Where the Wild Things AreWritten and illustrated by Maurice Sendak

Basic information• Where the Wild Things Are,

Written and Illustrated by Maurice Sendak

• Winner of the 1964 Caldecott Medal

Style & Media The style we see here is expressionism but could also venture into surrealism.

The features of the “wild things” are large and exaggerated.

The illustrator uses bold patterns and colors.

Although Max is human and has human traits, most of the story in drawn in an imaginary world.

There is a lot of precision pen work in the drawings.

There are many bold and dark colors to make this world seem big and foreign to the reader.

Line There are a lot of longer lines in

this book. The ones here create length in the trees and setting. The show the reader how big Max’s imagination is.

Other lines are thin and sketchy to create texture in the “wild things”

Shape The shapes in this story are

rounded and curved, suggesting a lot of nature. The “wild things” all have complex shapes that vary in each of them.

The shape of the creatures conveys movement and supports the imaginative tone of the story.

Color The colors in this book give off a

specific mood.

The dark tones give the reader a sense of nighttime and isolation on this secluded island of beasts.

The pictures are very saturated and contain almost no negative space.

The colors are achromatic and include some deep shades of blue, brown, and green. The may coincide with the loneliness Max feels when he misses his home at the end.

Texture• As stated earlier, there are

sketched and crosshatched pen lines in the “wild things” that convey texture in their skin and/or fur.

• The way they are designed gives off the impression of rough or scaly skin, course and fine hair, and soft fur.

• Texture is one of the strongest elements that Sendak uses in this book.

Composition The background of the

illustrations is flatter than the foreground, but this gives the characters more dimension and makes them almost pop right off the page.

There is a good balance of flat colors as well as detail and more complexity.

The dark eerie scenery makes this world seem vast.