It occurred to me the other day that the wild things in Maurice Sendak's most famous picture book are actually a version of trolls or ogres. This makes sense when you recall how Sendak himself described the inspiration for the wild things:Then, very gradually, these other people began to appear on my drawing paper, and I knew right away that they were my relatives. They were my uncles and aunts. It wasn't that they were monstrous people; it was simply that I didn't care for them when I was a child because they were rude, and because they ruined every Sunday, and because they ate all our food. They pinched us and poked us and said those tedious, boring things that grown-ups say, and my sister and my brother and I sat there in total dismay and rage. The only fun we had was later, giggling over their grotesque faces—the huge noses, the spiraling hair pouring out of the wrong places. So I know who those "wild things" are. They are my Jewish relatives.
