Holiday 2020 Catalogue

27 H o l i d a y 2 0 2 0 Beautiful First Edition, First Issue Of Where The Wild Things Are , Signed By Sendak With A Large Original Drawing By Him Of A Wild Thing 24. SENDAK, Maurice. Where the Wild Things Are. New York, 1963. Oblong quarto, original half gray cloth, dust jacket, custom slipcase. $34,000. First edition, in first-issue dust jacket, of one of the scarcest and most desirable books in modern children’s literature, signed with a very large original sketch of one of his wild things shouting, “Boo!” Hailed as “the Picasso of children’s books,” Maurice Sendak has produced more than 80 books, of which Where the Wild Things Are is unquestionably the most famous, being one of the ten best-selling children’s books of all time. “Sendak’s exploration of the realms of the unconscious in Where the Wild Things Are … lifts his work beyond the confines of the children’s picture book, and places it among major art of the 20th century” (Carpenter & Prichard, 476-77). First-issue dust jacket , with correct blurbs and no mention of the Caldecott award. Book fine; exceptionally bright dust jacket with none of the usual toning, only two short closed tears. A beautiful copy of this great rarity, one of the finest we have ever seen, most desirable signed and with a large drawing by Sendak of one of his iconic wild things. “There should be a place where only the things you want to happen, happen.”