Who wrote 'Where the Wild Things Are'?

Where the Wild Things Are was written by Maurice Sendak. Sendak also illustrated the 1963 picture book, which follows Max, a boy sent to bed without supper after causing trouble at home. His bedroom transforms into a forest, and he sails to an island inhabited by the Wild Things, who make him their king.

Max leads the creatures in a wild rumpus, but eventually becomes lonely and returns home. A hot supper is waiting for him, giving the story an emotional ending beneath its monster-filled adventure. The book’s compact plot explores anger, imagination, independence and the reassurance of returning home after a difficult feeling has passed.

Sendak originally planned a story about “wild horses,” but he changed the creatures after realizing he did not know how to draw horses. The replacement phrase was influenced by the Yiddish expression “vilde chaya,” meaning wild animals or creatures. He based the monsters’ exaggerated faces partly on caricatures of relatives who visited his childhood home. The book won the Caldecott Medal in 1964 and later inspired an opera and a 2009 live-action film.