At 83 Years Old, Maurice Sendak Attends A Pig Party

“…& Max the king of all wild things was lonely & wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.”

I am not sure how the tradition started, but sometime in my late teens, I would give my mother a gift of a classic children’s’ book as a gift on her birthday. The very first one I presented her with was Maurice Sendak’s Where The Wild Things Are.  She had given me a copy for Christmas 1963. I traveled with my copy to Boston, LA, & NYC. I am not certain at what point it was lost, but I hope some child, or child at heart loved having a copy.

Maurice Sendak has inspired the imagination of readers young & old for more than 50 years. A prolific author & illustrator of children’s books, he has published over 100 works of fiction. Sendak has received numerous awards, including the prestigious Caldecott Medal, the National Book Award & the National Medal of Arts.

Born in Brooklyn, to Jewish immigrants, Sendak’s early childhood was plagued with illness. He spent most of his time indoors where he satisfied his imagination with books. Having discovered his creative voice at a young age, Sendak found the perfect expression in drawing & illustration.  At the age of 12, after seeing Disney’s Fantasia, an awestruck Sendak decided to become an illustrator.

One of his first professional jobs was creating window displays for the toy store F.A.O. Schwarz. His illustrations were first published in 1947 in a textbook titled Atomics for the Millions by Dr. Maxwell Leigh Eidinoff. He spent much of the 1950s working as an artist for children’s books, before beginning to write his own stories. Sendak also illustrated Else Holmelund Minarik’s famous Little Bear series of books.

His best known book Where the Wild Things Are has sold over 20 million copies worldwide. In 2009, it was adapted into a critically acclaimed film directed by Spike Jonze.

Sendak’s work has often generated controversy. In the Night Kitchen, published in 1970s, features a young boy prancing naked around his house. It has been censored in many states. In The Night Kitchen remains on the American Library Association’s list of frequent & challenged books. It was listed #11 on the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2010.


Where the Wild Things Are has been condemned by conservatives who claim the book involves witchcraft & supernatural elements. Sendak: "I thought my career was over, he kids saved me. They loved the books because they are not afraid of life.”

In addition to writing and illustrating, Sendak has created award-winning set designs for dance, opera & theater, including Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Prokofiev’s Love for 3 Oranges & Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Nutcracker for PNW Ballet. The sets were stored a few blocks from our cottage in Seattle & I would see stacks of huge toy soldiers & rats stacked against a wall.

In the 1970’s he donated nearly 10,000 works of art, photographs, manuscripts & books to the Rosenbach Museum & Library in Philadelphia, including rare sketches for unpublished editions of stories such as Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, & other illustrating projects.

Until he was 80 years old, Sendak hid his sexuality from the public fearing it would ruin his career. Sendak: “All I wanted was to be straight so my parents could be happy. They never, never, never knew.” In a terrific 2008 interview with the NY Times, Sendak opened up about his private life & revealed his 50 year relationship with psychoanalyst Eugene Glynn, who passed away the previous year.

Sendak turns 83 years old today. He has not published a new book in 30 years, but  Bumble-Ardy, the story of a pig party will be published later this year.

Maurice also told Newsweek that parents could “go to hell” if they felt the movie Where the Wild Things Are was too scary for children.

Perhaps Maurice Sendak is most celebrated for the book Where the Wild Things Are, the winner of a Caldecott Medal in 1964. Sendak also illustrated Else Holmelund Minarik’s famous Little Bear series of books.


Coming out of the closet is an important step to finding happiness, even if you wait until you are 80 .My hope is Sendak has found  happiness in his golden years, despite the tragic loss of his life partner.