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Ms. Bowles
US
Posts: 20

Questions to Consider:

1. Is Spiegelman’s use of the comic form effective in conveying the emotional and historical weight of the Holocaust? How does the format of the graphic novel support movement between past and present, and integration of the two, as Vladek tells his story? What is the argument against the suggestion that the medium lacks the seriousness needed to discuss the Holocaust?


Word Count Requirement:

500-750 words (one post) or 300-500 words each (two posts)

Sources to Reference:


Please refer to the ideas, either using a description, quote or paraphrasing, from Maus I or II in addition to one other source in your response.


Maus I (Spiegelman,1986)

Maus II (Spiegelman,1991)

“The Shadow of Past Time”: History and Graphic Representation in Maus (Chute, 2006)


Rubric to Review:

LTQ Rubric

vetoed UN resolution
Posts: 10

Maus: A past of unbridled Horror, brought to the Westchester Suburbs

It is very rare that a comic book manages to gain publicity for its impact. We usually think of comic books as vessels for bouncy, unserious premises, right? There have indeed been a few works that have broken out of those constraints and stunned readers with their hard-hitting content. Most people who are well-versed in comic books will agree that Maus by Art Spiegelman is one of those works. How do you break out of those confines? How do you use that medium to create something so sombering?

In my view, part of it has to do with Spiegelman's use of juxtaposition; the present-day setting of the book is in the generally affluent, comfortable white-picket fence NYC suburbs, or the idyllic natural beauty of the upstate Catskills. Most of the flashbacks, obviously, take you to the lands of tragedy en masse; wartime occupied Europe. That establishes a general overarching theme of juxtaposition. Then, said juxtaposition is emphasized again and again; one moment, Vladek will be talking about some grave horror he witnessed, and just as the reader will feel their stomach sink into the very floor, he will snap back to the present, sitting next to Artie, on an exercise bike in his stereotypical suburban garage. It hits you for real then and there that every survivor at some point had to make the transition back to normal life, as impossible as that seems. They lived that dichotomy, from total tragedy to normal life, every day.

In a way, one thing that I think Maus does better as a comic book than it would as say, a movie is that it allows the reader to create their own impact. There's no room for a bad director to put in cheesy sound effects or crappy effects or half-assed segues that could dampen the psychological intended effect of the story. We CREATE that impact in our minds as we read. We interpret each panel to whatever parameters which would allow it to resonate the most with us.

Gaius
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 16

Comic Format in Maus

The virtue of portraying a situation such as the Holocaust in a format such as the comic is that it allows the story to be accessible to a wider variety of audiences. There are many people who would never read a book about the Holocaust because they don’t like reading, or because they believe they would find it dull, which is much less of an issue when it comes to Maus. The artistic liberties that can be taken allow for a more diverse understanding of the story, not only what happened but its personal impact. An example of this is Speigalman’s use of masks in his storytelling. All the groups of people in the story are portrayed with different animals, a tool which Speigalman uses to portray racial, cultural, and social differences between the groups. This tool is used differently when a character pretends to be part of a group that they are not, such as when Vladek pretended to be Polish and wore a pig mask. The use of masks not only provides a visual cue for when a character is pretending to be something they are not, but also provides some modicum of insight into the emotional effect of such an act. The use of masks is even more profound when during book II Speigalman is shown being interviewed about Maus, and the emotional effect this has on him. This is visualized by him, along with the various reporters, wearing animal masks over their faces. This could be a way to symbolize the writer's identity issues when it comes to his views regarding the Holocaust. As said in the article named “Intergenerational transmission of trauma in Speigelman’s Maus,” “We argue that the social status of this medium contributes to the narrator’s uncertainty about its appropriateness and adequacy to express the tragedy of the Holocaust in its complexity.” The use of a format that is usually associated with less serious works displays how Speigalman acknowledges how far removed he is in his understanding of the Holocaust, and how he portrays it to himself and to the world in the artistic format he best understands. Also in the scene with the reporters, Speigalman is drawn growing progressively smaller as the reporters bombard him with questions, showing his uneasiness about his role in portraying the conflict. This effect would not have been achieved to the same level in a non-visual format.

The graphic format also allows the transitions between past and present to be both less confusing and more distinct, as they are both important stories. The use of the present time as a frame for the story, in its narration and in its separate story line, serves to humanize Vladek as an imperfect human being and not as an idealized survivor of a horrific event. In a non-visual format, the use of the alternating timelines would not only be very confusing, but also would not carry the same emotional depth.

