Sendak, Maurice | Eight drawings for Macbeth, his earliest formal artwork, ca. 1943

Sendak, Maurice

Eight early drawings for Macbeth, made for Grace Warshauer’s English class at Lafayette High School, Brooklyn, ca. 1943, with a group of autograph letters signed (1960–1991) from Sendak to his former teacher

Eight original watercolor and ink drawings on card, each signed and captioned, uniformly mounted and framed (each to sight: 226 x 291 mm; frame 1275 x 834 mm); toned, some staining from adhesive to mounts. [Together with:] A group of four letters sent to Grace Warshauer, comprising: Autograph letter signed ("Maurice Sendak"), 28 November 1960, thanking Warshauer for her early encouragement, describing her class and the Macbeth assignment as formative to his creative life and career — autograph letter signed ("Maurice Sendak"), 25 December 1973, updating Warshauer on his work, teaching, publishers, and new life in Connecticut, conveying contentment in his career and personal rhythms — autograph letter signed ("Maurice Sendak"), 22 June 1987, on his difficult school years, affirming Warshauer’s lasting influence, and updating her on his ongoing creative projects and artistic purpose — autograph letter signed ("Maurice Sendak"), 3 March 1991, briefly and affectionately updating Warshauer on his opera work, creative vitality, and children’s theatre projects, all roughly 4to, two on Maurice Sendak stationery; each with fold marks [and:] a note from Grace Warshauer, congratulating Sendak on Ravel’s L’Enfant et les Sortilèges.

An extraordinary survival: Sendak’s earliest sustained narrative drawings, produced at age sixteen as an attempt not to fail English, preserved by the teacher who recognized and championed his talent.

As Sendak later recalled, he was so shy and frightened in class that he “never spoke up” and could not write essays; Warshauer—also the school’s guidance counselor—noticed that he “was always drawing” and permitted him to earn his grade through art. The resulting suite of eight Macbeth scenes reveals a fledgling illustrator already capable of dramatic staging, character type, and emotional atmosphere. Warshauer kept the drawings for the rest of her life, and the experience proved pivotal for Sendak: the same teacher later helped him secure illustration credit in her physics-teacher colleague’s science text Atomics for the Millions (1947), his first published book. Indeed, he wrote to her in 1960:

"Those Macbeth illustrations were so important to me because of your encouragement + perhaps it is not too much to say that the Macbeth incident was one of the important links in the elaborate chain of events that led to my present happy state - that of writing and illustrating for children."

The accompanying letters—spanning decades—form a remarkably intimate record of their relationship. In them, Sendak repeatedly acknowledges the importance of Warshauer’s early encouragement, writing in 1960 that her class was the “only bright spot in my school life - I loathed school I'm sorry to say,” and in 1987 that he had lumped “all teachers psychotic—with rare exception of you.” He reflects on the emotional strain of his wartime adolescence, recalling his school years as marked by “terror + depression,” and describes how her early encouragement and the Macbeth assignment led to his life’s work as an illustrator. The letters trace his career from early struggles to major opera and theatre productions, including Higglety Pigglety Pop!, Ravel’s L’Enfant et les Sortilèges, Janáček’s Cunning Little Vixen, and his later work in England.

A rare and deeply personal archive, documenting the genesis of Sendak’s artistic identity, the pedagogical insight of a remarkable teacher, and the earliest known visual evidence of the narrative instincts that would shape a foundational career in American illustration.

PROVENANCE

Grace Warshauer, the artist’s teacher at Lafayette High School; thence by descent