Horton and the Kwuggerbug and More Lost Stories

I went a little crazy last time I went to the library. Checked out nine books and I've finished seven of them already, one of them contributing today's title. There's at least two collections of Dr. Seuss stories I'm aware of that have come out in the near quarter-century now since his death (hence the More in that title today, so there was another book; this one's ISBN 9780375973420) bringing together stories of his that appeared once in 1950s magazines. Further expansions on Marco (And To Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street) and Horton (Horton Hatches An Egg!) and the Grinch (The Hoobub and the Grinch) as I was reading this last night and Sarah and Jeffrey were reading it this morning made me think of how the Seuss-verse interconnects, the way many authors' works do such as Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, and David Alvin without them telling you that their works all do exist in the same fictional universe.


Certain common characters, certain comment events, they allow authors of the printed word to not force themselves to do a reboot or reimagining of their entire line every decade or so as comic book publishers often do. And on the that subject, I bring you to volume one of The Justice League of America: The Silver Age (ISBN 9781401261115) where the lineup of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Aquaman, Martian Manhunter -- I could never get behind this green skinned knockoff of Superman either -- and their honorary member Snapper Carr (it's the Sixties, man) engage in a reprint of twelve of their earliest adventures. Superman and Batman seem to be missing on most of them, though ... oh, and the Silver Age of Comics roughly covers 1956 to 1970, in case you needed to know. Reading this, you actually LEARNED things in comic books you could apply in real life.


That's almost worth lines such as "I can't marry you until my services are no longer needed to battle crime and injustice"! What else have we got here? Going through my pile of fun reads -- hey, I have my tastes you have yours -- I come across my copy of The Lost Worlds of 2001 by Arthur C. Clarke (451-Y4929-125) his 1972 record of collaboration with Stanley Kubrick on the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey as well as a diary of his own work leading up to and trailing off it, including his original story "The Sentinel" with the first appearance of the Monolith that's supposed to have accelerated human development on this planet. Then the Australopithecus (?) tosses the bone he used to kill his enemy up in the air and it becomes a spaceship headed out from Earth. Deep story, but you really have to have patience with it, which is easier to do with the movie. Although I must admit the novel (which I'm to understand came out AFTER the movie) has its good points as well.


Good morning, Dave.