Talk:On Beyond Zebra!

Yiddish?
What are the grounds for stating that three letters "clearly come from German or Yiddish?" Since none of the Yiddish definitions have anything to do with the content of the rhymes (just as Itch has nothing to do with itching, Jogg has nothing to do with jogging, Hi! has nothing to do with greeting), it seems far more likely that the letters were named to fit the rhyme and wordplay (as Suess does repeatedly throughout his books) or simply coincidence. If, however, there is a documented connection, it would be nice to have a reference. Jondemos 06:32, 7 November 2006 (UTC)


 * I think some of the similarities to German and Yiddish are pretty compelling, whether they were Seuss's original intention or not. Esp. "zatz/satz" for a printer's mistake, that's pretty interesting given the book is about fictional symbols.  But I removed the unsourced speculation that that is in fact where the letters came from. Squidfryerchef (talk) 16:33, 2 March 2008 (UTC)


 * There is no citation that these resemblances were intended by Dr. Seuss. Coincidences are not the same as reality and speculation doesn't belong here. Lots of the words resemble other words in lots of languages. Yuzz resembles yutz too. Quan is clearly short for quantity. Never mind, Quan is really a Chinese word. Fuddle ~ befuddle. Snee ~ sneeze. Actually, Snee is an english word. Flunn sounds like flan, a Spanish for custard. Wum is a city in Cameroon as well as sounding a lot like yum. I've marked the section as citation needed but I'd be surprised if there is one. If not, the section should be removed. 71.112.37.116 (talk) 04:37, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

world-building?
The process used in On Beyond Zebra seems very similar to that used by J. R. R. Tolkien: Create a new language, and build a world around it. Das Baz, aka Erudil 17:36, 1 August 2011 (UTC)


 * The two seem very dissimilar to me -- Tolkien has a whole internal timeline of events, internal linguistic history, and internal history of the development of writing systems which are somewhat synchronized, and in which three writing systems are applied in specific detailed ways to write a number of languages. Seuss doesn't attempt anything resembling any of this. AnonMoos (talk) 10:32, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

True, Tolkien has a far more elaborate process: Whole languages and a consistent world. But basically, Geisel did what Tolkien did: Invent new words, then develop a world based on them. Like Tolkien, Geisel also invents a new alphabet - nonsensically, not scientifically as Tolkien does, true, but the principle is the same. We cannot all be Tolkien, but we can still have some fun. Das Baz, aka Erudil 17:43, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Narrator?
The character narrating the book is not named, but appears to be drawn identically to "Peter T. Hooper" from "Scrambled Eggs Super". Does anyone know if this is in fact Peter T. Hooper? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.243.198.160 (talk) 00:06, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Syllable
 are not letters. They are syllables. 108.66.234.132 (talk) 00:22, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Well, the Coptic alphabet has a letter called Ti/De (Ϯϯ) that is a syllable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ThatGuy30722 (talk • contribs) 15:48, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I suppose the closest thing we could come to in English is a letter name for a sound, like "double-U" for the letter W, the sound of which is nowhere within the name of the letter. H is another one without the letter sound.  In Spanish, at least until the late 20th century, there are four letters not known in English: ch (chay), ll (el-yay), the ayn-yay letter (n with a tilde on top) and rr (ayrrrray), but even these include the sound.  Possibly, we could take six of these 20 letters as names for the dipthongs of the first letter or two.  Glikk would be the dipthong GL, Snee SN, Thnad THN, Spazz SP, Floob/Flunn (redundant if a vowel is not included) FL, Vroo VR.  The other 13 are basically redundant to the letters before Z.  So, those six or seven letters could, if the character wished to do so, be used in place of letters known to his friends.  Florence could be spelt "floob-o-r-e-n-c-e, Special could be spelt "Spazz-e-c-i-a-l", Snore could be spelt "Snee-o-r-e", Glitter could be spelt "Glikk-i-t-t-e-r". GBC (talk) 22:14, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

The last letter doesn't seem to include every letter, as claimed
"The book ends with an unnamed letter that apparently is a monogram of all 26 letters in the existing Latin alphabet from A to Z. A list of all the additional letters is shown at the end." But if you look at the pic, it only includes letters up to around "I". Equinox ◑ 00:38, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Withdrawal for \what\?
Did I read this correctly? The book was withdrawn from publication, because someone thought that a fictitious cartoon character, with an imaginary title, from a fictitious country, \might\ be intended to be an Arab? Seriously? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.95.43.253 (talk) 01:20, 10 March 2021 (UTC)


 * In a word. Yes. Somebody, somewhere, whose race and/or culture have been demeaned by white Europeans in the past might see an image that depicts their race/culture as being somehow different from white European culture/people, and if that image was created by a white European descendant, they might march with it into the offices of that lawyer whose ads on the radio proclaim, "There's no fee unless we get money for you!" Can you blame them? They've got nothing to lose, and if they win, they'll be set for life! 2600:4041:D5:D600:28DE:5FBE:8CA:AFBC (talk) 13:15, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

No basis for correspondence table
by The Mysterious El Willstro adds a table showing how the OBZ letters purportedly "correspond" to "double-digit letters". However, there is no citation given and no indication of any significance to this. This strikes me as non-notable original research. I will add a citation-needed tag to give notice for future deletion. ---Vroo (talk) 02:30, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's obvious some editor's original research; should be removed. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 11:51, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * A screenshot in Microsoft Excel, showing the double-digit column letters as explained in that paragraph and table. As in Excel, the same is true in other spreadsheet programs, like those in LibreOffice, NeoOffice, and so forth. The only one that doesn't do this, as far as I know, is Google Docs Calc, and only because that program has a hard cut-off, not allowing columns beyond Z to be added at all. (Probably to save server space, as it's a cloud-only program while the others mentioned can be downloaded.)
 * Double_Digit_Letters.png
 * The Mysterious El Willstro (talk) 22:48, 25 March 2021 (UTC)


 * That has nothing to do with this article although it may belong elsewhere. This article isn't about alphabet extensions, it's about Seuss's book. I will remove the confusing material. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 14:40, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Pat The P
what about him 2A02:C7C:BE4F:4800:35F3:F55A:6910:FB94 (talk) 21:19, 21 October 2022 (UTC)