Would You Go This Far to Write a Children’s Classic?

Ducklings Sculpture at the Boston Public Garden / Lorianne Di Sabato on Flickr

For several years I lived near one of America’s loveliest urban parks, the Boston Public Garden. Almost every day, I walked past its pond — called “the lagoon” — that captivated eight ducklings in Robert McCloskey’s classic Make Way for Ducklings.

But I hadn’t known the backstory of the book until I read Leonard Marcus’ Show Me a Story!, a collection of interviews with…