Overview This story is based on the novel Mr. Popper’s Penguins by Richard and Florence Atwater. The book is about a man, named Mr. Popper, who is a painter, but also enjoys reading about other countries in his spare time.

Mr. Popper’s favorite countries to write about are the North and South Poles.

OverviewSo, Mr. Popper decides to write a letter to Admiral Drake, an explorer that Mr. Popper admires, regarding how much Mr. Popper enjoys hearing about Admiral Drake’s journeys. Mr. Popper also mentions in the letter that he loves the Antarctic’s animals, especially the penguins.

Overview Admiral Drake receives the letter and sends Mr. Popper a gift. A penguin arrives as a pet for Mr. Popper to care for as a pet from Admiral Drake!

Although his family was quite surprised, Mr. Popper was able to keep the penguin he named Captain Cook. Captain Cook soon became part of the family.

But, sadly, Captain Cook became extremely ill.

OverviewTherefore, Mr. Popper did everything he could to research what was wrong with his beloved pet penguin. In writing to an aquarium, Mr. Popper discovered that Captain Cook’s sickness was actually loneliness.

The aquarium then sent their penguin,

OverviewGreta, to keep Captain Cook company. Happily, Captain Cook and Greta had ten little penguins. Then, Mr. Popper and his penguins then went on the road as a show after learning many tricks to amuse an audience. Just as Mr. Popper was offered a large amount of money to make a movie with his penguins, Admiral Drake asked Mr. Popper to release the

Overviewpenguins in the North Pole to start a population of the animals there. After thinking about his choices long and hard, Mr. Popper chose to take his penguin family to the North Pole with Admiral Drake to live happily ever after.

Compare/Contrast

Some similarities of the children’s book Mr. Popper’s Penguins and the novel are very clear. The children’s book and the novel both include Mr. Popper, who is a painter, Admiral Drake, and Captain Cook as the penguin. Both work include Captain Cook meeting Greta and

Compare/Contrast

becoming a family. Also similar, Greta, Captain Cook and the whole gang of penguins tour around the country in a show. Finally, in both plots, Mr. Popper returns the penguin family to the North Pole.

Compare/Contrast

In contrast, the novel is much longer and much more detailed than the children’s book. In addition, in the novel, Mr. Popper goes to jail for his penguins and Admiral Drake has to bail him out. However, that detail was omitted from the story version. In the novel, Mr. Popper’s children missed ten

Compare/Contrast

weeks of school, but that detail was left out of the children’s story. Finally, the children’s book does not address the penguins living in the basement of the Popper’s house and loving it like the novel does.