Cover image for William the Curious, from William the Curious, 1997, by Charles Santore (Collection of the artist)
and illustrate it. That was a bad idea because I did
frog—it’s been sitting on my desk ever since. I
four or five pictures, I put a lot of time in, and then
thought I’d like to write a story about that frog, but
the story went off in another direction and they
I didn’t consider myself a writer. So I just started
were no longer relevant. So, I stopped that. Now I
scribbling. I mentioned it to a friend who was a
write the story and don’t think about pictures at all.
professor at the Annenberg School at the time,
I just write a story, then I illustrate it as though I’m
and he said, “Just write it. I’ll edit it for you.” I wrote
illustrating somebody else’s story.
it and he edited it, but I didn’t like what he did,
TOW: When did you start writing your own stories?
so I put it away for a while. Then I took it out and rewrote it, and I sent it to a couple of publishers
SANTORE: I wrote William the Curious before I ever
and got responses like, “Knights in armor are
did a children’s book, maybe thirty-five years ago.
not in vogue.” I never got criticism that I thought was valid, but I just put the story away and never
TOW: What propelled you to do that? SANTORE: Somebody gave me a little ceramic
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WOODMERE ART MUSEUM
thought about it. After I did Peter Rabbit, Aesop’s Fables, and The Wizard of Oz, I was in a different position; I showed it to the same editors, saying,