User:Lbrown44/Where the Wild Things Are

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Literary Significance:

-Analysis (subsection of literary significance)

In Selma G. Lanes's book The Art of Maurice Sendak, Sendak discusses Where the Wild Things Are along with two other books, In the Night Kitchen and Outside Over There, as a sort of trilogy centered on children's growth, survival, change, and fury. He indicated that the three books are "all variations on the same theme: how children master various feelings – danger, boredom, fear, frustration, jealousy – and manage to come to grips with the realities of their lives." Fundamental to Sendak's work for over fifty years is his trust in the validity of children's emotions.

Dr. Kara Keeling and Dr. Scott Pollard, both English professors, assess the role that food plays in the book, arguing that food is a metaphor for Max’s mother’s love based on the idea that Max comes home to a “still hot” supper, which suggests that his mother “loves him best". Going along with this, Mary Pols of Time magazine wrote that "[w]hat makes Sendak's book so compelling is its grounding effect: Max has a tantrum and in a flight of fancy visits his wild side, but he is pulled back by a belief in parental love to a supper 'still hot,' balancing the seesaw of fear and comfort".

Where The Wild Things Are is a story that shows children's resilience through their “spirit” and “pluck”. Max is able to stand up to the wild things with their "terrible teeth" and "terrible claws" using "the magic trick of staring into all their yellow eyes without blinking once."

Professor Liam Heneghan describes Max’s dream as one of mastering the wild, from which he also learns to master his “inner tumult”. It sets forth the unrestrained rowdiness of the wild things and enlightens the reader to the idea that one cannot live in the wild forever: “In this notion of wilderness, there is a heightened reminder that after our fill of wilderness, one can, or perhaps even should, return, replenished, to the comforts of home." Heneghan concludes, “The overarching thought is an old one: a human engages with wild things and in so doing comes into accord with the world and gains a measure of self-mastery."

-Reception: (subsection of literary significance)

According to Sendak, the book was banned in libraries and received negative reviews at first. It took about two years for librarians and teachers to realize that children were flocking to the book and for critics to relax their views. Since then, it has received high critical acclaim. Francis Spufford suggests that the book is "one of the very few picture books to make an entirely deliberate and beautiful use of the psychoanalytic story of anger". New York Times film critic Manohla Dargis noted that "there are different ways to read the wild things, through a Freudian or colonialist prism, and probably as many ways to ruin this delicate story of a solitary child liberated by his imagination." Based on a 2007 online poll, the National Education Association listed the book as one of its "Teachers' Top 100 Books for Children". Five years later School Library Journal sponsored a survey of readers which identified Where the Wild Things Are as a top picture book. Elizabeth Bird, the librarian from the New York Public Library who conducted the survey, observed that there was little doubt that it would be voted number one and highlighted its designation by one reader as a watershed, "ushering in the modern age of picture books". Another critic called it "perfectly crafted, perfectly illustrated ... simply the epitome of a picture book" and noted that Sendak "rises above the rest in part because he is subversive". President Barack Obama read it aloud for children attending the White House Easter Egg Roll in multiple years.

New York Times writer Bruce Handy brought up the idea that “as a child myself, without benefit of personal insights subsequently gleaned from more than a decade of talk therapy, I had been left cold by Where the Wild Things Are." Deborah Stevenson, a writer for The Horn Book Magazine, talks about the effects the book had on a child who “screamed, apparently not with delight, every time Where the Wild Things Are was read to him. It is quite possible for some young readers or listeners to be moved to alarm by a book, just as they can be moved to joy or excitement or boredom." Sendak responded to this criticism in an interview, asking, “Did she hate her kid? Is that why she was tormenting her with this book?”

Despite the book's popularity, Sendak refused to produce a sequel; four months before his death in 2012, he told comedian Stephen Colbert that a sequel would be "the most boring idea imaginable". Where the Wild Things Are was number four on the list of "Top Check Outs OF ALL TIME" by the New York Public Library.

-Other works


 * Kenny’s Window
 * Very Far Away
 * The Sign on Rosie’s Door
 * Pierre
 * Chicken Soup with Rice
 * Alligators All Around
 * One Was Johnny
 * Higglety Pigglety Pop! or There Must Be More to Life
 * In the Night Kitchen
 * Really Rosie
 * Some Well Pup, or Are You Sure You Want a Dog
 * Seven Little Monsters
 * Outside Over There
 * Caldecott & Co
 * We Are All in the Dumps with Jack and Guy
 * Bumble-Ardy
 * My Brother’s Book