Where the Wild Things Are

Where the Wild Things Are is a picture book written and illustrated by the American author Maurice Sendak, published in 1963.

Max is sent to his room for misbehaving, and the room turns into a jungle, and a boat with his name on it carries him over a year and a day to the place where the Wild Things are. The creatures are large, toothy and frightened of nothing except Max, who looks them in the eye without blinking until they call him the most wild thing of all and make him their king. The rest of the story is his: the rumpus, the crown, the command to be still, and the smell of supper waiting for him at home. Sendak leaves a great deal out of the pages and lets the pictures carry the size of the place, and the text runs to fewer than forty sentences, which is why it holds up when it is read aloud.

Sendak drew the book as well as writing it, and his Wild Things spend their time eating, sleeping and swinging from trees rather than doing anything wicked.