I was introduced to Maurice Sendak by a dog, a small, shaggy white terrier, spoiled, self-centered and sassy. Her name was Jennie, and she felt there must be more to life than her sheltered existence. She was right; there was a world of adventure, sometimes dark and perhaps somewhat dangerous, full of sly word play and heart-breakingly beautiful art, outside and over there. It was a world for the bold, not the timid, but it opened its doors to any child willing to take a chance. At 10, I dived right in.
The world of children’s literature in the second half of the 20th Century, a period that was full of Baby Boom kids growing up, is defined by Sendak’s books. His influence is wide-ranging: the carefree, dancing children sketched in books by Ruth Krauss (A Hole is to Dig) and Sesyle Joslyn (What Do You Say, Dear?). The old-fashioned charm of Else Holmelund Minarik’s Little Bear beginning reader series. The stunning book-making art of Randall Jarrell’s Bat Poet, Animal Family and Fly By Night, and the editions of Grimm’s fairy tales illustrated by Sendak. The exuberant alphabet, counting, months of the year and cautionary tales of the Nutshell Library, Jennie’s ominous Higglety Pigglety Pop adventure, and of course, the powerful trilogy, Where the Wild Things Are, In the Night Kitchen, and Outside, Over There.
It was a world full of children, but they were growing up in the shadow of World War II, with television sit-coms sandwiched between menacing news reports of the Cold War and the upheaval of Vietnam, wrenching political assassinations and scandals, the race for the moon, the battle for Civil Rights and coast-to-coast protests. In Sendak’s trilogy, an angry boy works out his tantrum by retreating to the world of his imagination to become King of the Wild Things. Another one deals with the fine line between dream and nightmare. And a young girl must rescue her baby sister from the goblins, as her mother sits nearby, oblivious. All three of these children emerge victorious.
Sendak was inspired by the comic strips, films and fairy tales he loved in his youth, and by the world of classical art (music and literature as well as painting—Mozart and Melville show up in his books, as well as nods to Renaissance masterworks). In turn, the generation of children’s book illustrators growing up since the 1960s have been inspired by him, consciously or subconsciously. I definitely see his influence in the Caldecott-winning work of Chris Van Allsburg, David Wiesner, Paul O. Zelinsky and Brian Selznick. Sendak empowered his readers to be themselves, and validated the worlds of their imaginations. He did this for children’s literature, too. Sendak started at age 20 and did not quit until his recent death, 63 years later. He never lowered his high standards, and even in increasingly crotchety old age, he never forgot what it was like to be a child, confused and often frightened by the world, but holding the keys to an infinite universe.
