I didn’t read GDG as a kid, so when I first read the board book to my son, I thought it was the worst book I’d ever seen. It made no sense, ended abruptly–it even seemed to confound him, and he was only six months old! Once we had the real book, it all made sense. Still one of his favorite books.
Welp, after all of this good investigative reporting from you guys, I went to Borders and picked up the real hardcover edition of “Go Dog Go” and the silly broadboard version, and read them simultaneously. There has been MUCH editing.
I also checked out “Hop on Pop” and the broadboard book was also quite edited. No House on Mouse, the Pup never goes under the Cup, etc.
So the broadboard books will go back to Amazon. I thought about just giving them to my cousin who just had a baby but like others have said it’s just crap without the “hat” part.
Oh, and I also stopped by my brother’s place to tell him he’s a moron 
Where else can you have such wonderful discussions about fine literature?
Yep. I’m sure my parents HATED that I wanted this book read so much - but I really just wanted to get to the part about the party in the tree at the end. I used to imagine that I could have such a party. 
It was way up there with Whose Mouse Are You to me.
It is, of course, the post-post-modern answer to Waiting for Godot, where the question, What do you do if God doesn’t appear? is answered by, Let’s have a party!
The use of dog, which is god backwards, is also a way of pointing out we must turn our attention inward to find sanctity.
The hat imagry, of course, is obvious.
Got to keep a straight face…
This was my FAVORITE book when I was a little girl! I was so happy to find it in it’s original form when my oldest was born.
I’d just like to say though, that “Another Monster at the End of This Book” is complete CRAP. Elmo adds nothing to the story! It was perfect with just Grover’s neurosis! All Elmo does is show kids not to listen to their elders. Damn brat.
I was also ecstatic to find an unedited “The Little Red Hen”. But why in the heck does she keep asking for help to bake that itty-bitty loaf of bread when the other animals repeatedly tell her no?
Oh yeah - *Go,Dog, Go * rocks. Add us to the list of family’s for which “do you like my hat?” has been incorporated in the lexicon.
Ah, one of my favs as well. This one and Are You My Mother? . When I read these for the first time to my kids, I got such a feeling…I knew what the next pic would be like etc. I must have memorized them as a kid.
Mess with that kind of stuff at your peril, publishers!
I can’t believe they released a shorter version of Go Dog, Go!
That’s just wrong.
My favorite scene is the dog party, but the sleeping bit was good too. I liked the one with his legs sticking out from under the bed, and the one asleep up on the headboard (going from memory here.)
And the hat gag was great too.
My daughter, now 12, loved that book when she was 2. She called it “Doggo Doggo”
I loved the “Do you like my hat?” Who knew the dog liked extremely gaudy hats?
Thanks for the memories.
Isn’t the lesson of The Little Red Hen that you’ve got to put your part in if you want a piece of the final results? The Hen asked the other animals if they wanted to help, and she was willing to do it herself. But when the bread is done, they all want a piece! The Hen decides they don’t deserve it since they were too lazy.
Actually, I just today mentioned to a co-worker on the sunny side of the building, “It is not hot, here under the house.”
We have a hefty children’s library in our house as my wife is an Early Childhood Educator. She says (a) you are correct, and (b) the boardbooks are edited to fit the mold.
It’s probably the old quantity (of $$$) over quality bit…
Yeah, I know the real lesson, but you’d think she’d realize it was futile after the first two times! I mean how many times do we have to go through the same story before she learns that they’re lazy no good bums? 
3, minimum!
At this point she’s doing it to spite them. She knows they’ll decline. And she knows they’ll want some of the bread. Her final revenge is made more sweet each time they refuse to help.
As one who’s read Go Dog Go way too many times for his daughter…upon further scrutiny, I noticed…
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The “critical” dog in the “Do you like my hat” exchange steals the feather off the hat when they meet on scooters.
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Some assorted objects from the book appear on the elaborate hat in the end - note the small fish that a dog “under the water” was about to spear.
Scary, but true…
I know. I am alternating between tearing up at everyone’s sweet memories and laughing at the seething outrage that they would have dumbed down a favorite.
There’s a play? Really? Any chance it’ll be in Chicago? goes to start searching through all the Chicago area venues
This isn’t a sympton of obsession is it?
Does it at least have Constantinople and Timbuktu? That was a literary turning point for me - moving from little words to big words.