Colbert Report Segment Leads to Actual Children’s-Book Deal

It turns out Stephen Colbert’s recent interview with legendary children’s author Maurice Sendak didn’t just generate extreme hilarity — it has also led to a real-life book deal.

On a January episode of The Colbert Report, the satirist said he planned to “cash in” on the celebrity children’s book craze, joining stars like John Travolta and Madonna as a budding author. In the two-part segment featuring Sendak, author of Where the Wild Things Are, Colbert previewed his own foray into children’s literature: I Am a Pole (And So Can You!). Grand Central Publishing announced Tuesday it will publish the book — an illustrated account of a pole’s journey to self-discovery – on May 8. Grand Central published Colbert’s first bestseller, I Am America (And So Can You!) in 2007.

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When Colbert asked Sendak what it takes for a celebrity to produce a successful book, Sendak joked, “You’ve started already by being an idiot … That is already the very first demand.” Colbert kicked around a few potential plotlines — a squirrel loses his mittens, a buffalo loses his gun — before presenting Sendak with his first draft of I Am a Pole (And So Can You!). It outlines the story of a lonely pole who searches for his purpose and ends up as an American flag pole.

Colbert’s idea seemed to amuse Sendak, who provided advice on the next step Colbert must take. “All you need to do is get a popular illustrator who has a horrible sense of design, no taste for type, nothing about the aesthetics of what a picture book could look like,” Sendak said, “and you will probably make a lot of money.”

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