Take a deep dive into the murky waters of internet literary interpretation and you can find analysis that goes into some pretty far-out and distressingly dark places when it comes to figuring out what Green Eggs and Ham is “really” about. But stick with closely to the text and the illustrations and there is really only rational interpretation that covers everything within the story and leads to a final resting destination where one can lean back and say with confidence, yes, that is what Green Eggs and Ham is really about.
What is the first thing the big guy in the story tells us? He does not like that Sam-I-Am. Almost as soon as the words are about, who shows up but that Sam-I-Am. It takes all of about fifteen seconds to understand what it is about Sam that the big guy doesn’t like. “Do you like green eggs and ham?” he asks.
“I do not like them,” he is told. That is where the story should end, but of course it does not. Sam-I-Am proceeds to ask the very same question more times than anyone should ever have to answer any question. It sounds like he is asking a different question, but in reality is not:
“Would you like them in a house?
Would you like them with a mouse?”
Not only is it the same question phrased differently, but difference is ridiculous. What difference could it possibly make to eat them in a house or with a mouse? For that matter, why would one want to eat breakfast food with a mouse? Or fox? Maybe on train. That makes a little sense; eating food on a train might just possibly make the experience better. But even so, it is still the same question. It’s kind of like the difference between having cavemen, a pig or a gecko all asking if you want to save fifteen percent on car insurance. You may like a cavemen asking more than a gecko and you may even miss the pig, but it is still the same question just asked in a slightly different way.
Sam-I-Am is not selling food to the big guy. He certainly is trying to sell something the big guy wants. In fact, he spends most of the story trying to sell the big guy food he doesn’t want. Even the fact that ultimately his mark finally reveals he likes green eggs and ham once he actually tastes it doesn’t change the essential fact of the tale: after being told time and time again that his product is not desired, Sam-I-Am continues trying to sell the big guy on the idea of green eggs and ham.
Green Eggs and Ham is the Great American Novel. It succinctly distills the essence of American capitalism into fifty words used repetitively. Just like advertising. It is an advertisement for the power of advertising which offers a critique of advertising. Does the big guy really like green eggs and ham or has he actually just been manipulated into liking it? And does it make a difference? Like so many non-smokers who became addicted to poison packed into rolled paper that was came with a written guarantee that it using it could kill them, the big guy may really like green eggs and ham or, perhaps, he was just bullied into confusing something else with enjoying the taste.
