Maurice Sendak Quotations

It dawned on me that art was the way I could survive.

Venturing back further, learning is so slow. Accomplishment is so slow. Experiencing and evaluating your experience is so slow.

Life has only gotten better personally for me as I've gotten older. I mean, being young was such a gross waste of time. I was just such a miserable, miserable person.

I want to see me to the end working, living for myself. Ripeness is all.

The magic of childhood is the strangeness of childhood — the uniqueness that makes us see things that other people don't see.

I have been doodling with ink and watercolor on paper all my life. It's my way of stirring up my imagination to see what I find hidden in my head. I call the results dream pictures, fantasy sketches, and even brain-sharpenin g exercises.

I became a set designer for opera. I'm a great opera buff, I love classical music, and I needed a time-out.

How do you write for children? I really have never figured that out. So I decided to just ignore it

Art has always been my salvation.

What is the point of it all? Not leaving legacies. But being ripe. Being ripe.