15 Intriguing Facts About The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Since its debut in 1969, Eric Carle's beloved children's classic about a famished caterpillar has earned numerous accolades and a devoted following. Here are a few fascinating tidbits about The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

1. The vivid colors in The Very Hungry Caterpillar are a stark contrast to a dark chapter of Eric Carle's early life.

Eric Carle was born in Syracuse, New York, on June 25, 1929. However, when he was just 6 years old, his family moved back to his father's hometown of Stuttgart, Germany. This was 1935—an unfortunate time to return to Europe. The horrors of World War II overshadowed Carle’s childhood, as his father was drafted into the German army and captured by Soviet forces, remaining separated from the family for 8 years. Upon his return, Carle's father was not the loving and supportive figure he remembered, but a changed and distant man.

The author later reflected that his attraction to the bold, vivid colors of painted tissue paper collages might have been, in part, a reaction to the harshness of his childhood. "It may be psychobabble, but I sometimes think I revisit that time in my life through my books,” Carle told The Guardian in 2004.

2. A courageous art teacher introduced Carle to the vibrant colors that would come to define his artistic style.

Herr Kraus, Carle’s high school art teacher, saw the potential in his young student and took a considerable risk to nurture it. Defying the strict censorship of Nazi Germany, Kraus invited Carle to his home to view forbidden expressionist art, sharing reproductions of works by Paul Klee, Henri Matisse, and Pablo Picasso.

"I had no idea that art like that even existed because I was used to seeing art that was all about patriotic, heroic Aryans—super-realistic depictions of Aryan farmers, women with muscular arms,” Carle remarked.

3. The caterpillar was initially conceived as a bookworm.

The war didn't exactly foster Carle's fondness for Europe, and he yearned to return to America. As a young adult, he moved back to New York, where he landed a job as a graphic designer in advertising. After a brief stint back in Germany, having been drafted by the U.S. Army, Carle returned to the U.S. and took a job at an ad agency, where the idea for his future classic was born.

"I wasn't thinking of books or anything like that," Carle told The Guardian. "I had nothing else to do, so I grabbed a stack of paper and a hole-punch and just started punching holes... then I looked at them. Immediately, the idea of a bookworm came to me."

Carle pitched the idea of A Week With Willi Worm to his editor Ann Beneduce. However, she had concerns about the protagonist’s lack of appeal. The story goes that the two of them sat together, brainstorming a more captivating concept, when, in unison, Ann exclaimed, "Caterpillar!" and Carle responded, "Butterfly!"

4. The book’s playful design proved challenging to produce.

Although Carle eventually abandoned the bookworm idea, the punched holes remained, becoming the chewed-up portions of the various foods the caterpillar eats. This unique feature has helped the book stand out for 50 years, but it nearly derailed production. The publisher couldn’t find a printer in the U.S. willing to handle so many die cuts at a reasonable cost, but eventually found a willing publisher in Japan who could manage the task.

5. The book has been seen by some as a Catholic allegory.

Due to the book's central theme of transformation—the caterpillar retreats into a cocoon and emerges as a butterfly—it is often interpreted to have religious significance. As a result, it's frequently included in sermons and Sunday school curriculums.

6. Some readers have suggested that the caterpillar symbolizes a capitalist figure.

A young East German librarian once told Carle that she disapproved of the book because of its capitalist undertones: "She said, 'This book would never have been published here. The caterpillar represents a capitalist. He takes a bite from every fruit, just one bite, and moves on, growing fatter and fatter. He's exploiting everything.'"

7. Former President George W. Bush was a big admirer of the book.

When George W. Bush visited schools, he would exclusively read The Very Hungry Caterpillar. "If teachers had other books out, his advance team would remove them," Nick Clark, the former chief curator and founding director of the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, told The Guardian.

Despite the fact that Bush's fondness for the book earned him some public ridicule early in his political career, he remained a fan. In 1999, then-Governor Bush listed Eric Carle's picture book as one of his childhood favorites. The only issue? He was almost 23 when The Very Hungry Caterpillar was published. The media mocked Bush for his childlike taste in books, but it evidently didn't dampen his love for the story.

