Dear Genius: In Memory of Maurice Sendak (1928-2012)

Working in a museum on average five days a week, I think about legacy on a daily basis. I think about people and the work they've done, the objects they've collected, and the stories they tell...and ultimately how audiences connect with them. It's rare for me to talk about my museum job here, but this week has been a particularly memorable week there, with the sad passing of Maurice Sendak. For years part of my job has been to explain to visitors his significance to our institution, and I've absorbed details of his life as if he were a relative. To many I work with he was a dear friend. To me, like many others in the world, he was and will continue to be an inspiration and live on through the objects and stories he's left behind.

Where I work, some of my favorite items in the collection are letters between editors and authors/illustrators. I appreciate them so much, because when I was an editor I remember that so much of my job was emailing with a balance of business & personal. The book Dear Genius: The Letters of Ursula Nordstrom, collected and edited by Leonard S. Marcus, houses many letters between Nordstrom and her troop of talents. Nordstrom was the editor who "discovered" Sendak, and her letters to him (many of which are in the museum's collection) are never without wit. In honor of Mr. Sendak and the woman who launched him into the world of (children's) book publishing, I give you this letter between Sendak and Nordstrom from Dear Genius (pages 166-167):

TO MAURICE SENDAK                 September 23, 1963

Dear Maurice:

We just rushed by messenger a pasted up Where the Wild to George Woods, so it can at least be considered for TEN BEST ILLUSTRATED. Of course the Holt Sendak will be included, and it seems dreadful for your Where the Wild Things Are not to be too.

Spencer Shaw is on the Newbery-Caldecott Committee. Just found out. Did he dote on you? But natch!

Maurice, before I sent the paste-up I went through it, rereading the words, and looking at the pictures again. It is MOST MAGNIFICENT, and we're so proud to have it on our list. When you were much younger, and had done only a couple of books, I remember I used to write you letters when the books were finished, and thank you for "another beautiful" job--of words of wonder from me. But I must send them, anyhow, when I look through Where the Wild Things Are. I think it is utterly magnificent, and the words are beautiful and meaningful, and it does just what you wanted it to do. And you did just what you wanted to do.

I've felt sort of down in the dumps about picture books lately, (and about those who write and illustrate and buy and review them, too, to be frank!). But this bright beautiful Monday your beautiful book is exhilirating [sic], and it reminds me that I love creative people and love to publish books for creative children.

As for creative plate makers, more later.

Yours sincerely,