The use of images in conjunction with words allows people to form a deeper emotional connection with the people they are reading about. This is especially prominent when it comes to people who have trouble visualizing things, because the drawings allow them to understand what is happening on a deeper level. The use of a graphic novel format also takes away some of the mystique and complicated feelings surrounding depictions of the Holocaust by making it appear to be less serious. This allows more people to feel comfortable reading it, and therefore opening more people’s eyes to the horrors of the Holocaust. The seemingly less serious nature of the graphic novel provides an alternate perspective to usual Holocaust stories, giving it both a greater emotional depth as well as a greater accessibility to a wide variety of readers.

Gaius
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 16

Originally posted by vetoed UN resolution on March 07, 2024 14:24

It is very rare that a comic book manages to gain publicity for its impact. We usually think of comic books as vessels for bouncy, unserious premises, right? There have indeed been a few works that have broken out of those constraints and stunned readers with their hard-hitting content. Most people who are well-versed in comic books will agree that Maus by Art Spiegelman is one of those works. How do you break out of those confines? How do you use that medium to create something so sombering?

In my view, part of it has to do with Spiegelman's use of juxtaposition; the present-day setting of the book is in the generally affluent, comfortable white-picket fence NYC suburbs, or the idyllic natural beauty of the upstate Catskills. Most of the flashbacks, obviously, take you to the lands of tragedy en masse; wartime occupied Europe. That establishes a general overarching theme of juxtaposition. Then, said juxtaposition is emphasized again and again; one moment, Vladek will be talking about some grave horror he witnessed, and just as the reader will feel their stomach sink into the very floor, he will snap back to the present, sitting next to Artie, on an exercise bike in his stereotypical suburban garage. It hits you for real then and there that every survivor at some point had to make the transition back to normal life, as impossible as that seems. They lived that dichotomy, from total tragedy to normal life, every day.

In a way, one thing that I think Maus does better as a comic book than it would as say, a movie is that it allows the reader to create their own impact. There's no room for a bad director to put in cheesy sound effects or crappy effects or half-assed segues that could dampen the psychological intended effect of the story. We CREATE that impact in our minds as we read. We interpret each panel to whatever parameters which would allow it to resonate the most with us.

I love your idea of juxtaposition, it is something I didn't think of. I agree that the comparison between the past and the present is boosted by the visuals, since when Vladek is telling his story from during the Holocaust it is usually much darker and sinister than the present day of when Art is writing. The comic format allows for a greater contrast that a book or movie would not be able to accomplish.

deepwaternearshore
Boston, MA, US
Posts: 7
I do think that Spiegelman’s use of comic form is the most effective way to convey the emotional and historical weight of the Holocaust because it allows for personal narrative to be woven in with a larger history. The reader is able to acknowledge the emotions of the people that the book follows while understanding that it is likely others felt similarly, but also have room to comprehend how each individual has a different emotional response to a given situation. I have read many books that try to effectively communicate transitions between the past and the present through chapter breaks and changing storytellers. I always think I will enjoy these books, but I get frustrated and am unable to be able to picture what is actually going on. Maus is the exception to me not enjoying books that move around to different times, and that is because of the comic form. Art tries, unsuccessfully, to keep his father telling his story chronologically saying that he will “never get it straight,” which becomes increasingly important when Art decides to make his book jump around in time, but on two separate narrative timelines, one of the Holocaust and one of the 1970s. Maus is not just a story about the Holocaust, it is the story of a father son relationship which has to be shown over time, and it is executed skillfully and comprehensively. In the first part of Maus II, Art starts to doubt his own attempt to convey the Holocaust and considers the possibility that telling the story of an atrocity as horrible as the Holocaust shouldn’t be through comics. Art, in discussion with Francois, says, “Just thinking about my book…it’s so presumptuous of me. I mean, I can’t even make any sense out of my relationship with my father…how am I supposed to make any sense out of Auschwitz?…of the Holocaust?...” This is indicative of the insecurity Art feels in telling his father’s story without having experienced any of it. He feels guilty that he didn’t have to experience the horribleness of the Holocaust while his family did and has no idea how to picture it, to portray it accurately in his books. He feels like the story doesn’t belong to him and whatever he communicates about it will be inadequate, he can never fully understand or be able to visualize it completely. No medium can ever fully communicate what an experience was, the details may be warped, the tones shifted. In saying that, I believe that artistic expression is the closest one could come to in relaying an experience. Art is able to portray emotions with flexibility, using colors and detail to show differences in the ideas and emotions exhibited, allowing them to be passed on more fully and, in turn, allowing for the reader to have a deeper understanding. The heavy moments become more accessible to the public through a lens that lets them see perspective and not just accept something cut and dry, but see real people in the context.
crazyarmadillo
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 13

