Summary
Gerald continues listing the places he would go if he ran his own zoo. He says he would capture animals fat and scrawny, including “a scrabble-foot Mulligatawny,” a fast-stepping animal from the Desert of Zind. Gerald says that chieftains ride these animals when they need to hide. He adds that he would bring back a chieftain to the zoo as well. The image shows a man with a long mustache riding a camel-like animal in the desert.
Next, Gerald says he would travel to North Dakota to capture a very fine animal called the Iota. He would also capture another in South Carolina. He imagines that people would see it and remark that the McGrew Zoo is really a wonder. The illustration shows a smiling creature with a shock of choppy blue hair. Gerald says that some beasts are too dangerous to capture by hand, and so he would build a “Bad-Animal-Catching-Machine.” The illustration shows Gerald operating a vehicle. A cage on a pulley system extends from the front of the vehicle, looking like it is about to land over a saber-toothed creature.
Gerald says he would then go and catch some Chuggs and bean-shooter bugs. He would also capture a Thwerll, “whose legs are snarled up in a terrible snerl.” The illustration shows an unhappy-looking four-legged large insect with his legs twisted and looped around each other. Two smaller bugs fire beans at each other from their blowpipe-like nostrils.
Gerald says he would travel to the African island of Yerka to bring back a tizzle-topped Tufted Mazurka. Gerald says the animal is like a canary with a tall throat. His neck is so long that if he swallows an oat on the first of April, the oat won’t reach the bird’s stomach until the fifteenth of May. The illustration depicts two caricatures of tribal Africans with large rings in their noses and no clothing besides small red skirts. They carry a perch, on which stands the long-necked Mazurka.
Gerald says he would “bag a big bug” that uses a propeller extending from his head to fly from Texas to Boston. Then he would capture a wild Tick-Tack-Toe. The illustration shows the propeller creature rushing into the sky while the Tick-Tack-Toe stands proudly atop a hill with a game of Tick-Tack-Toe written in red on his stomach.
Gerald says he will bring back a Gusset, Gherkin, Gasket, and a Gootch from the wilds of Nantasket. He says eight Persian Princes will carry the animals in a basket, adding “what their names are, I don’t know. So don’t ask it.” The illustration shows Gerald arriving back at his theoretical zoo while excited members of the public wait to see what he has brought with him. Behind him are the eight nameless Persian Princes, caricatured with pointed shoes, turbans, large mustaches, and vests. They carry a large basket full of smiling animals.
Gerald says that in a cave in Kartoom there lives a beast called the Natch that no hunter has been able to catch. Gerald says he would coax the animal out with a wonderful meal cooked by a chef in his mobile Cooker-mobile. The meal they would cook is chicken croquettes made of library paste, baked at 600 degrees and then iced. The illustration shows Gerald and several cooks offering platters of food to a Natch in its cave. They must walk over a precarious tightrope to reach the animal from their kitchen-outfitted vehicle.
Next, Gerald will go to the Mountains of Tobsk and bring back an Obsk, which only eats rhubarb and corn on the cob. He imagines what the adoring public would say, as they flock to the zoo in a mob and comment on the wonderful job Gerald is doing as he grows his zoo. Gerald says that speaking of birds, there’s also the Russian Palooski, whose “headski is redski and belly is blueski.” The illustration shows a caricature of a Russian soldier in a snowy landscape carrying the blue-and-red bird.
Gerald predicts that the entire town would gasp over how Gerald must never sleep to be able to catch so many animals. And just then he would sail to Ka-Troo and bring back “an It-Kutch, a Preep, and a Proo. A Nerkle, a Nerd, and a Seersucker, too!” The illustration shows each of the creatures standing on a hill while pointed signs baring their names stick out of the ground and point at them.
Gerald says he will hunt in the Jungles of Hippo-no-Hungus and bring back a flock of Bippo-no-Bungus. He imagines the public commenting on how astounding a zookeeper he is. He imagines them wondering if he will ever stop poaching new animals. Gerald says he won’t stop until he catches the Fizza-ma-Wizza-ma-Dill, the world’s biggest bird from the Island of Gwark. Gerald says the animal only eats pine trees and spits out the bark. The illustration shows Gerald using a traction vehicle with a rope pulley to drag the creature by the neck off the island. Several natives of the island assist Gerald, looking curious and frightened as they hold on to ropes tied to the animal.
The book ends with a large two-page illustration of McGrew’s Zoo. The area is filled with all kinds of exotic invented animals of different sizes. Humans rush into the entrance to look at the strange and fascinating animals. Gerald imagines them cheering in wonderment. However, the last page of the book returns to the image from the first page. Gerald stands in front of the sleeping lion and the contented zookeeper. A tiny boy, Gerald looks up at the zookeeper and says, “Yes… That’s what I’d do … I’d make a few changes if I ran the zoo.”
Analysis
Seuss continues to interweave the themes of imagination, public recognition, and global conquest in the second half of If I Ran the Zoo. Racially insensitive depictions of non-white people also continue. Speculating that he would travel to the “Desert of Zind,” Gerald dehumanizes the unnamed chieftain character by casually commenting that he would bring back a chieftain, as if to do so were no different than bringing back a “scrabble-foot Mulligatawny.”
The theme of imagination escalates as Gerald dreams up invented creatures such as the Iota, snerl, and bean-shooter bugs. The theme of global conquest soon returns with Gerald imagining traveling to Africa to bring back a tall-throated bird. In another of the book’s racist images, Seuss’s illustration shows the bird being carried by two men in caricatured tribal African skirts.
The next racially insensitive imagery arises with the mention of eight Persian Princes who Gerald would enlist to carry his catch of animals from Nantasket (an area in the U.S. state of Massachusetts that is quite far from Western Asia). In a comment that dehumanizes the servile princes, Gerald seems proud to say that he doesn’t know any of the princes’ names, as though their names are irrelevant and not worth learning.
Gerald also imagines enlisting the help of a Russian to help him capture a Russian Palooski bird in the frozen Russian wilds. Like the other illustrations of non-Western characters in the book, the accompanying illustration is a caricature: the Russian figure has a vacant expression, an unkempt beard, tall furred hat, and a shotgun.
The wild inventiveness of the made-up animals escalates until Gerald reaches the last creature: the Fizza-ma-Wizza-ma-Dill. The illustration shows Gerald driving a traction vehicle to tow the world’s biggest bird off the edge of a cliff. Surrounding the creature are several worried looking natives, who hold on to ropes attached to the bird. While the capture operation seems to put their lives in peril, Gerald appears not to care, smiling behind the wheel of his vehicle.
The book reaches its climax when Gerald imagines the public coming to see his fully stocked McGrew zoo. Having completed his vision and received praise from the adoring public, Gerald returns to reality. Standing before the zookeeper at the local zoo—the same place he stands at the opening of the book—Gerald repeats the line that he would “make a few changes” if he ran the zoo. The book ends on this instance of situational irony. Even though the zoo may have been dull to him, Gerald uses the dull zoo as a launching point for his imagination, thereby using a combination of the real zoo and his mind to entertain himself.
