Harry Potter isn’t the only thing Scholastic is doing right. Late last year they published the first pop-up book illustrated by Maurice Sendak. Mommy! was a collaboration between Sendak, author Arthur Yorinks and the noted paper engineer Matthew Reinhart.
The book’s beginnings can be traced to a play written and directed by Arthur Yorinks called It’s Alive for the Night Kitchen Radio Theater Company (which was founded by Yorinks and Sendak). The story is about a baby’s search for his mother in a haunted house.
“Unlike a traditional picture book, a pop-up book requires that a great deal more original artwork be created. Maurice Sendak was certainly up to the task creating every single piece of color art including the many gorgeous backgrounds!”
Sendak is best known for his book Where the Wild Things Are which one the Caldecott Medal in 1964. Another of his works In the Night’s Kitchen, which features a naked boy as one of the characters, was listed as number 25 on the American Library Association’s “100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990-2000.” (The Harry Potter series comes in at number 7!)
The sneak peek of the project at Robert Sabuda website.
A 4 minute video trailer for the book including a chat with Sendak.
The PBS American Masters profile of Sendak