In a world of categories, Maurice Sendak had to be put in his
place: Children’s book author.Though the artist and writer’s work extended well
beyond those boundaries, he, in his own grouchy way, accepted this category. As
he told the Associated Press in 2003: "So I write books that seem more
suitable for children, and that’s OK with me. They are a better audience and
tougher critics. Kids tell me what they think, not what they think they should
think."Still, the man, who died Tuesday at 83, knew his worth.I interviewed
him once about 20 years ago by telephone.Then a reporter for an upstate New York
newspaper, I sought his comment on a story he knew too well. A parent in rural
school district had objected because when Mickey falls out of bed and out of his
clothes in "In the Night Kitchen," he’s revealed to have
genitals."Cock-a-doodle doo," as Mickey exclaimed, to be sure."In
the Night Kitchen" was often a target of those who wanted to shield tender
young minds from feelings those minds were aware of. Sendak’s most popular book
"Where the Wild Things Are" was deemed by some protectors of youth as
too scary.Sendak articulated those nascent understandings, and in doing so
created classics, tormenting small-minded adults in the process.The artist did
not suffer fools gladly, and I remember feeling as I talked to him back then
that I was straddling that line. The limits of his patience were obvious from
the time he answered his telephone. Still, he answered his telephone, and he
answered my questions, however exasperated he was. He didn’t shy away from
summoning the example of Michelangelo’s David to defend his depiction of
Mickey.Sendak was an artist, and as an artist he pushed limits. His books grew
darker as time went on, more and more shadowed by the Holocaust that had
shadowed his own Jewish family in Brooklyn as he grew up.I’m old enough not to
have grown up with his work. Yet I remember as a child who’d outgrown picture
books finding his illustrations intriguing and vaguely troubling. These were the
dark children of the city, full of secrets, not the cheery blonds of the
suburbs.Over the years, I learned more about his work, and probably read about a
few attempts at censorship, and enjoyed Carole King’s musical adaptation of the
stories in his "Nutshell Library," including Pierre who didn’t care
and the self-assured Rosie.So when my first son was born, Sendak’s books were
among the first my wife and I added to his library. All three of my children
were inundated with books – that comes from having a librarian and writer as
parents. Sendak’s were among the most prized.He was also a storyteller in the
most compact, profound and comic way. His books were always a joy to read aloud.
In the right mood the wild rumpus section of "Where the Wild Things
Are" could extend into a couple minutes of vocal percussion.Yet I also
remember long discussions with adults about whether the subtext of "In the
Night Kitchen" was the Holocaust or Mickey’s subconscious discovery of sex.
Sendak scattered plenty of evidence for both throughout the book.He told public
radio’s Terry Gross in 1986 such issues were not his concern. He only wrote his
books to "amuse, entertain and distract" children, and they did all of
these.When his latest "Bumble-Ardy" came out there was a tinge of
regret that I had no young one to buy it for, and share it with.Sendak told
Gross that the book was written during and after the death of his life partner
of 50 years, Eugene Glynn. "I did ‘Bumble-Ardy’ to save myself,"
Sendak says. "I did not want to die with him."It reflects, he said,
that confrontation with death but his continued love of life even as he neared
its end."I’m ready. I’m ready. I’m ready," he told GrossSendak was a
freethinker who did not believe in religion or an after life. He said his gods,
the ones who got him through troubled periods, were John Keats, Shakespeare,
Herman Melville, Mozart and, at the top, Emily Dickenson.He is survived by his
books, and thousands of readers young and old who have been touched by them, so
Max, Mickey, Pierre, Rosie and the rest will live on.