Maus is able to convey the historical and emotional weight of the Holocaust. Art’s comic form of Vladek’s story allows the readers to look at scenes that one would not picture in a literature format. An important artistic component of the book was the way Spiegelman drew the differences of the people living in Germany: the Jews as mice, the Pole as pigs, the Americans as dogs, and the Nazis as cats. The different animals shown allows the readers to quickly connect who Vladek mentions and who he talks to. The animals used to interpret people “enables him to avoid a total identification with the Holocaust,”(Stanislav, 2013). By using animals to represent people, Art is able to avoid the inaccurate depictions on how the people looked like. In Maus I when Vladek is pedaling while telling his story, it symbolizes him accepting his past and moving on from what hapent. Art’s integration of the past and present allows readers to compare and contrast Vladek in America and Vladek in Germany. In America, Vladek is old and weak, but in Nazi Germany he was young and strong. With the understandable comic form, in the present Vladek still incorporates tactics he used in Nazi Germany to his present life. On page 116, Vladek talks about Anja’s parents as he is walking with Art, until he stops because he sees a wire on the floor. If that scene was written in literature form, one would not comprehend when the scene switched. Wires are typically used to connect circuits, however he finds the wire useful for “tying things.” Vladek’s abrupt stop to pick up the wire shows to readers that during the Holocaust, due to limited resources, Vladek had to be resourceful with surrounding things opened to him. With the switching of the past and present, readers can see the interaction between Art and Vladek. When Arte drives to his father’s house, he talks to his wife about the guilty feeling of having an easier life than his parents went through. Arte feels guilty for not working hard enough because his father went through so much. Art chose to tell his father’s story, but he thinks that he is exploiting it for money. Although the book became a major success, Art was consumed by the idea of how he could portray his father’s story correctly and accurately draw it. Art says that he wished he could be in the Holocaust with his parents. That scene shows to many readers the tremendous guilt a child has when they know their parents lived everyday in fear of death. Many children, like Art, live with the guilt due to them not fully understanding what truly happened to their parents, however it is best to live with it than ignore it. Living with the guilt allows the children to acknowledge what happened to their parents and how strong they fought to survive. By ignoring the guilt, is to also ignore the life that their parents went through. Maus was a well told book about Vladek’s life and readers are able to explore more on the Holocaust effect on different individuals.

fridakahlo216
Posts: 12

Ultimately, Spiegelman’s use of comic form is effective in that it accomplishes exactly what he wanted it to: it accurately depicts both him and his father’s stories. The raw, candid conversation between Artie and his father, Vladek, uses a much different tone than what you would find in a typical (auto)biography or historical text recounting the Holocaust. Not only is this beneficial in that it allows the book to have a more unpolished storyline, reflecting the characters in as raw and realistic a way as possible, but it also makes it easier for the reader to understand and relate to them. Rather than using a formal tone and style of writing, Vladek’s many flaws and true perceptions are included in the book, which helps the reader to understand the impact of the Holocaust on real, imperfect people. Additionally, the use of drawings within the graphic novel are effective in conveying the emotion behind each scene and character more than a traditional book would likely be. According to Spiegelman, he aimed to “[give] a form to [his] father’s word’s and narrative,” and the details included in Maus regarding “panel size, panel rhythms, and visual structures” are a useful aid (“The Shadow of a Past Time”). The use of these also drawings makes it possible for such horrific events to be presented, described, and reflected on without having to use graphic images that could potentially trigger readers or censor them as a whole, thus cutting out an important piece of the story.

Regarding the integration of the past and present within the graphic novel, the comic form is effective in illustrating the complexity of the scene and characters, such as by including panels that show both a flashback of the events Vladek is describing and images of Vladek and Artie’s current characters (ie. their reactions and mood throughout the story). It would likely be more confusing if a book written only in text attempted to overlap such timelines, so the visual aid of the graphic novel is helpful.

