Or is it just that they are genuinely WILD - and they know it? (If you don't believe me, ask my boys how many times they've been assumed to be girls for having long hair.) Yet a few have long flowing hair, a generally female trait. Maybe it's because some of the wild things sport beards - a generally masculine trait. (But so do female reindeer, cows, goats, and some sheep.) (So, too, are wicked step mothers witches Miss Trunchbull Cruella de Ville.) Is it because they are (at times) menacing, making a big show of how terrible they are? (Another article from The Guardian - Must monsters always be male? Huge gender bias revealed in children's books - supports this idea.) Is it merely because they are monsters - strange, mythological blends of human and animal parts? Surely that is a stereotype in itself?
![wild rumpus 2019 wild rumpus 2019](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/yJacJ54kXWA/maxresdefault.jpg)
( Although I agree that, yes - the wild things do have a masculine feel to them.Whatever that means.) How come they end up being made the scapegoat for her argument? What is it about the book that makes Grindell assume the wild things to be male? Yet once Max reaches the land of the wild things, nowhere in the story are they referred to as either male or female.
![wild rumpus 2019 wild rumpus 2019](https://www.blanemarable.com/img/s/v-10/p3715683447-4.jpg)
So he was sent to bed without eating anything.Īdmittedly, this is before the forest grew up in Max’s room, before ‘the walls became the world all around' and before he sails away 'to where the wild things are.' of The Maurice Sendak Foundation e-mailed My Life In Books, pointing out that ‘ many of Maurice Sendak’s protagonists are girls, including, Really Rosie, Outside Over There, and Higgelty Pigglety Pop! (a girl dog).’ To which I would add, Circus Girl, Charlotte and the White Horse and Maggie Rose: Her Birthday Christmas.)Īlthough not shown pictorially, Wild Things begins with Max's mother: (Incidentally, since originally publishing this piece, Jonathan Weinberg, Ph.D. So I went back to the book to explore Grindell’s assertion that the land of the wild things really is 'devoid of females.' Because in my mind, the wild things aren't assigned any gender.
![wild rumpus 2019 wild rumpus 2019](https://bigscioty.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/wildrumpus-960x675.jpg)
Samantha Grindell, The Gender Gap in Children’s Books is the real monster in the room enters into a wild world of his making where he has total control and there are no girls. The author of The Gender Gap in Children's Books highlights the classic picture book Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak (Harper & Row, 1963) as being problematic, stating: Now, whilst I recognise the need for diversity, and for all kids to see themselves reflected in books (and acknowledge that yes, the statistics clearly show a higher percentage of male to female lead characters), I do wonder if sometimes we are in danger of exacerbating the problem, making it more potent than it actually is, and potentially depriving kids of some great books. Eastman, and Jack Ezra, among others, as the greats in children's literature means that today's kids will inherit a canon that is similarly skewed towards male authors and characters. The ongoing celebration of Maurice Sendak, Dr. Online article The Gender Gap in Children's Books is the Real Monster in the Room claims that: There's currently a lot of discussion in the world of kid lit about gender inequality - in particular, the under-representation of female characters in children's books.