The Colbert Report host Stephen Colbert interviewed Where the Wild Things Are author Maurice Sendak this week. Follow these links to watch part one and part two of the interview.

According to Shelf Awareness, Colbert “turned [to Sendak] for advice on becoming a celebrity children’s author, pitched his sequel idea for Where the Wild Things Are 2: Still Wildin’ (featuring action star Vin Diesel) and generally let the wild rumpus begin.”

During the interview, some of the “rumpus” that emerged included Sendak’s opinion on the current state of children’s literature; he finds it “abysmal” and thinks that “most books for children are very bad.”

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Amazingly, the plight of newspaper book reviews got the attention of The Colbert Report, and last night Salman Rushdie joined Stephen Colbert in a rather entertaining exchange (which got Rushdie to call Cormac McCarthy‘s THE ROAD “that book” in reference to its Oprah selection” and to admit that “no one bitches about literary criticism more than writers.”)

As for Colbert: “If it’s a good book, I had that guy on my show.”