Additionally, the comfortable conversation throughout the book and the unpolished drawings effectively illustrate the impact of the Holocaust, as well as other traumatic events, on its victims. The people in Maus are able to talk so casually about these horrifying events, even joking about them at times, which illustrates the way in which the oppression and persecution they suffered from was normalized. Along with the raw emotions that are conveyed, the humanity that is seen behind each of the people in the book cannot be ignored, as this style of recounting of the Holocaust is truly effective in making the reader understand that they are not so different from the survivors of such events; they are normal people just like us, and they should neither be normalized nor should they be victimized.
deepwaternearshore
Boston, MA, US
Posts: 7

Originally posted by crazyarmadillo on March 08, 2024 15:50

An important artistic component of the book was the way Spiegelman drew the differences of the people living in Germany: the Jews as mice, the Pole as pigs, the Americans as dogs, and the Nazis as cats. The different animals shown allows the readers to quickly connect who Vladek mentions and who he talks to. The animals used to interpret people “enables him to avoid a total identification with the Holocaust,”(Stanislav, 2013). By using animals to represent people, Art is able to avoid the inaccurate depictions on how the people looked like.

I agree with your assessment of Spiegelman's choice to use animals as stand-ins for people in Maus. Similarly to what you said, I also think that it allows for less stereotypes to be portrayed, and when they are portrayed it is fully intentional, adding depth. If animals had not been used, Spiegleman would have had to find some other way to distinguish people, possibly playing off of stereotypes.

bobboston28
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 14

It’s difficult for the average person to empathize with the emotions and experiences of Holocaust survivors simply because what occurred during the Holocaust is so atrocious, it seems almost humanly impossible. Comic books in comparison to a pure text narratives are more effective in conveying the emotions felt by the characters, aiding the reader in better visualizing the events. Throughout the book, Spiegelman questioned if it was proper to take a heavy story, like his father’s, and tell it through a typically light-hearted medium. Humans are generally able to better understand traumatic events like these through visuals, such as pictures and videos, because the human mind is not easily able to visualize crimes against humanity, especially when we have not been exposed to circumstances like these. If done incorrectly, telling a Holocaust story through comic book form could be seen as an attempt to make light of the situation or having it be “watered down”, therefore taking away from the heavy impact it had on the survivors. However, Spiegelman did an effective job of showcasing the weight his father’s story had on him and himself, but also not depicting him as a hero through idolization.

What makes Maus unique is how Spiegelman incorporates thoughts and dialogues from the present day of him creating the comic. Not only does it make the book seem more realistic, but also shows the author’s inner thoughts and feelings. Even in a book that was intended to be his father’s story, Spiegelman adds himself as another character to the story. It doesn’t necessarily take away from the importance of his father’s story, but adds another layer of how his experiences impacted Spiegelman in being the child of a Holocaust survivor.

On page 81 of Maus I when Vladek briefly mentions Richieu and his death, there is a flash to the present day, where he tells Artie this while simply pedaling on a bicycle. If there was no picture depicting what Vladek was doing when he said this, the reader may have imagined him to be near tears or doing nothing, especially after bringing up a dead son. Vladek has experienced and witnessed the deaths of close friends and family, including his wife. Many unfortunate occassions like these may have caused Vladek to become numb to the idea of death and desensitived to the events of the Holocaust.
Fig Leaf Tree
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 10

Art Spiegelman’s Maus is an effective literary form of conveying the emotional weight and physical trauma due to the author’s use of space and illustration details. Although the experiences of Jewish people in the Holocaust cannot be fully conveyed, due to the deep trauma and range of experiences, Spiegelman communicates the sensations and continuous mental struggles of survivors better in comic form than he would in pure text narrative. Graphic novels are often seen as unserious, or juvenile. However, when the use of imagery is handled skillfully, unrealistic illustration can exaggerate facial expressions to convey emotion, and realistic illustration can make the reader imagine themselves inside the physical space of the setting.

One of the most important ways that Maus communicates the horrors and personal trauma of the Holocaust is through showing the dimensions and layouts of some of the settings. For example, the hideouts of Vladek’s family and other Jewish people he encounters are drawn to scale, to the best of Art’s abilities, to show how uncomfortable and claustrophobic the living situation for Jews in hiding was. The bottom left panel of page 110 of Book I is the first occasion of Spiegelman drawing the layout of a hideout. The bunker is squished between a wall, coal cellar, and street-level metal bin. A pure text narrative could describe the area, but could not draw it out in a way that makes the reader imagine if their family could fit in the space, or how warm the room would be, or how uncomfortable it would be to climb through the bin and down the ladder. The use of illustration gives life to the setting. Page 56 of Book I shows the hills that the POWs had to level out as a form of heavy labor, including proportions and dimensions. This conveys the extent of the physical pain and exhaustion the POWs must have felt on a daily basis.

