What I researched and Why? I researched what people thought of the book and also the author. The reason I researched this is because I believe that some people may have seen this book as very controversy. It involves 'scary' monsters and them Max wanting to 'Eat up' his mother. This can be seen as something children should not read because it may scare them or give them ideas that they should not do.

What I found? When I googled critiques of Where the Wild Things Are many items came up. The one that stuck out to me was the one by PBS. It opens up with an author who wrote an article called "The Not-So-Wild Things." The author states that when Sendak released the book, he was called a Wild Thing. Many people believed that children should not read the book because it was "dark and disturbing." It then questions how books similar to Where the Wild Things Are are treated with in school. The answer was censorship. http://www.pbs.org/now/arts/kidslit.html


My Interpretation When it comes to censorship, I believe that it is not always a good thing. Censoring a book, I believe would take us back in time when books were banned. The idea of banning books was to prevent children from reading something the adults did not want them to read. The idea may have seemed good, but the children would be more inclined to read something that is banned. I know from my personal experience that if something is 'off limits' to me, I am more inclined to want to do it. Also calling the book dark and disturbing is very interesting. Many other things that have been written could be classified as dark and disturbing. Where the Wild Things Are may have some dark and disturbing aspects, but I do not think children would find these particular images disturbing. In our society today, children are exposed to many other things that are more disturbing, such as the news. Our society is becoming more violent and the solution is thought to be censorship. Censorship is not going to solve the violence in our society. It may help people feel better that their children can't read a particular book or listen to a certain song, but sooner or later they will be exposed to it.

What this Adds to Class Discussion? The question about what children should read and should not read seems to be a common topic. My question is would a book like Where the Wild Things are have any impact on the children reading it? When I was little, i would just read a book and not really think much about it. This somewhat relates to Tom Sawyer in that Tom did 'bad' things and Max did 'bad' things. Yet are these boys considered 'naughty'?