Biographical Information
Early Years
Maurice Sendak was born on June 10th, 1928 in NY City. He grew up in Brooklyn to Jewish immigrants from Poland. When he was a child, he would illustrate his stories on shirt cardboard which he got from his dad being a tailor. He was very sick as a child and did not go outdoors a lot, which is what started his interest in books and art. He was largely self-taught when it came to art. The only art he was taught was after he graduated high school he took a couple of art night classes. In 1947, Maurice publishes illustrations for a textbook called, "Atomics for the Millions". In 1948, Maurice receives news that his dad's village in Poland is destroyed by the Nazis and his family is taking to concentration camps and is killed. In 1951, he illustrates his first children's book, The Wonderful Farm by Marcel Aymé.
Later Career
In 1963, Maurice writes and illustrates "Where the Wild Things Are", which brought him a lot of international recognition, and he became one of the world's greatest illustrators. In the 1970s, Maurice Sendak began to produce and design performances. He even put on a number of operas. He designed the winning production of "The Nutcracker". "Dubbed by one critic “the Picasso of children’s literature” and once addressed by former President Bill Clinton as “the King of Dreams,” Maurice Sendak illustrated nearly a hundred picture books throughout a career that spanned more than 60 years" ("Maurice Sendak Biography and Timeline").
Death
Sendak died on May 8, 2012, at a hospital in Danbury, Connecticut. He was 83 years old and had suffered from a stroke a few days before his death.
Maurice Sendak was born on June 10th, 1928 in NY City. He grew up in Brooklyn to Jewish immigrants from Poland. When he was a child, he would illustrate his stories on shirt cardboard which he got from his dad being a tailor. He was very sick as a child and did not go outdoors a lot, which is what started his interest in books and art. He was largely self-taught when it came to art. The only art he was taught was after he graduated high school he took a couple of art night classes. In 1947, Maurice publishes illustrations for a textbook called, "Atomics for the Millions". In 1948, Maurice receives news that his dad's village in Poland is destroyed by the Nazis and his family is taking to concentration camps and is killed. In 1951, he illustrates his first children's book, The Wonderful Farm by Marcel Aymé.
Later Career
In 1963, Maurice writes and illustrates "Where the Wild Things Are", which brought him a lot of international recognition, and he became one of the world's greatest illustrators. In the 1970s, Maurice Sendak began to produce and design performances. He even put on a number of operas. He designed the winning production of "The Nutcracker". "Dubbed by one critic “the Picasso of children’s literature” and once addressed by former President Bill Clinton as “the King of Dreams,” Maurice Sendak illustrated nearly a hundred picture books throughout a career that spanned more than 60 years" ("Maurice Sendak Biography and Timeline").
Death
Sendak died on May 8, 2012, at a hospital in Danbury, Connecticut. He was 83 years old and had suffered from a stroke a few days before his death.
General Information about Maurice Sendak
Awards:
Sendak's style was greatly influenced by the hardships he went through with being sick, hating school, and WWII.
"Sendak's whimsical work had a thoroughly unique style, and a distinctly European flavor with strong influences from Marc Chagall and Henri Matisse, as well as Francisco de Goya and Pablo Picasso. Furthermore, his characters looked rumpled and dumpy compared to the illustrations of fresh-scrubbed, athletic children then in fashion" (NNDB).
- The American Library Association awarded Sendak a Caldecott Medal in 1964
- Hans Christian Andersen Award for children's book illustration (1970)
- National Medal of the Arts, awarded by President Clinton (1997)
- The first Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award for Literature, awarded by the Swedish Government (2003).
Sendak's style was greatly influenced by the hardships he went through with being sick, hating school, and WWII.
"Sendak's whimsical work had a thoroughly unique style, and a distinctly European flavor with strong influences from Marc Chagall and Henri Matisse, as well as Francisco de Goya and Pablo Picasso. Furthermore, his characters looked rumpled and dumpy compared to the illustrations of fresh-scrubbed, athletic children then in fashion" (NNDB).
Genre, Subjects, and Themes
Sendak's books reflected a lot of emotions and it promoted creativity in children. A main theme of his books is not giving up and overcoming hardships. Most of his books were fantasies and had unrealistic characters in them. Sendak got in trouble with a few of his books, and some of them were banned because of the controversial topics that were brought up such as in, In the Night Kitchen.
Illustrator's Work
List of Some Works:
- Where the Wild Things Are
- In the Night Kitchen
- Higglety Pigglety Pop!: Or There Must Be More to Life
- Chicken Soup with Rice: A Book of Months
- Little Bear
- Pierre: A Cautionary Tale in Five Chapters and a Prologue
- Outside Over There
- Alligators All Around
- The Nutcracker
- Seven Little Monsters
- The Cunning Little Vixen
- Very Far Away
- Kenny's Window
- The Nutshell Library
- We Are All in the Dumps with Jack and Guy
- Swine Lake
Interesting Quotes
- “Once a little boy sent me a charming card with a little drawing on it. I loved it. I answer all my children’s letters — sometimes very hastily — but this one I lingered over. I sent him a card and I drew a picture of a Wild Thing on it. I wrote, “Dear Jim: I loved your card.” Then I got a letter back from his mother and she said, “Jim loved your card so much he ate it.” That to me was one of the highest compliments I’ve ever received. He didn’t care that it was an original Maurice Sendak drawing or anything. He saw it, he loved it, he ate it.”
- “You cannot write for children. They're much too complicated. You can only write books that are of interest to them. ”
- “There must be more to life than having everything.”
- “There should be a place where only the things you want to happen, happen”- "Where the Wild Things Are"
- “there is no such thing as fantasy unrelated to reality”
- “Kids don’t know about best sellers. They go for what they enjoy. They aren’t star chasers and they don’t suck up. It’s why I like them.”
- "In plain terms, a child is a complicated creature who can drive you crazy," Sendak once said in an interview. "There's a cruelty to childhood, there's an anger. And I did not want to reduce Max to the trite image of the good little boy that you find in too many books."