Outside Over There [Paperback]

The story of 9-year-old Ida rescuing her baby sister from goblins with the aid of the magical music from her wonder horn is timeless and enjoyable and could happily slip in to any century's fairy tale tradition. And as with the very best fairy tales there is so much more beneath the surface if the reader cares enough to look.

As is proper, the first things you notice on opening the book are the illustrations and how slightly strange they appear. Extensive photo reference for the figures married to the fantasy landscapes they inhabit lends the book a surreal edginess. These illustrations avoid the airy cross-hatching of "Where the Wild Things Are" or the comic book boldness and flat colours of "In the Night Kitchen" (the two previous books in Sendak's loose trilogy). Instead "Outside Over There" is filled to bursting with sumptuous, velvety watercolours akin to Pre-Raphaelite paintings. Yet for all their painterly-ness and lovingly rendered seas, skies and foliage the pictures are not immediately accessible and they are not pretty. Rather, theirs is a stealthy beauty uncovered through scrutiny. I cannot look at them now without a tingle at the base of my skull, and a churning in my gut for the man's overwhelming talent.

The text is a different animal entirely, with a simplicity that hides the amount of work Sendak put in perfecting it. One hundred drafts over a year and a half distilled the text to a bareness that threatens to dissolve in front of your eyes. This is spare but substantial writing with a poetic depth. However, if there is a fault it lies in the words. An occasional turn of phrase will have a slightly over-wrought, over-written weight that risks unravelling the delicacy of the rest. That said, the words keep their feet at these moments and join with the paintings in an intensity that avoids shallow prettiness.

Sendak has said "Outside Over There" resonates on three levels. The top level, I take to mean, is the baby kidnapping plot. Beneath this is the deep psychological vein of Ida coming to terms with unwanted responsibility (i.e. having to look after her baby sister. It was her failure to do so that allowed the kidnapping to occur). There are some tremendous illustrations that capture vividly Ida's frustration and anger. The view from her window switches from foliage to a stormy sea and the sinking of a sailing ship (her father's?) suggesting a rather disturbing orphan fantasy is being played out in Ida's head, revenge for this most boring of tasks falling to her when she'd much rather be playing her horn. This moment convinced me that this book should not be classed exclusively as children's literature. It poses other questions. Is this a children's book despite or because of these difficult and controversial ideas? Can children see the meaning beyond the symbolism and relate to the anger and frustration, or is it beyond their ken? Is this actually an adult's book? Sendak is famous for never writing down to children and maintains they know exactly what is going on. I would like to think so too, and would have no hesitation in giving this book to my young daughter.
There is also a suggestion that what happens in the story does not, in fact, happen at all. It is all part of a fantasy Ida creates to escape the tedium of child-minding while her mother is momentarily occupied with thoughts of her far-flung sailor husband.

Sendak's third level, then, is the parallels the story has with his own life, either direct or subliminal. Although the heroine of the book is undoubtedly Ida, Sendak has said that it is the baby's story, and that, unusually, it is with the baby that he identifies. When Sendak was born his sister, Natalie, was Ida's age and had to spend much of her time supervising the infant Maurice. Mozart is the artist's favourite composer and this influence pervades the whole book. The story is set at the end of the eighteenth century (Mozart died in 1791). In one picture Mozart can be seen sitting at a piano composing "The Magic Flute" (Ida's instrument is "the wonder horn"). One of the denouements in the story is apparently stolen from "The Magic Flute", but without hearing this opera I do not know what it is! What purpose the sleeping shepherd who is later seen driving his flock over a hill? Who are the three red-haired fellows crossing the bridge and what are they pointing at? There are so many little delights and details enlivening these pictures, with colours so striking and compositions so energetic that it is hard to see a time, even with repeated viewings, when they will ever become stale. It is my fervent hopes to one day see these paintings in the original.

This 20 year-old book should not be kept from adults simply because bookshops automatically squirrel it away in the children's section - and adults should not be ashamed to seek this book out to read it for themselves! A place should be found for it among more 'adult' literature.
"Outside Over There" is not a children's book, nor is it an adult's book. It is plain and simply a book with pictures, and one with a universal appeal borne out by its longevity. It is also Maurice Sendak's most potent artistic statement, conceived of intellect and passion in equal measure, and a genuine work of art.