8. Eric Carle believed the simplicity of the book was part of its charm.

While all children's books are simplified, The Very Hungry Caterpillar stands out in its sparseness: it follows a simple pattern with minimal text, lacking poetic flourishes or rhyme. Carle explains that this was deliberate, comparing the straightforward style of the book to his grandfather's work on car engines, creating "[b]eautiful parts for Porsche cars."

In fact, Carle's desire to bring a minimalist approach to children's literature was what first inspired him to pursue writing. "Back when I was in advertising, someone asked me to illustrate what they called 'educational material,' and I thought it was awful," Carle said in 2009. "They put too much on the pages—32 good ideas on one page make a terrible book. Then Bill Martin Jr. asked me to illustrate his book Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? It got me excited—the simplicity of the text, the rhythm. I learned from Bill: you take one idea and spread it over 32 pages."

9. There was an "awful" TV version of The Hungry Caterpillar.

In 1993, the UK-based The Illuminated Film Company released a TV adaptation of The Very Hungry Caterpillar along with several other of Carle’s stories under the title The World of Eric Carle. The shorts were later released on DVD as The Very Hungry Caterpillar & Other Stories and can still be downloaded from platforms like iTunes or Amazon. However, the author himself described the DVD set as "awful. God-awful. I'm ashamed of it."

10. The book was turned into a video game.

In 2010, CYBIRD Co., Ltd. launched an educational video game inspired by The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Interestingly, while the book serves as an early tool for teaching counting, the video game, The Very Hungry Caterpillar's ABCs, focuses on basic language skills.

11. Carle had his own theory about why the book is so beloved.

When asked why he believed The Very Hungry Caterpillar had achieved such widespread success, Carle—who passed away on May 23, 2021, at the age of 91—offered the following insight:

"My guess is it’s a book of hope. That you, a small, seemingly insignificant caterpillar, can grow and eventually reveal your potential, soaring into the world. As a child, you may feel small and powerless, wondering if you'll ever grow. Perhaps that’s part of its appeal. But those thoughts came later, more like psychobabble in hindsight. I didn’t set out to say: 'I want to make a truly meaningful book.'"

12. The Hungry Caterpillar received a Google Doodle for its 40th anniversary.

In 2009, marking the 40th anniversary of The Very Hungry Caterpillar's publication, Google honored the book with a special Eric Carle-style Doodle on its homepage.

13. Pediatricians incorporated the book into a campaign promoting healthy eating.

While following the caterpillar's Saturday feast (chocolate cake, ice cream cone, pickle, Swiss cheese, salami, lollipop, cherry pie, sausage, cupcake, and watermelon) might lead to more than just a stomach ache, the American Academy of Pediatrics saw the depiction of healthy produce throughout the rest of the week as a positive influence on children's eating habits. In 2011, the organization teamed up with a charity linked to former President Bill Clinton to send over 17,000 pediatricians special editions of the book, along with growth charts and educational materials on healthy eating for parents.

14. The Hungry Caterpillar has been translated into over 60 languages.

These include languages such as Yiddish, Urdu, Ukrainian, Tamil, Somali, Panjabi, Luxembourgish, Latvian, Icelandic, Gaelic, Frysian, Catalan, and even Aramaic.

15. The book remains extremely popular, even more than 50 years after its original publication.

A copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar is sold every minute around the world, with total sales now exceeding 30 million copies. "It is one of our most successful books of all time," said Francesca Dow, managing director of Puffin Books, in an interview with The Guardian. "It's a publisher's dream, and we are very fortunate to have it," she remarked.

Even other authors recognize the undeniable importance of Eric Carle's simplified masterpiece. Fellow children's book author Ted Dewan described The Very Hungry Caterpillar as "one of the cornerstones of children's culture," comparing it to the timeless greatness of The Beatles. "It's beyond reproach," he told The Guardian.