The many moods of Maurice Sendak

You'd have to be living under a rock not to be aware of the release of the movie version of Maurice Sendak's classic children's book, Where the Wild Things Are. So I was pleased to see the arrival of our copy of Making Mischief: A Maurice Sendak Appreciation, written by Gregory Maguire, author of New York Times bestseller Wicked. This lovely book is an ode to Sendak, almost a poem in and of itself. Maguire takes a look at Sendak's influences (from William Blake to Warner Brothers) and explores Sendak's deep understanding of children's emotions. There's lots of art in here I've never seen before, some quite "adult," all of it beautiful. The book closes with a riff on the last line of Wild Things, when Max returns to his room to find his dinner waiting: "And it was still hot." One illustration after another, each from a different book, each with that caption.

Here's Sendak's self-portrait with one of his influences: