Maurice Sendak
Maurice Sendak
Maurice Bernard Sendakwas an American illustrator and writer of children's books. He became widely known for his book Where the Wild Things Are, first published in 1963. Born to Jewish-Polish parents, his childhood was affected by the death of many of his family members during the Holocaust. Besides Where the Wild Things Are, Sendak also wrote works such as In the Night Kitchen, Outside Over There, and illustrated many works by other authors including the Little Bear books by Else...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionChildren's Author
Date of Birth10 June 1928
CityBrooklyn, NY
CountryUnited States of America
Do parents sit down and tell their kids everything? I don't know. I don't know. I've convinced myself - I hope I'm right - that children despair of you if you don't tell them the truth.
We're supposed to be civilized. We're supposed to go to work every day. We're supposed to be nice to our friends and send Christmas cards to our parents.
All I wanted was to be straight so my parents could be happy. They never, never, never knew.
Parents shouldn't assume children are made out of sugar candy and will break and collapse instantly. Kids don't. We do.
I was a very sickly child. My parents were immigrants. They were not decorous. They were not discreet. They always thought I was gonna die.
Kids never get pissed at their parents. Unheard of.
As a kid, all I thought about was death. But you can't tell your parents that.
I've convinced myself - I hope I'm right - that children despair of you if you don't tell them the truth.
People from New York have been calling, to see if I'm still alive. When I answer the phone, you can hear the disappointment in their voice.
Do parents sit down and tell their kids everything? I don't know. I don't know.
It dawned on me that art was the way I could survive.
I'm still as enamored and turned on by work as I was when I was young.
Girls are infinitely more complicated than boys and women more than men. And there's no doubt about that. We just don't like to think about it. Certainly the men don't like to think about it.
I cry a lot because I miss people.