In this episode, we speak with Golan Moskowitz, Assistant Professor in the Department of Jewish Studies at Tulane University, about Maurice Sendak. Golan discusses Sendak, the beloved author and illustrator of picture books, with sensitivity to the interplay between queer, Jewish, immigrant, and traumatic elements of Sendak’s life and expressiveness. Golan shares poignant analysis of Sendak’s career in the broader context of assimilation into dominant American society, the Holocaust, gay liberation, and the AIDS crisis. Golan is the author of Wild Visionary: Maurice Sendak in Queer Jewish Context. Golan draws from Kathryn Bond Stockton‘s concept of queer children “growing sideways” in his research and throughout the episode.
