Sendak’s Last Book: Extraordinary Art
Fifty years after the iconic “Where the Wild Things Are” was published, the late Maurice Sendak’s final completed book, a tribute to his brother Jack, is garnering generous praise. Inspired by Shakespeare’s “The Winter’s Tale” and influenced by the drawings of William Blake, Sendak’s “My Brother’s Book” is the story of two brothers, Jack and Guy, separated from each other when the brightest star in the sky smashes. Jack is flung to “continents of ice” and Guy to the “lair of a bear,” but they are eventually reunited. “To read this intensely private work is to look over the artist’s shoulder as he crafts his own afterworld, a place where he lies in silent embrace with those he loves for ever,” wrote Publishers Weekly. ALA Booklist praised the book’s “extraordinary art – some of Sendak’s most beautiful,” and said that “Sendak’s tribute to his brother is also a final tribute to his own genius.” Sendak died last May at the age of 83.