Graphic novels can also distort or oversimplify expressions to make the characters’ body language easier to read and more impactful. In real life, human facial expressions can be interpreted in different ways based on the personality and social experience of the reader. Art circumvents this possibility for flawed interpretation through making his characters’ emotions easy to gauge. For instance, it is easy to see when a character is angry through their eyebrows. The eyebrows of furious characters are a simple tilted slash above the eye. The tension between Art and Francoise is communicated on page 11 of Book II using the eyebrow slashes, while they are discussing which animal she should be drawn as. In some moments of the scene, the dialogue alone does not convey anger, so the overall meaning of the conversation relies on the illustration. Additionally, the use of visual communication saves the author from wasting space with descriptive text.

Lastly, Maus conveys the relationship between the past and present through the layout of the panels and figures. Often the panels portraying the past and present seem to flow into each other, or include movement between them. The most impactful pages, however, are the ones in which the past and present seem to coexist. To illustrate these moments, Spielgelman bends reality and creates scenes composed of different moments in time. In Book II, one panel includes 4 Jewish girls being hung in the forefront of the panel, and Artie and Vladek driving through the Catskills in the background. The Catskills is a peaceful community place, and the father and son are driving to the supermarket, which is an ordinary and uneventful action. By drawing the victims in the scene, Art is able to show that Vladek’s traumatic experiences are still with him despite being in a safe environment decades later. The memories are coexisting with his current reality, and are just as clear. In “‘The Shadow of a Past Time’: History and Graphic Representation in Maus,” Hillary Chute examines page 12 of Book I, which depicts Vladek on his bike, with his numeral tattoo exposed, and Art in the background. She claims the panel exhibits the relationship between the past and present in an indispensable way, by showing the tattoo and pre war items as “markers of the past,” and Art as an “ultimate marker of the present” because he was born after the Holocaust (Chute 205). She also notes that the panel is an important transition point into the beginning of Vladek’s story, as he starts talking about the 1930s later in the page. Art Spiegelman’s use of the comic format shows both how history and the present coexist, and how they flow into one another as Art and Vladek change topics of conversation.


bobboston28
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 14

Originally posted by fridakahlo216 on March 08, 2024 18:20

Ultimately, Spiegelman’s use of comic form is effective in that it accomplishes exactly what he wanted it to: it accurately depicts both him and his father’s stories. The raw, candid conversation between Artie and his father, Vladek, uses a much different tone than what you would find in a typical (auto)biography or historical text recounting the Holocaust. Not only is this beneficial in that it allows the book to have a more unpolished storyline, reflecting the characters in as raw and realistic a way as possible, but it also makes it easier for the reader to understand and relate to them. Rather than using a formal tone and style of writing, Vladek’s many flaws and true perceptions are included in the book, which helps the reader to understand the impact of the Holocaust on real, imperfect people.

Many people often imagine genocide survivors as perfect people and having no flaws, and I agree with your statement of how the incorporation of Vladek's flaws and true perceptions helped readers understand that he is still human like the rest of us. This reminded of the scene where Vladek was being incredibly racist to the black hitchhiker, which was shocking to many, as he was targeted and almost killed for racist beliefs like these. Many of the flaws that Vladek had, like being stingy and irritable, also connects to generational trauma and how they created obstacles for Artie and him to have a good relationship.

