Whenever a celebrity dies, there seems to be this tendency to aggrandize his or her accomplishments... even those artists who had long since fallen into obscurity. People seem to come out of the woodwork to proclaim the virtues of deceased. I've never really been one for that sort of thing... but today I find myself mourning the loss of a true giant. It is impossible, I think, to overstate the importance of the work of Maurice Sendak.
For many, many years, the technology of printing books made the idea of a children's picture book an artist's dream. Certainly, Tenniel's illustrations in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass are among the most famous in all of children's literature. Denslow's illustrations for The Wonderful Wizard of Oz incorporated the use of color in new and interesting ways, but it wasn't until the twentieth century that publishers even had the ability to produce a “real” picture book. Children's books inherited a tradition of using illustrations to support text—and the idea that the illustrations could themselves serve a truly narrative function was one that developed slowly... but much more quickly after Sendak's groundbreaking work.
Those who have been following my blog (and my professional work) know that children's literature has long been the object of derision by literary critics and scholars. Children's picture books, with their simple storylines and basic vocabulary, had a difficult time winning over adult audiences—who tended to dismiss the entire enterprise as “kid's stuff.” The first chapter of Beverly Lyon Clark's Kiddie Lit: The Cultural Construction of Children's Literature in America contains an excellent discussion of the cultural prejudice against works of literature for children (and the prejudices faced by children in general). The fact of the matter remains, though, that early-twentieth century children's picture books did tend to lack narrative complexity, and the illustrations peppering the texts tended to be superfluous to (and not very integrated with) the storytelling.
Kudos should go to Dr. Seuss and “The Cat in the Hat” (1957) for refusing to talk down to children and giving them a narrative in which the words and illustrations were weighted equally... but even Seuss's work relies heavily on the lyrics to tell the story. It wasn't really until Sendak published “Where the Wild Things Are” in 1963 that the narrative art of the children's book was definitively established. (And, guess what? Adults still disliked it.)
The prose in “Where the Wild Things Are” is used incredibly sparingly. In fact, the whole tale is comprised of 338 words. Sendak used 338 words to craft one of the most enduring works of fiction in the English language! Sendak's diction is impeccable, wasting not single one of those words.
One is propelled through those words, though, by the pictures. Max puts on his wolf suit to make mischief “of one kind”...
“and another.” Notice here, how (perhaps for the first time in all of children's literature) the picture is more (or at least as) central to the storytelling experience as the words. What kind of mischief does Max create? Sendak's economy of words forces the child to read the illustration in addition to the text. (The detailed and engaging pictures practically beg to be scrutinized in all their beautiful detail, anyway.)
We are sixteen pages into the book before we've gotten to the end of the second sentence. There is a tension built on each page as it ends mid-sentence. The reader is drawn deeper and deeper into the story, turning page after page, pulled into vivid illustration after illustration.
What is also fascinating is the interplay between text and illustration. When Max was in his room, we were able to see how the forest “grew-- and grew-- and grew.”
The words and pictures refer to one another in a way that had not been fully explored in a children's picture book before. A far cry from the traditional picture-to-help-the-reader-visualize-the-scene, Sendak's words and pictures mutually supported one another. The minimalism of the words, combined with the denseness of the drawings, created a new type of reading experience.
Moreover, the use of negative space in the illustrations also helps forge this experience. The first illustration, a small rectangle surrounded by the large white space of the paper, is replaced by a slightly larger rectangle and slightly less white space. As each page is turned, we experience more drawing and less empty space, being slowly pulled into Max's imagined world—the forest grows and grows, until eventually there is no space on the page for words at all. We have a multi-page wild rumpus—in which all of the narrative is presented through the pictures. Eventually, though, the pictures start getting smaller and smaller, until we are back inside Max's room.
