That’s the current bid for a long lost Dr. Seuss manuscript up for auction at Nate D. Sanders. The collection is pictured above, via the auction site (click to enlarge).
The manuscript began almost forty years ago. The rhyme master wrote the first seven pages of the 19-page manuscript and an assistant completed the job. You can see Seuss’ corrections throughout the remainder of the manuscript. The story focuses on athletics: “All Sorts of Sports. Shall I play checkers? golf? croquet? There are so many games there are to play.”
The manuscript comes with a typed letter signed “Ted” (his full name is Theodor Seuss Geisel). Dated July 11, 1983, the letter reads: “What, in my opinion, is wrong with this story is that … despite the greatness of Pete as a stellar athlete hero … the negative image of him flubbing and unable to catch any ball at all will make him schnook. This is not entirely apparent in the text, but when you picture these negative scenes in illustrations, you will find that negatives are always more memorable than positives. And I think the reader’s reaction will be, ‘What’s the matter with this dope?’”
According to Booktryst, the auctioneer obtained the manuscript from one of Seuss’ former writing assistants. The auction ends on Thursday, October 21st, 2010 at 5pm Pacific Time.
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