R.I.P.

"Librarians objected to Night Kitchen because the boy is nude. They told me you can't have a penis in a book for children; it frightens them. Yet parents take their children to museums where they see Roman statues with their dicks broken off. You'd think that would frighten them more. But 'Art' is somehow desexualized in people's minds. My God, that would make the great artists vomit. ...In this country...we prefer the blur, the figleaf, the diaper."


"Contrary to most of the propaganda in books for the young, childhood is only partly a time of innocence. It is, in my opinion, a time of seriousness, bewilderment, and a good deal of suffering. It's also possibly the best of all times. Imagination for the child is the miraculous, freewheeling device he uses to course his way through the problems of every day. It's the normal and healthy outlet for corrosive emotions ...the positive and appropriate channeling of overwhelming and, to a child, inappropriate feelings. It is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis."

-- Maurice Sendak