I used to read this book to my daughter when she was 2 or 3…It was also one of her favorites. As a matter of fact, I took it out of the library and she somehow knew I had to take it back, so she hid the book…Then, I ended up buying a brand new copy for the library and later found their copy.l
I always thought it was comparable to “Sesame Street” which is full of non-threatening looking monsters, so that children will not have a fear of them. I mean, come on, the monsters in the book look like big dorks. Maurice Sendak said he modeled them after his relatives.
I think Sendak is a great artist…he did the art for the “Little Bear” series…and the book won a Caldecott for art.
If I were you I’d sneak the book in there and read it gleefully.
There’s nothing traumatic about it whatsoever.
You may be interested in the political, soccer-mom, and/or religious reasons why books and words get banned discussed
in the great book The Language Police by Diane Ravitch.
BTW, they are going to make Where The Wild Things Are into a movie (http://www.aint-it-cool.com).
But it’s important to get scared once in a while, so you can learn to get over being scared. If you shield your kids from every image that might possibly be even the least bit disturbing, they will be very poorly equipped to face tangible sources of fear when they’re older.
Absolutely loved this book as a kid and this is just beyond understanding to me.
By the way, as an all grown up MeanJoe I came across these and had to buy the entire set.
Rumpus! Rumpus!
MeanJoe
Am I the only one who was expecting a Buffy discussion here? Funny that a lot of children’s literature doesn’t cross boundaries; I’ve never heard of this book you speak of.
Let the wild rumpus start!