Dealer and supporter of UsefulNotes/FranklinDRoosevelt, and liberal causes generally. On the less savory side, while he [[http://www.k-state.edu/english/nelp/childlit/seuss/10922.html opposed]] anti-semitism and segregation, Seuss is also known for being [[WartimeCartoon quite racist towards Japanese]] in his WWII-era political cartoons ([[http://www.dartmouth.edu/~hist32/History/Seuss02.jpg here's]] an example). He later realized such work was inappropriate and [[OldShame felt horrible about it]]. He was against Jim Crow, even basing one book on getting over [[SillyReasonForWar small differences]] (also dedicating ''Literature/HortonHearsAWho'' to a Japanese friend). He would probably enjoy that hand-drawn, {{Animesque}} spoof in the 2008 ''Horton'' movie quite a lot!

* ''Literature/AndToThinkThatISawItOnMulberryStreet'' (1937)

* ''[[Literature/McElligotsPool [=McElligot=]'s Pool]]'' (1947)

* ''Literature/IfIRanTheZoo'' (1950)
* ''Literature/ScrambledEggsSuper!'' (1953)

* ''On Beyond Zebra!'' (1955)

* ''The Cat's Quizzer'' (1976)