And the wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws.
Maurice SendakRead
I have to accept my role. I will never kill myself like Vincent Van Gogh. Nor will I paint beautiful water lilies like Monet. I can't do that. I'm in the idiot role of being a kiddie book person.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Accepting one's role and limitations in the creative landscape.
In this quote, Maurice Sendak reflects on the importance of recognizing and accepting one's own artistic identity and role within the larger picture of art and creativity. He compares himself to iconic artists like Vincent Van Gogh and Claude Monet, acknowledging their greatness while simultaneously embracing his own unique contribution as a creator of children's literature.
Themes
AcceptanceArtIdentitySelf-RecognitionCreativity
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech on embracing individuality, one might reference Sendak's role as a children's author.
More from Maurice Sendak
All quotes βFrom their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions, fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can. And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming Wild Things.
Maurice SendakRead
I'm totally crazy, I know that. I don't say that to be a smartass, but I know that that's the very essence of what makes my work good. And I know my work is good. Not everybody likes it, that's fine. I don't do it for everybody. Or anybody. I do it because I can't not do it.
Maurice SendakRead
That always seemed to be the most critical test that a child was confronted with - loss of parents, loss of direction, loss of love. Can you live without a mother and a father?
Maurice SendakRead
One of the few graces of getting old - and God knows there are few graces - is that if you've worked hard and kept your nose to the grindstone, something happens: The body gets old but the creative mechanism is refreshed, smoothed and oiled and honed. That is the grace. That is what's happening to me.
Maurice SendakRead
To get a child's trust - you may know or not - is a very hard thing to do. They're so used to not believing adults - because adults tell tales and lies all the time.
Maurice SendakRead
Similar quotes
If, when you wake up in the morning, you can think of nothing but writing . . . then you are a writer.
Rainer Maria RilkeRead
I was honoured when they asked me to appear at the president's birthday rally in Madison Square Garden. There was like a hush over the whole place when I came on to sing 'Happy Birthday,' like if I had been wearing a slip, I would have thought it was showing or something. I thought, 'Oh, my gosh, what if no sound comes out!'
Marilyn MonroeRead
I was never interested in looking at myself in an aesthetic mirror. My intention was always to get away from myself, though I knew perfectly well that I was using myself. Call it a little game between 'I' and 'me.'
Marcel DuchampRead
Nothing I force myself to write about ever turns out well, and so I've learned to wait for the voice, the incident, the image that reverberates.
Louise ErdrichRead
When you are having fun and creating something you love, it shows in the product. So when a woman is sifting through a rack of clothes, somehow that piece of clothing that you had so much fun designing speaks to her; she responds to it and buys it. I believe you can actually transfer that energy to material things as you're creating them.
Tom FordRead
Ballet technique never becomes easy, it becomes possible
Agnes De MilleRead