I think you will be hard pressed to find a children’s lit blog that does not feature the death of Maurice Sendak.

While I have always loved Where the Wild Things Are and all other things Sendak, I somehow did not realize what a part of me he was until I learned of his death. I heard the news on MSNBC on XM Satellite in the middle of a show about politics. And I almost had to pull over. How had the The Wild Things man died?

I have spent a lot of the day trying to figure out why this whole thing is so important to me and I think I finally get it. Maurice Sendak had become a rock star in the world of children’s literature. Almost everyone knew his name. When he was on The Colbert Report recently, clips of the interview went viral.

In today’s day when it seems reality tv stars and people who are famous simply for being famous command so much of the airway, I love knowing that Maurice Sendak, a children’s author, was a household name. I love knowing that he was loved.

And I can’t help but imagine Max and all the Wild Things welcoming him with open arms right now…