The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins (Classic Seuss)

I think this is the absolute best of Dr. Seuss's books. It's a really fun story that doesn't teach an overt lesson; it's truly absurd and takes between 20 and 23 minutes to read aloud. Every kid I've ever read it to (and I taught preschool for several years) has loved it.

This is a classic Seuss book for older children - it's dedicated to a girl 90 months old, which puts her at 7 and a half, my guess is that this book is intended to be read for children 7 years old or so.

Bartholomew Cubbins is struck by a terrible misfortune - every time he takes off his hat to the

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king, it is replaced by another. The king gets on his high horse about the subject, but everything turns out fine in the end when the king buys the final, majestic hat and puts it on his own head.

My nieces like this book quite a bit.

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Bartholomew Cubbins is a poor boy who was just going to town to try and get cranberries for his family. When the King comes into town, Bartholomew was not able to take off his hat because each time he tried, another hat would appear. The story continues with the King going through great lengths to

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try and take the book off of Bartholomew, although each time the hats become more and more elaborate. By the 500th hat, the King asks if he can buy the hat for 500 gold coins, and Bartholomew walks away with no hat and money for his family.

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I find this book very long and probably not a good read aloud choice. It would be a good read for 2nd grade or higher because of the length and because it is not a simple rhyme book. This story follows Bartholomew Cubbins a the simple boy in the Kingdom of Didd. Bartholomew always wore the same red

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had with a feather in it and one day as the king's is parading through town Bart is asked to bow and remove his hat at once. Bart bows and removes his hat several times only to find another red hat everytime. The king's men sieze him at once. Many people try to figure out why Bart always has another hat when he takes one off. The king gets a wise man, magicians, and a yeomen to figure out Bart's mystery, Finally after going through 499 hats Bart finds a the most beautiful hat anyone had everseen on his head and it was the last hat and the king buy the beautiful hat from bart for 500 pieces of gold.

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My favorite Seuss book as a kid.

This was a very different Dr. Seuss book than most I have read. It was very long and had much more text than his later stories. It also had no rhyming, again not following the pattern of his later work. I found the story to be frivolous and lacking any real point like a lot of Dr. Seuss books have

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despite the fun rhyming. I would not recommend this book to younger (preschool-1st grade) readers.

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Genre: Fantasy
Genre Critique: This book is a good example of fantasy through the use of imaginary characters and setting that is quite unbelievable (magic hats that won't come off a young man's head). The way the story is written though helps the reader to enjoy and follow along, and put the fact

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that the story can not be true to the side while they read.
Review/Critique: I really enjoyed this book (gotta love Dr. Seuss) and thought it was an interesting change from some of his other styles of writing. There weren't a ton of funny made up words and places, and there seemed to be more of a plot than some of his other stories.
Media: Black and white (Pencil sketching), red colored pencil for hats

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This is not a typical Dr. Seuss book, and sadly I wan't a huge fan. Maybe it was because I went into it thinking it would be more like his others and was very surprised to find that it was very long and less whimsical, although it does have a sense of fantasy to it with the magically appearing

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hats. I also had a hard time really seeing the message in it like his others, but it does nod to the notion of patience and understanding.

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Bartholomew Cubbins happens to be along the cobblestone street when the King of Didd passes by and notices that Bartholomew has not removed his hat before the king. But Bartholomew has removed his hat, it's just that a new one has re-appeared in its place. As more and more hats emerge on

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Bartholomew's head, he finds himself in deeper and deeper trouble with the king!

This book is one of the earliest ones written by children's author Dr. Seuss and therefore least resembles his later books. Typical Seussical elements such as rhyming, tongue twisters, alliteration, imaginary creatures, and so forth are missing here. The illustrations do have his style at heart but are nonetheless a bit more realistic than his later ones. Still, none of that is to say this is not a good book. Indeed, it's a magnificent book with a fairy tale like story of fantastical magic. It's rather funny and the appearance of a variety of interesting characters makes it interesting to read aloud to young children if you're willing to attempt various voices. I also enjoyed how the illustrations were all black in white except with a hint of red for Bartholomew's many hats.

Do be aware, however, that this book is rather lengthy compared to other Dr. Seuss titles. This is not a beginner reader book that an emergent reader will sit down with on their own and it will take some time to read aloud. I think it's more than worth the effort and found that my 6-year-old babysitting charge was enraptured throughout the entire reading.

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At first, Bartholomew Cubbins has just one hat, but when the King orders him to take it off, he finds he cannot-each time there is another on his head.

Fantastic book for kids! So imaginative and creative. Easy read that children will find delightful!

Dr. Seuss is always brilliant! His stories and rhymes are fun and entertaining! Some of my all time favorites!! Such a great way to entertain children and get them interested in reading!

I chose this book because it is unlike any other Dr. Seuss book I have ever read. Although I did not enjoy the book that much, I am still glad that I selected it to review. Compared to most other Dr. Seuss books, this one is quite unique.
I'll start with the writing. Perhaps the lack of rhyming

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scheme that I am so used to is why this Seuss book in particular is different from the rest. Seuss chose to write this book using a prose technique. For those who don't know what it means to write in prose, it means to use complete sentences and proper grammar, rather than a rhyming technique. Although this book still tells the story of a fantasy adventure as do most of his other books, the presence of such prose writing completely throws me off. I even found myself reading the text and inserting my own rhythm to the words, as if my brain was attempting to make sense of what I was reading. I found the text too wordy and the setting was unoriginal. I'll be honest, I wasn't a fan.
As for the illustrations, I am so undecided. I have always loved the cartoonist side of Dr. Seuss. He illustrates his own book with his own special technique. However, unlike many of the books that I am used to, the illustrations don't take up the whole page. The words take up most of the pages and are simply written on white space. There are even a few pages where there is a page filled with words and no illustrations! An example of this is when Bartholomew was in the throne room and the magicians were chanting deep and mysterious sounds. On the left page is an illustration to accompany the text, but on the right page is no illustration at all! When comparing to other books, Seuss generally writes his text over his illustrations. When he does in fact write on white space, it is generally written on a space that is meant to be a wall or ceiling, like what he does in The Cat in the Hat. Again, I don't like the lack of illustrations.
I had a hard time determining the overall message or big idea of this book. I actually had to conduct some research in order to even begin to construct a big idea. I found one review that the book was about bullying. I somewhat agree with this as the entire story revolved around the fact that Bartholomew did not remove his hat to the king, and the king felt disrespected. Therefore, the king wanted to show his authoritative powers and discipline Bartholomew. Overall, I simply found the plot uninspiring to me. I found that it lacked a message or idea for the reader to determine.

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This is a great imagination and intriguing book! I think it would be great to use as a way to get kids imaginations stirring. I love Dr. Seuss and this is just another one of his great books!

Summary: Bartholomew Cubbins is having a lovely day in his very ordinary hat until the King comes through and demands his hat be removed to show respect to the king, and whenever Bartholomew removes a hat, another takes its place on his head. He is promptly taken to the castle where all the king's

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men try desperately to get his hat(s) off.
Genre: This makes a good fairytale/fantasy because it takes place in a faraway kingdom that is very fairytale-esque and has magic causing problems while he tries to interact with royalty.
Classroom use: Fun story! Good for a younger classroom's class library

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