A biography for Maurice Sendakhasn’t been written yet.
“As a kid, all I thought about was death.”
“My work is not great, but it's respectable.”
“That always seemed to be the most critical test that a child was confronted with - loss of parents, loss of direction, loss of love. Can you live without a mother and a father?”
“It's only adults who read the top layers most of the time. I think children read the internal meanings of everything.”
“But the wild things cried, “Oh please don’t go - we’ll eat you up - we love you so!”And Max said, “No!”The wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws but Max stepped into his private boat and waved goodbye.”
“My father belonged to a Jewish social club.”
“You can't write masterpieces in your 80s and be happy too.”
“I would infinitely prefer a daughter.”
“I remember how much - when I was a small boy I was taken to see a version of 'Peter Pan.' I detested it. I mean, the sentimental idea that anybody would want to remain a boy.”
“There must be more to life than having everything.”
“I hate those e-books. They cannot be the future. They may well be.”
“I am not a religious person, nor do I have any regrets.”
“I was miserable as a kid.”
“If life is so critical, if Anne Frank could die, if my friend could die, children were as vulnerable as adults, and that gave me a secret purpose to my work, to make them live. Because I wanted to live. I wanted to grow up.”
“Most children - I know I did when I was a kid - fantasize another set of parents. Or fantasize no parents. They don't tell their real parents about that - you don't want to tell Mom and Dad.”
“I did not know how to paint a mural. I did not know how to prepare the surface. There was nobody from the Renaissance around who could advise me, and I did the best I could.”
“Grown-ups are afraid for children. It's not children who are afraid.”
“I have this idiot name tag which says 'controversial.'”
“Oh, I adored Mickey Mouse when I was a child. He was the emblem of happiness and funniness. You went to the movies then, you saw two movies and a short. When Mickey Mouse came on the screen and there was his big head, my sister said she had to hold onto me. I went berserk.”
“Kids lead a very private life.”