In sum, Sendak's work in “Where the Wild Things Are” was the genesis of a new form of narrative art. The innovative use of picture and language demonstrated to a whole generation of picture book artists what could be done with the medium—how a sequence of pictures could be used, not to illustrate a story, but to tell one. This is something nobody (not Tenniel, not Denslow, nor even Seuss) had done before. For this reason, “Where the Wild Things Are” is, indisputably one of the most important works of literature (for children or adults) of the twentieth century.
The relationship between the illustrations and text was not the only way in which “Where the Wild Things Are” broke new ground. I attended a fascinating paper at this year's annual meeting of the Popular Culture Association (Ammanda Moore's “Stirring the Embers of Childhood: The Effects of Romanticism on the Children's Literature of Today”) that traced thread of 19th century romanticism from the poems of Wordsworth to those of Dr. Seuss. In fact, Romantic notions of the innocence of childhood have proven shockingly long-lasting. The concept of the perfect, innocent, even angelic, child pervades modern American culture—including and especially popular media (with the notable exception of the horror genre in which evil children are the rule, rather than the exception).
Sendak's work, however, never seemed to gel around this Romantic notion of childhood. Max, certainly, is not the image of innocence. He chases his dog, threateningly waving a fork. We get the sense that he wasn't exactly lying when he told his mother, “I'll eat you up!” He becomes the king of the “wild” things. Darkness underlies much of Max's character—and this is a darkness that seems to resonate with the child readers. Not surprisingly, this was also a source of severe criticism of Sendak's work (by adults, of course).
I had a rough day with my youngest daughter today... It started out wonderfully, but as the day dragged on—and she grew more and more tired, she became an increasingly wild thing. So, we pulled out our well-loved copy of “Where the Wild Things Are” and had a bedtime story. It is a story that understands what it is actually like to be a child. It is a story that acknowledges that children create mischief, that they have dark thoughts and feelings, that they don't have the moral development to prevent themselves from acting on those impulses. It is a story that allows the child to fantasize about the logical conclusions of those feelings and work through them. Finally, it is a story that lets children know that their parents will always love them for the people they are, not the people we Romantically wish they were. My daughter learned that no matter what she does, there will always be dinner waiting for her when she's ready return to her loving home (and it'll still be hot)—or she would have learned that if she had been awake to hear the ending.
Maurice Sendak's death today hit me rather hard. Tonight's Sendak bedtime story was judiciously selected given the significance and the unique needs of the day. Last night's selection, “Bumble-Ardy” (another book fully aware of the darkness of childhood) was coincidental. After finishing it last night, I remember thinking, “I wonder what other amazing work Sendak has left in him.” As it turns out, we will now never know... and the world is a darker place for it.
I've concentrated in this post on “Where the Wild Things Are.” In part, this is because the work is his masterpiece. I could easily have lauded the importance of In the Night Kitchen (a prime example of adults simply not seeing Sendak's work through a child's eyes). Mickey's naked nighttime romp still lands the book on the most frequently banned books list (#24 over the last decade): http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedbydecade/2000_2009
Nearly fifty years after “Where the Wild Things Are” adults still just don't seem to get it... Also, the book's place in the history of comic books/graphic novels remains strikingly unexplored; I get this sense that some of the negative reception is (still!) a result of lingering prejudices against that medium. I would love to see more work on the book's role in legitimizing comics as an at form.
I could also have selected Outside Over There, the Little Bear books, or even Sendak's behind-the-scenes work with Sesame Street and the Children's Television Workshop. Sendak has enriched the lives of children in immeasurable ways—both directly and indirectly—and he will be missed.
A colleague of mine forwarded this link to a recent NPR interview with Sendak:
While most of this post has intellectualized my feelings about Mr. Sendak, I am covering up a great sense of loss. Sendak seemed prophetic about the end of his life and career:
"I have nothing now but praise for my life. I'm not unhappy. I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can't stop them. They leave me and I love them more. ... What I dread is the isolation. ... There are so many beautiful things in the world which I will have to leave when I die, but I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready."
It is bittersweet to know that you were ready, Mr. Sendak, but I wasn't ready. You died, and I couldn't stop you. I will miss you.
