What a wonderful legacy the Caldecott Award winning author Maurice Sendak has left. He died today at the age of 83 and I couldn’t let the event pass unnoticed. He has written and illustrated so many great children’s books, including “Where the Wild Things Are“, which of course I read to my children.
But the fondest memory I have of Maurice Sendek is reading the tiny books of “The Nutshell Library” to my son. I was first attracted to this set of books because of “One was Johnny”. Aren’t we all attracted to books that feature our children’s names? The rhymes in all four volumes were so simple and so fun to read – I never got tired of them.
Cover of Nutshell Library (Caldecott Collection)
Since it’s May, I’ll treat you to this one:
In May I truly think it best
To be a robin lightly dressed
Concocting soup inside my nest
Mix it once, mix it twice
Mix that chicken soup with rice
But my favorite by far, was “Pierre: A Cautionary Tale”. When my own Johnny was out of sorts and shouted “I don’t care!”, I began responding, “who are you, Pierre?” He never liked it, and I never tired of it. To this day, when I hear the phrase, “I don’t care”, I think of Pierre fondly.
So it’s a sad day that we have lost the man Maurice Sendak, but his beautifully misbehaved children will live on.
‘He rubbed his eyes, and scratched his head
And laughed because he wasn’t dead.
His mother cried and held him tight.
His father asked ‘Are you all right?’
Pierre said ‘I am feeling fine,
Please take me home, it’s half past nine,’
The lion said, ‘If you would care
To ride on me, I’ll take you there’
And everybody looked at Pierre,
Who shouted, ‘Yes indeed, I care!’
The lion took them home to rest,
And stayed on as a weekend guest,
The moral of ‘Pierre’ is CARE!”
RIP Maurice Sendak and thanks for the wild rumpus!
Maurice Sendak (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
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