Ruth Ida Krauss (July 25, 1901 – July 10, 1993) was an American writer of children's books, including The Carrot Seed, and of theatrical poems for adult readers. Many of her books are still in print.
Early life and education Ruth Krauss was born July 25, 1901, in Baltimore, Maryland to Julius Leopold and Blanche Krauss, members of "an upper-crust Jewish family." As a child, Ruth had numerous health problems, including the rare autoimmune disorder pemphigus. She began writing and illustrating her own stories while still a child, hand sewing her pages into books.
Ruth went to Western High School, and began studying violin there with Franz Bornschein. She left in 1917 after her sophomore year to focus on the study of art. She enrolled in the Maryland Institute for the Promotion of the Mechanic Arts (now known as the Maryland Institute College of Art). The school's focus on applied arts did not suit her and she left after about a year. Her next stop was a girls camp, Camp Walden in Maine, where she discovered her love for writing; the camp yearbook for 1919 contains her first published piece of writing. After the camp, she studied violin in Peabody Institute of Music's preparatory program. She studied the first two years with her former teacher Bornschein, and a third year under Frank Gittelson. Both considered her a naturally gifted but undisciplined musician.
Ruth's father died in November 1921, requiring Ruth to drop out of school and give up the violin professionally. She took a series of office jobs and lived with her mother and at times with her aunt's family. In 1927, an inheritance from her grandmother allowed her to leave home and follow artistic pursuits. She enrolled at the Parsons School of Design in New York, focusing mostly on costume design. Classmates during this time included Claire McCardell, and she had a brief relationship with Isamu Noguchi. Graduating from Parsons in 1929, as the Great Depression was beginning, she found it difficult to get work as an illustrator. Among the work she did find in this period was the first pictorial book jacket for the Modern Library (Alice in Wonderland, 1932). She was supported during this period by her mother, who continued to run the family furrier business until her remarriage in 1930 to Albert A. Brager, founder of the Brager-Eisenberg department store.
Ruth was a member of the Writers' Laboratory at the Bank Street College of Education in New York during the 1940s.
Personal life and career In 1930, she met and married journalist and crime novelist Lionel White; they divorced shortly before World War II. After her divorce from White, Krauss married the cartoonist and children's book author Crockett Johnson in 1943. They collaborated on many books, among them The Carrot Seed, How to Make an Earthquake, Is This You? and The Happy Egg.
Another eight of her books were illustrated by Maurice Sendak, starting with A Hole Is to Dig (1952), which launched Sendak's career. The Krauss-Sendak collaborations spawned a host of imitators of their "unruly" and "rebellious" child protagonists. The peculiar definitional phrasing of Krauss's writing in this book—with sentences like "A party is to make little children happy"—was based on quotes from children in Rowayton School Kindergarten (in Rowayton, Connecticut, where Krauss and Johnson lived) and became something of a cultural phenomenon when the book was first published and has helped to maintain its popularity.
Krauss also illustrated a few of her own books. In addition to her books for children, Krauss wrote three collections of poetry and plays in verse for adults.
Recognition Two books that Krauss wrote were runners-up for the prestigious Caldecott Medal, which is awarded to children's book illustrators: The Happy Day (1950) and A Very Special House (1954).
Maurice Sendak characterized Krauss as a giant in the world of children's literature, saying: "Ruth broke rules and invented new ones, and her respect for the natural ferocity of children bloomed in to poetry that was utterly faithful to what was true in their lives". He honored her in the New Yorker cover illustration for September 27, 1993, which shows a homeless boy using Krauss's book A Hole Is to Dig as a pillow and another child holding I Can Fly as they sleep.
Books
Children's books TitleYearIllustratorNotes1.A Good Man and His Good Wife1944Ad Reinhardt; re-illustrated Marc Simont (1962)2.The Carrot Seed1945Crockett Johnson3.The Great Duffy1946Mischa Richter4.The Growing Story1947Phyllis Rowand5.Bears1948Phyllis Rowand; re-illustrated Maurice Sendak (2005)6.The Happy Day1949Marc SimontA Caldecott Medal Honor Book for Simont7.The Big World and the Little House8.The Backward Day19509.I Can FlyMary Blair10.The Bundle Book1951Helen Stone11.A Hole Is to Dig: A First Book of First Definitions1952Maurice Sendak12.A Very Special House1953Maurice SendakA Caldecott Medal Honor Book for Sendak13.I'll Be You and You Be Me1954Maurice Sendak14.How To Make An EarthquakeCrockett Johnson15.Charlotte and the White Horse1955Maurice Sendak16.Is This You?By Ruth Krauss and Crockett Johnson17.I Want to Paint My Bathroom Blue1956Maurice Sendak18.Monkey Day1957Phyllis Rowand19.The Birthday PartyMaurice Sendak20.Somebody Else's Nut Tree, and Other Tales from Children195821.A Moon or a Button: A Collection of First Picture Ideas1959Remy Charlip22.Open House for Butterflies1960Maurice Sendak23.Mama, I Wish I Was Snow; Child You'd Be Very Cold1962Ellen Raskin24.A Bouquet of Littles1963Jane Flora25.Eyes, Nose, Fingers, Toes1964Elizabeth Schneider26.What a Fine Day for ...1967Remy CharlipMusic by Al Carmines27.The Happy EggCrockett Johnson28.This Thumbprint: Words and Thumbprints29.The Little King, the Little Queen, the Little Monster and Other Stories You Can Make Up Yourself196830.If Only196931.I Write It1970Mary Chalmers32.Under Twenty33.Everything Under a Mushroom1973Margot Tomes34.Love and the Invention of Punctuation35.Little Boat Lighter Than a Cork1976Esther Gilman36.Under Thirteen37.When I Walk I Change the Earth197838.Somebody Spilled the Sky1979Eleanor Hazard39.Minestrone 198140.Re-examination of Freedom41.Love Poems for Children198642.Big and Little1987Mary Szilagyi43.And I Love YouSteven Kellogg44.Roar Like a Dandelion2020Sergio Ruzzier
Poetry and verse plays TitleYearIllustratorThe Cantilever Rainbow1965Antonio FrasconiThere's A Little Ambiguity Among the Bluebells and Other Theater Poems1968This Breast Gothic1973
References
Further reading Nel, Philip. Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss: How an Unlikely Couple Found Love, Dodged the FBI, and Transformed Children's Literature. University of Mississippi Press, 2012.
External links Ruth Krauss papers at the University of Connecticut Libraries Ruth Krauss at Library of Congress Authorities – with 63 catalog records