At Rolling Stone‘s request, Eggers agreed to a rare interview about the project. The film’s co-screenwriter, Dave Eggers, was so absorbed in the project he agreed to write a novelization of the book, titled The Wild Things, at Sendak’s request.

But his highest achievement is in having found a fresh way to tell us a story we already know so well, about the monstrous forces of love and hate that mark every childhood-and pursue us howling into adulthood.It took years to bring the adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s 1963 children’s book Where the Wild Things Are to the big screen, and this weekend the Spike Jonze-directed film cleared another hurdle: the thoughtful and visually stunning picture opened at Number One at the box office. Eggers has written a book for readers of all ages, without dumbing down his prose. The best books-and I happily include The Wild Things on this list-manage to do both. The real question, when it comes to literature, is whether a particular author is interested in hustling us through a breakneck plot (a la Dan Brown) or investigating the internal lives of his or her creations. We get a writhing Technicolor landscape of carnivorous vines, lava beds, mini-tornadoes, mutant snakes, and, of course, the beasts themselves, a motley bundle of brawn and neuroses. 'Once Max reaches the island of the beasts, Eggers goes for broke. Funny, dark, and alive, The Wild Things is a timeless and time-tested tale for all ages.Ĭlick here to read an excerpt published in the New Yorker. But things get complicated when Max realizes that the Wild Things want as much from him as he wants from them. He lands on the island of the Wild Things, and soon he becomes their king. He finds a boat there, jumps in, and ends up on the open sea, destination unknown. During a fight at home, Max flees and runs away into the woods. At the same time, he finds himself capable of startling acts of wildness-he wears a wolf suit, bites his mom, can't always control his outbursts. His father is gone, his mother is spending time with a younger boyfriend, his sister is becoming a teenager and no longer has interest in him. The Wild Things, based loosely on the storybook by Maurice Sendak and the screenplay co-written with Spike Jonze, is about the confusions of a boy, Max, making his way in a world he can't control.

The Wild Things by Dave Eggers