Maurice Sendak quotes

Maurice Sendak was an American author and illustrator, most famous for his groundbreaking children's book "Where the Wild Things Are." His imaginative stories and distinctive illustrations have inspired generations of readers. He is celebrated as one of the most influential figures in children’s literature. Here are 162 of his quotes:

You cannot write for children... They're much too complicated. You can only write books that are of interest to them.

Maurice Sendak

I'm not Hans Christian Andersen. Nobody's gonna make a statue in the park with a lot of scrambling kids climbing up me. I won't have it, okay?

Maurice Sendak

I often went to bed without supper 'cause I hated my mother's cooking. So, to go to bed without supper was not a torture to me. If she was gonna hurt me, she'd make me eat.

Maurice Sendak

Please don't go. We'll eat you up. We love you so.

Maurice Sendak

Children do live in fantasy and reality; they move back and forth very easily in a way we no longer remember how to do.

Maurice Sendak

I remember my own childhood vividly... I knew terrible things. But I knew I mustn't let adults know I knew. It would scare them.

Maurice Sendak

And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming wild things.

Maurice Sendak

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.

Maurice Sendak

I adored Mickey Mouse when I was a child. He was the emblem of happiness and funniness.

Maurice Sendak

And the wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws.

Maurice Sendak

And the walls became the world all around.

Maurice Sendak

It's only adults who read the top layers most of the time. I think children read the internal meanings of everything.

Maurice Sendak

When you hide another story in a story, that's the story I am telling the children.

Maurice Sendak

I don't believe in things literally for children. That's a reduction.

Maurice Sendak

An illustrator in my own mind - and this is not a truth of any kind - is someone who so falls in love with writing that he wishes he had written it, and the closest he can get to is illustrating it. And the next thing you learn, you have to find something unique in this book, which perhaps even the author was not entirely aware of. And that's what you hold on to, and that's what you add to the pictures: a whole Other Story that you believe in, that you think is there.

Maurice Sendak

Art has always been my salvation.

Maurice Sendak

We've educated children to think spontaneity is inappropriate.

Maurice Sendak

I certainly don't spell it out. But they have to know it's possible things are bad. But, they are surrounded by people who love them and will protect them but cannot hide the fact that there is something bad.

Maurice Sendak

My big concern is me and what do I do now until the time of my death. That is valid. That is useful. That is beautiful. That is creative. And also, I want to be free again.

Maurice Sendak

And it's one of the sexiest things you will ever read of how slow you should take the peach. Don't rush it.

Maurice Sendak

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.

Maurice Sendak

When I did 'Bumble-ardy,' I was so intensely aware of death. Eugene, my friend and partner, was dying here in the house when I did 'Bumble-ardy'. I did 'Bumble-ardy' to save myself. I did not want to die with him. I wanted to live, as any human being does.

Maurice Sendak