Socks by Beverly Cleary

First published: 1973

Subjects: Animals, emotions, and family

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Domestic realism

Time of work: The 1970’s

Recommended Ages: 10-13

Locale: The home of Mr. and Mrs. Bricker

Principal Characters:

• Socks, a black kitten with white paws who sees himself as all-important in the Bricker family
• Marilyn Bricker, a cat lover and the doting mother of Charles William
• Bill Bricker, Marilyn’s husband, who initially only tolerates cats but who grows to love Socks
• Charles William Bricker, the new addition to the Bricker household and Socks’ competition
• Mrs. Risley, the baby-sitter who restores Socks’ self-esteem
• Nana Bricker, Bill’s mother, who visits and has Socks banished from the house
• Old Taylor, a nasty tom cat who fights with Socks

Form and Content

Beverly Cleary’s Socks explores the themes of family rivalry and jealousy in an unusual form: between Socks, the cat, and the new baby of the Bricker family, Charles William. This warm, humorously told story, which could take place anytime and anywhere, is told from Socks’s perspective.

Marilyn and Bill Bricker are leaving the grocery store when they come upon two children who are selling kittens. Marilyn falls in love with Socks, appropriately named for his white paws, and Bill hesitantly agrees to pay the fifty cents. Before long, Socks is in control of the household, amusing the Brickers with his kittenish antics, soaking up their affection as he sits on their laps, and indulging himself with the abundant food. His good life begins to unravel when he is penned in the laundry room for several days. Upon his release, he sees Mrs. Bricker coming through the front door carrying a blanketed bundle. The bundle wiggles and makes strange sounds. No longer is Socks the center of attention now that Charles William, the firstborn of the Brickers, has made his entrance into the world.

Socks feels neglected and resents the little intruder. The Brickers have no time to pet, brush, and play with him anymore, and, when Mr. Bricker discovers that Socks is gaining weight from eating Charles William’s leftover formula, Socks is put on a strict diet. One night, Mrs. Risley, a true cat lover, comes to baby-sit. She fusses over Socks, allowing him to sit on her lap, feeding him morsels of her snacks, and talking to him all the time. He is comforted by the fact that someone has come who apparently loves him more than Charles William. Socks sleeps his best sleep since the baby entered the house.

Not too many days later, Nana Bricker comes to visit. She does not like cats and is not sure that it is safe for Socks to be around the baby. After Socks attacks and almost destroys her wig one evening and nips Mrs. Bricker’s ankle the next morning, he is banished from the house. Only after Nana returns to her own home and Socks is beaten by Old Taylor, the neighborhood tom cat, is he restored to the living quarters. Upon seeing Socks, Charles William calls him “Ticky,” his first word, which thrills the Brickers. The cat and boy begin a new relationship.

One day, Charles William pushes his crib in front of the door, making it impossible for Mrs. Bricker to enter his bedroom. To compound the problem, Socks is in the bedroom with the baby. Mrs. Bricker has never left the two together unsupervised. Charles William picks at the bumper pad in his crib and removes cotton batting, which he throws to Socks. The two make a game of playing with the batting. By the time that the panicked Mrs. Bricker finds a ladder and climbs in the bedroom window, the boy and cat are exhausted from their play and are both sound asleep side by side in the crib, friends at last.

Critical Context

In more than forty years of writing, Beverly Cleary published more than forty titles and distinguished herself as a clear favorite among both children and adults. This success is evidenced by the sales of her books, the high circulation of her titles in libraries, and the numerous awards and honors attributed to her work, including recognition from at least seventeen different state library associations, frequent Young Reader’s Choice Awards from the Pacific Northwest Library Association, and the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award and the Newbery Medal from the American Library Association. She received the William Allen White Award and the Golden Archer Award from the University of Wisconsin for Socks.

Humans dominate Cleary’s writings; Ramona Quimby is undoubtedly the most memorable character in her realistic stories for young readers. Henry Huggins was her earliest creation, and Leigh Botts, an adolescent from a divorced family, is the protagonist in Dear Mr. Henshaw (1983) and Strider (1991), books for a slightly older audience. Ralph S. Mouse, a motorcycle-riding mouse and the friend of Keith Gridley, appeared in three Cleary fantasy books, and Ribsy, Henry Huggins’ dog, had a book of his own prior to the publication of Socks, Cleary’s second animal story.

Cleary writes from her childhood desire to read amusing books about children like herself. While some critics fault her lack of stories with a racial mix of characters or books that deal with serious childhood problems, Cleary has remained true to her personal goals and provided several generations of children with appealing, entertaining reading.