Book Review: Where the Wild Things Are

| By: Committee for Children

By Maurice Sendak

Ah, Max, you wild thing. Maurice Sendak's eternally impish little boy has struck a chord in children and parents for half a century and shows no sign of aging yet. One evening Max makes mischief “of one kind and another,” and tells his mother that he's going to eat her up. His mother, understandably at her wits' end, sends him to bed without any supper. From here, Max launches his flight—or rather sail—of fancy, navigating his private boat across the sea of his imagination to a land of truly wild things: huge monsters with claws and fangs and fierce yellow eyes. Undaunted, Max tames them and quickly becomes their king.

Eventually, though, in spite of the power he wields and the joy of the “wild rumpus,” Max heeds the call of home, where “someone loved him best of all.” Following the smell of “good things to eat,” Max climbs in his boat and sails back across the world to his own bedroom, where, as children everywhere know, he finds his supper waiting for him, “and it was still hot.”

Using one's imagination to work through strong, angry feelings can be a satisfying way to calm down. Young readers of Where the Wild Things Are have a surprising role model in Max. Yes, he misbehaves, but his subsequent adventure lays bare his youthful wish to have some kind of control over his world. Here is the push-pull of childhood, when the desire to be powerful battles the longing to be where someone loves and cares for you best of all. The task of childhood is to develop the skills to make peace with those battling instincts and with the world all around. Max, like so many raging children, finally comes back into the fold, weary and seemingly contrite.

Social-Emotional Lessons in Where the Wild Things Are

Teachers reading aloud this Caldecott Medal–winning classic can talk with their students about this natural clash of feelings, asking if anyone has had two feelings at the same time, or if feelings ever change. What were those feelings? What helped change one feeling into another? In the story, what helped Max move from anger to calm? How did the monsters feel when Max told them he was leaving? How did they handle their feelings? Does it remind readers of the way Max behaved earlier in the story with his mother? How do you think Max's mom felt after she sent him to his room?

Research shows that children's social and academic success is dependent on such elements as emotion awareness and management, planning, listening, paying attention, and language skills. Reading and discussing a book like Where the Wild Things Are blends these ingredients into a just-right soup of “good things to eat.”