Maurice Sendak: “I Am in Love with The World”

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Maurice Sendak was the embodiment of childlike whimsy, even in his final years. In fact, the beloved children’s author was more enchanted by the beauty of life as he got older.

In an illustrated interview with “Fresh Air,” Sendak talks about death, and more importantly, what it means to live a full life while you can.

Sendak was an atheist, so he was under no impression that he would go to a glorious afterlife when he died. He explains how much harder it is to embrace death as an atheist. While religious folks are comforted by their belief in life after death, atheists must fully embrace the lives they are living now, knowing their lives will come to a permanent end one day.

His perspective gave him a rich experience of life as he got older. He wasn’t afraid of the death monster. Like the characters in his books, he befriended the looming creature everyone else seems so afraid of, treating death as a beautiful but sad part of life.

Credit: Amazon.com

Maurice Sendak experienced the harsh reality of death from a young age. Many of his Jewish family members were killed during the Holocaust, and he was riddled with health problems as a child. Being sick in bed forced him to use his imagination. He dreamed up entire universes in his head before publishing the famous Where The Wild Things Are in 1963.

In his brief interview, he says growing old is a blessing, but he hates watching people he loves die before him. He lost his partner of 50 years, Dr. Eugene Glynn, in 2007. Although Sendak himself died in 2012 from stroke complications, his stories and this 2011 interview below, live on without him.

No explanation or summary does this short interview with Sendak justice. The author sums up the bittersweet beauty of growing old and dying better than anyone. It’s truly something special.

Take a look at the video for yourself below, and try not to tear up at the end: