Favourite Sendak
“Once Jennie had everything. She slept on a round pillow upstairs and a square pillow downstairs. She had her own comb and brush, two different bottles of pills, eyedrops, eardrops, a thermometer, and for cold weather a red wool sweater.”
Higglety Pigglety Pop! or There Must Be More To Life is the story of a little dog who leaves her home to find herself, via a stint of nannying, milk man-ing and a leading role in a play where she eats a mop daily, “and twice on Saturdays.”
I’ve owned my copy of this Maurice Sendak book for as long as I can remember, and I still find it frightening, inspiring and mysterious. Maurice Sendak died this week, aged 83, and so I wanted to recommend this lesser known work, especially for anyone with young impressionable kids. For a small child it’s mind blowing.
I was sad to hear of the death of Maurice Sendark and love this book too.
In an interview with Stephen Colbert, Sendak said that this book was one of his two favorites as well as the best that he’d done. He will be missed, but his work will continue to inspire for generations. Here’s a link to the episode. The interview is about 10 minutes in.
http://www.colbertnation.com/full-episodes/tue-may-8-2012-michelle-alexander
That’s lovely – thanks for the link. It really is a strange and powerful book, even by Sendak’s standards, but I didn’t know it was one of his favourites. x