Poetry Path: Maurice Sendak

Maurice Sendak, born in 1928 in Brooklyn, New York, was a self-taught artist and the illustrator of over a hundred children’s books. In 1956, with Kenny’s Window, he began writing as well as illustrating his stories. His most well-known work, Where the Wild Things Are (Harper & Row, 1963), won the 1964 Caldecott Medal. His other honors include the 1970 International Hans Christian Andersen Award, the 1983 Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, a 1996 National Medal of Arts, and the 2003 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award. Sendak died in 2012 at the age of 83.

Maurice Sendak, excerpts from Where the Wild Things Are. Copyright © 1963 and renewed 1991 by Maurice Sendak. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers.

The Poetry Path is made possible through a partnership with Battery Park City Authority, partners in design and fabrication of the Poetry Path, with additional support from our Outreach Partner, Goldman Sachs. Special thanks to the Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Foundation for funding the Poetry Path planning process, and to the Marcia Brady Tucker Foundation for supporting Poetry Path educational initiatives for youth and children.