Dr Seuss or Roald Dahl...

[MrsMilton]

... for a 5 year old. What do you think?

Roald Dahl, without a doubt! I remember being read The Twits when I was about five and I couldn't wait for storytime!

Depends, I read Dr Seuss and Danny Champion of The World to my DC at around that age and she quite quickly started to read Dr Seuss to herself but really enjoyed the chapter a night things with DCotW. Is it a present?

Yes, a present, just something small to go with a bigger gift. It's a funny inbetween stage, isn't it? Starting to read alone but enjoying being read to still.

Definitely think both! My 13 yo DD still loves Dr S - we watch the original animated Grinch film every Xmas, loves Boris Karloffs voice. Tho she read all the Dahls at the appropriate stage of growing up and had them read to her, she wouldn't go back to the Dahl books now whereas Dr S continues to amuse with his theatricality.

Dr Seuss - mine loved those (all three of them) - only one liked Roald Dahl (and I hated his!).

Start with Dr Seuss and then move on to Roal Dahl. At that age dts loved their Dr Seuss & practised reading with them.

My DC's have a box set of Dr Seuss and they love it but my heart sinks when they pick them to read at bedtime, the rhyming nonsense drives me insane and they are not short books! Give me revolting rhymes or Fantastic Mr Fox over them any day!

I never really got dr Seuss tbh - dd was never really interested either. So my vote definitely goes with roald dahl!

RoaldDahl!!!! More specfically Matilda, George's Marvellous Medcine and The Twits. They are all fab, but these three are my favourite.

Always Seuss, never Roald Dahl.

The enormous crocodile is a good in between book so not that much of a step up from picture books

Roald Dahl if you're reading it to them, Dr Seuss if they're reading it to you.

Dr Seuss. Most of them have a recommended reading level. My children loved the rhyming flow of the stories and theyre full of pictures that match the text. Most of the words in Dr. Seuss books are phonically regular so its easier for children to start reading. Roald Dahl is great but it skews a little older.

Another Dahl vote here, like the cadence of Dr Seuss but never got beyond that, the gruesomeness of Dahl cannot be bettered for a small child.

Also try Der Struwwelpeter by Heinrich Hoffmann, can't be beaten for horridly gleeful morality tales in the spirit of Dahl.

Although I guess as Hoffman was writing in the 19th C, Dahl is in the spirit of him rather than the other way round.

I decided not to read Dahl to my five year old yet, because it is a bit too dark, and I think he would be disturbed rather than amused by it. That may just be his personality though.

We are reading Naughty Amelia Jane, and that seems to be the right level.

Ooooh spiderslegs did you see that stage production of Struwwelpeter a few years ago (well, actually it was probably about 12 years..ahem)? It was wonderful - really one of the best things I've ever seen in the theatre.