Leonard s marcus biography

Marcus was married to children's book author and illustrator Amy Schwartz from 1990 until her death in 2023.
Leonard Marcus is a prize-winning author, curator, NYU professor and authority on children's literature featured in print, TV and radio.
Leonard S. Marcus is an American author and expert on English language children's literature.

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Photo by Sonya Sones

Leonard’s pathfinding writings and exhibitions have earned him acclaim as one of the world’s preeminent authorities on children’s books and the people who create them. He is the author of more than 25 award-winning biographies, histories, interview collections, and inside looks at the making of children’s literature’s enduring classics. His reviews and commentary have been featured in the New York Times Book Review, Washington Post, The Horn Book, and on numerous radio and television programs including Good Morning America, All Things Considered, PBS NewsHour, BBC Radio 4, CBC As It Happens, Beijing Television, and Radio New Zealand, among others.

A founding trustee of the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, Leonard curated the New York Public Library’s landmark exhibition The ABC of It: Why Children’s Books Matter, as well as a long roster of touring exhibitions highlighting the art of Golden Books, Alice and Martin Provensen, Leonard Weisgard, Bernard Waber, Jules Feiffer, Garth Williams, and others. He has served as a consultant

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“You’ve done it!” began Leonard Weisgard’s characteristically warm and encouraging letter to me, written in the spring of 1992 soon after he’d read my just published biography of Margaret Wise Brown. During the ten years I spent writing my book, Leonard had done everything possible to help. He had welcomed me to Denmark and allowed me to interview him for days on end. He and his wife Phyllis had both made it clear that no question was off-limits. In advance of my arrival, he had prepared pages of notes as memory prompts and had taken out a stack of old letters and manuscripts. One day Leonard showed me the inscribed paper-thin platinum pocket watch that Margaret, extravagant as always, had given him on winning the Caldecott Medal for their book The Little Island. Each evening, I wrote down everything that had been said that day in my notebook. After 11 days, I had a novella’s worth of stories.

My one disappointment was that Leonard had no photographs. (I later realized that—notwithstanding her film-star good looks–Margaret Wise Brown was intensely self-conscious about her

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Marcus, Leonard S.

MARCUS, Leonard S. American, b. 1950. Genres: Children's fiction, Art/ Art history, Literary criticism and history, Young adult non-fiction, Biography. Career: Writer. Teacher of seminars at School of Visual Arts, 1982-, and New School for Social Research, 1985-; coordinator of symposia; exhibition curator. Creator and director of Parenting magazine's annual awards for excellence in children's literature. Publications: (ed. and author of intro.) New York Street Cries in Rhyme, 1977; The American Store Window, 1978; Petrouchka (juvenile), 1983; An Epinal Album: Popular Prints from Nineteenth-Century France, 1984; (ed.) The Picture Book, 1985; (ed.) Humor and Play in Children's Literature, 1990; (ed. with A. Schwartz, and author of intro.) Mother Goose's Little Misfortunes, 1990; Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened by the Moon, 1992; (compiler) Lifelines: A Poetry Anthology Patterned on the Stages of Life, 1994; 75 Years of Children's Book Week Posters, 1994; Making of Goodnight Moon, 1997; Caldecott Celebration, 1998; Side by Side, 2001; Ways of Telling, 2002