Children's book analysis: I Wish that I Had Duck Feet

I Wish that I Had Duck Feet

By Dr. Seuss *writing as Theo.LeSieg

Illustrated by BTOBEY

Published in 1965

'I Wish that I Had Duck Feet' is a story of a young boy who wishes to change various parts of his body into animal parts. As he makes these wishes he considers how it will affect his everyday life and interactions with other individuals such as the antagonist, a bully, "Big Bill Brown", his mother, father and teacher Miss Banks. After considering the pros and cons of each part he chooses he would be better off without that particular animal part and then considers another. Eventually coming to the conclusion that he should have ALL of the animal parts at once; duck feet, a tiger tail, elephant trunk, whale spout and deer horns! But with all of the parts together people are afraid of him and he gets locked up and thrown in the zoo. Finally the boy decides he is better off just being himself after all. 

Every character in this book is an extremely mainstream caricature of upper middle class white America in the 1950's-60's. The book paints a picture of a small town where all the children go to school and play together. The culture of that time of children playing 

together without a lot of adult interaction/supervision is well depicted. Stereotypes 

such as that of the classic 'big bully', the stay at home mom who is always cleaning and rather bossy, Dad who's role is basically lounging and ordering chores to be done, an older female teacher and public servants who are solely male are all strongly represented in the book. The society is clearly patriarchal and there are literally no people of color represented 

in any way, everyone is very pale complected. Along with everyone being very 

white the children and women in the story all have light brown, orange, yellow or gray hair, only men are depicted with black hair.

Clearly white males have the authority and are the ‘active doers’ as described under section 1.Check the illustrations in the 10 quick ways handout, in everything other than housekeeping and the elementary school classroom. Even within the social structure 

of the children in the story the largest male has the power. The Father in the story uses his power to take advantage of the boy’s new animal parts having him wash the car and house with his elephant trunk. The male authority figures, police and zookeepers, lock him up 

and keep him in the zoo with poor treatment. The bully holds the power and torments the boy, even tying him in a tree by his tiger tail at one point in the story. The mother is only depicted as being inside the house and upset because the boy has gotten water on her floor from his duck feet and his whale spout. She has a stern disposition and YELLS at him both times, with capital letters and everything. 

In her first appearance she has an apron on and a vacuum in her hand, the second she is standing above him on the stairs yelling and 

pointing down at him. The teacher, Miss Banks is depicted as pleasant and the boy is clearly eager to please her. She is only shown as being happy with the benefits of the boy’s newfound animal parts. Her power is that of positive reinforcement.

Miss Banks shows some amount of wisdom in the story, as she is not quick to 

negatively judge the boy’s animal parts and finds benefits to them instead. The character showing the most wisdom is in fact the boy himself. He is creative, a critical thinker 

and ultimately finds strength and confidence from within himself.

The rewards and consequences in this story are very telling; there are little to no consequences for bullying behavior exhibited by Big Bill Brown. The only 

consequences doled out to the bully are that of the boy’s imagination when he beats 

him in a game or otherwise upstages the bully due to his animal parts. In the 

boy’s imagination he is belittled by his mother, exploited by his father , judged by society and ultimately locked up for being different.

Language is used creatively, as is the style of Dr. Seuss. “Big Bill Brown” sounds appropriately intimidating for a bully. There is really no use of slang or terms that could be considered anything other than common and appropriate for an early reader. The way language is used in the book gives a good overall idea of the individual’s motives and personality through the way they speak. Miss Banks speaks positively, like on pg. 37 of I Wish that I Had Duck Feet stating, “No other boy in town can hit a fly so far away” about his tiger tail. The mother speaks harshly, “Not in the house! You shut that off! You take that spout away.” (pg. 28, I Wish that I Had Duck Feet) when referring to his whale spout. Interestingly the boy’s father doesn’t speak, the lack of conversational language is just another nod to the power of the middle aged white male. He sits back, inappropriately with a pipe in his mouth, and it is understood that the boy must do as he wishes.

Surprisingly to me, even with all of the previously stated issues I found of complete race exclusion and sexism, I couldn’t find a negative word about I Wish that I Had Duck Feet anywhere. Literally the most negative thing I found was someone who stated that as a child the book spooked her slightly because as the reviewer, Cathy, stated, “It's funny b/c I see that my brother gave this book 5 stars! It creeped me out when I was little. I think that I was always worried that the boy wouldn't be able to get rid of his new animal parts.”  (goodreads.com, 1 star reviews) However, through research I found that Dr. Seuss himself is much more controversial than I was aware. He drew many racist cartoons as advertisements and as posts in newspapers. (openculture.com) While the culture was clearly different at the time of these illustrations and he did issue public apologies these cartoons remain extremely shocking and offensive. I believe the book is so “white” and sexist because that was the society and culture in which Theodor Seuss Geisel, Dr. Seuss, lived at the time, this is described as the “author’s perspective” under section 7. of the 10 quick ways handout. Segregation, racism and sexism were an accepted and common part of society when I Wish that I Had Duck Feet was written which makes it outdated at the least.

        

I could find very little information on the illustrator BTOBEY, but obviously he lived 

in the same time as the Dr. and therefore likely subscribed to the same 

racially discriminatory and sexist points of view.  

What I do find valuable in the story is the voice of the boy and his brilliant imagination so colorfully portrayed. The voice of society in this book is that of white males where both women and men alike are un-accepting of differences. I believe the voice of girls, women and any type of minority are extremely lacking. The boy imaginatively rejects the status quo with his desire to break out of his place in society but is sadly shut down with negativity until his glorious realization that it is wonderful to be himself.

I have to be honest; this has always been a favorite of my daughter’s and mine to read together and there’s a copy of it in the ‘Dr. Seuss’ section of my preschool library.

 As discussed in the Evaluating Children’s Literature, Bliss, section 1. this book is very well written; it lends itself to funny voices, creative and critical thinking and discussions about

 the wrongness of bullying and smoking. However a children’s book shouldn’t 

incite conversation based upon what’s ‘wrong’ with it and I can't help but feel deeply concerned that racism in America is so strongly immeshed in everyday culture that I couldn't find a single negative review in such a blatantly biased children's book. Still, Many teachers value I Wish that I Had Duck Feet as a teaching and creative experience. (firstgradewow.blogspot.com)  

The narrative of I Wish that I Had Duck Feet is not so offensive

 as are its illustrations; the illustrations are so stereotyped as 

discussed under section 1. Check the illustrations, of the 10 quick ways handout, that 

a child viewing the illustrations would be led to think that only physically perfect

 Caucasians live in the town where I Wish that I Had Duck Feet takes place. I realize 

that with copy writes and such it would be nearly impossible to alter a beloved classic

 but it would be absolutely amazing if this book were re-illustrated to demonstrate 

today’s beautifully diverse society. Maybe really shake things up and have the 

protagonist be a black elementary school girl in a wheel chair!

References:

I Wish that I Had Duck Feet, Dr.Seuss, (1957)

10 Quick Ways to Analyze Children’s Books For Racism and Sexism, California State Department of education (1998)

Evaluating Children's Literature, Bliss

goodreads.com, Goodreads Inc (2014)

openculture.com, Crow, Jonathan (2014)

firstgragewow.blogspot.com, VandenBurge, Nancy (2013)