The Butter Battle: Stupidity Of War

Brena Moore

Professor Podolan

English III

3 February 3006

The Butter Battle Book Analysis

Doctor Suess’s work in The Butter Battle Book explores the stupidity of war. In the book, the fight starts with two different cultures having biases against one another. Those cultures were the Yooks and the Zooks. During the war, both sides of the battle were trying to one-up each other on who had a better weapon. Throughout the story, Suess clearly is showing the stupidity of war through satire, illustration, and external conflict.

Suess’s way of inserting satire into The Butter Battle Book to assert his thoughts about war is very powerful. On page 7, Suess writes, “‘It's high time that you knew of the terribly horrible thing that Zooks do. In every

It is showing us that the Yooks are waging war on the Zooks just because they eat bread, butter side down. In another passage from the book, Suess writes,“‘But we Yooks, as you know, when we breakfast or sup, spread our bread,’ Grandpa said, ‘with the butter side up. That's the right, honest way!’ Grandpa gritted his teeth. ‘So you can't trust a Zook who spreads bread underneath! Every Zook must be watched! He has kinks in his soul! That's why, as a youth, I made watching my goal, watching Zooks for the Zook-Watching Border Patrol!...’”(8) The satirical device shown here is parody and stereotyping. Suess is not only mocking what happens in a real war but he also has the Yooks making assumptions about the Zooks. Finally, Suess shows satirical devices when he writes, “‘My Boys in the Back Room have finally found how. Just wait till you see

Suess writes, “‘It's high time that you knew of the terribly horrible thing that Zooks do. In every Zook house and in every Zook town every Zook eats his bread with the butter side down!’”(7) This piece of evidence is how the whole story came to have its conflict. It all started with the Yook’s not liking how the Zooks ate their bread. From page 10, Suess says, “If he dared to come close I could give him a twitch with my tough-tufted prickely Snick-Berry Switch. For a while that worked fine. All the Zooks stayed away and our country was safe. Then one terrible day a very rude Zook by the name of VanItch snuck up and slingshotted my Snick-Berry Switch!” The conflict shifts when VanItch destroys Grandfather Yook’s Snick-Berry Switch. It goes from the bias of how butter should be on bread to the start of a war. In a long quote from the book, Suess says, “‘I marched to the Wall with great vim and great vigor, right up to VanItch with my hand on the trigger. ‘I'll have no more nonsense,’ I said with a frown, ‘from Zooks who eat bread with the butter side down!’ VanItch looked quite sickly. He ran off quite quickly. I'm unhappy to say he came back the next day in a spiffy new suit with a big new machine, and he snarled as he said, looking frightfully mean, ‘You may fling those hard rocks with your Triple-Sling Jigger. But I, also, now have my hand on a trigger! My wonderful weapon,