0_0
Boston, Massachusetts, US
Posts: 10

Reflections on Maus I and II

There are many stories out there about the holocaust and holocaust survivors but none quite like Maus. Maus is unique for the fact that it jumps between the modern day and the survivor's story breaking up the timeline to give the reader the bigger picture. It is also told through pictures, specifically in comic book style. It raises the question if whether this book truly captures the heaviness of what Vladek went through and the answer is yes. Visuals can have more of an impact than words and the comic style is still very realistic because these animals have such man-like features. There are multiple panels throughout the story that were direct illustrations of the most horrific events of the holocaust such as the depictions of mice being hung, the whole body of these mice-looking people being disrespected, hung, and lifeless. The mouths were left slightly ajar and the eyes popping out. Or the panel of the multiple dead bodies were being shoveled in the ovens and you see the actual people being burned alive. The amount of pain depicted in the pictures through their eerie eyes and facial expressions was chilling to the bone because it looked so real. At no point does Spiegelman ever sugarcoat his drawing to censor the brutality and gore of the holocaust if anything he depicts even the worst parts. This is further proven by Hillary Chute’s “The Standard of a Past Time”: History and Graphic Representation in Maus when they states, “On the pages of Maus, Spiegelman shows us the violation and breaking of the “world grid” in both senses of the term - phenomenologically and literally on the page”. Chute furthers the narrative that Spiegelman shows every detail of what the Holocaust was like for his father no matter how disturbing because it's needed to open up the raw conversation. Spiegelman also made the panels realistic to violence that occurred whether it came to adults and children. There was a scene where one of the Nazi soldiers smacked a kid against the wall to quiet him and the blood of his head hitting the wall was depicted, to the reader, they had to let it sink in that this was happening to a child, this child skull was being broken against a brick wall by an adult. What makes this story so compelling is the fact that the book jumps from Vladek in the present day to Vladek telling his story. This supports the movement because as Vladek tells his story we get to see the aftermath of what the Holocaust did to him and how it changed him as a person in the way he does things. You see him be overbearing to his son, hoard things, and lash out at the people around him which makes us see the parallel connection between his survivor story and his current life. Vladek lost a son during the genocide which explains why he loves his son more than everything even when he seems to be overbearing to his son to the point that he gets frustrated with him. The father also constantly hoards everything as a trauma response to the fact that at some point he did not have anything at all to survive. We see him in the camp struggling without food and not being able to save anything but then in the current timeline we see how he struggles to part ways with useless things which makes sense for a man who was once deprived of everything. Vladek also has a very short temper with his wife and at times with the actions committed by his family because, at some point in his life, he had to endure so much pain and be patient with his cruel treatment if he wanted to survive. Everything Vladek says and does is a direct response to the traumatic experience he went through in the camps. The Holocaust is a sensitive yet important topic to be discussed and Maus is able ro discuss the seriousness, especially with the fact that we see the reflection of the author at the beginning of Maus II about how he feels depressed because being the child of survivors still has an effect for all Jews to come. The author did not hold back in any way in trying to illustrate all parts of what happened. The gruesome parts, the modern-day parts of his father's actions, and the generational effect of being the son of survivors. Both Maus books were raw depictions of a survivor's story with all kinds of aspects of how the Holocaust has affected people from all angles. This is done through the comic book style that Spiegelman uses because it's a true depiction of the horrific events that further solidify the atrocity in the reader's mind. Maus leaves the reader with a heavy heart but more than anything an education that words could not have given.

HighAltitude
Posts: 9

A Reflection on Maus I and II

The comic medium has always been seen as fantastical, child-like, used to depict heroes and villains. Spiegelman, however, uses this misconception to his advantage, allowing him to convey his father’s story through an art form that encourages the exaggerated expressions of Vladek, Artie, Anja, Mala, and the other mice (people). Spiegelman uses the space inbetween panels as the transition between time and space during Vladek’s narrative. This is a unique application of the comic medium as there is typically a sign or obvious plaster to accomplish this job. The difference between Maus and other comics’ transitions enhances the narrative by demonstrating how the memories are not a separate time or place, rather it is ingrained into the consciousness of Vladek and now Artie as he learns more about the Holocaust. While, yes, there are arguments against using the comic medium to portray a topic such as the Holocaust, the benefits it provides far outweigh any prejudice against the “seriousness” of the medium. As the book focuses on the illustrations, readers are able to accurately interpret the emotions and expressions of the characters as Vladek explains his experiences. In many of Vladek’s words, the visualization of his surroundings are not the clearest. However, with Spiegelman’s artistry, we are able to experience the most accurate story Vladek could’ve told. There have been many points in the story where the art conveyed the feelings, not words. The most prominent example would be when Artie reveals his other comic, and in those panels, we see the distraught and mental horrors the characters face based on personal experience. It truly terrified me as an audience, a shock that cannot be replicated through words.


Each generational survivor experiences and deals with the grief and trauma of events differently. It is usually assumed that each subsequential generation of survivors are less personally affected by the trauma. Spiegelman has shown himself to be not much different, however, the amount of effort and care he puts into his work on Maus reflects his deviation from that norm. Artie, through writing Maus, develops the desire to learn more about the Holocaust and how it affected his parents. The mentors and caregivers in his life are all affected by it, influencing how they raised and taught Artie. I don’t believe it’s possible to ‘move on’ from generational trauma because of the diminishing effects it has over time. Many generational survivors of today are exponentially less affected by the events of the Holocaust from what I’ve seen because it didn’t have a direct impact on their livelihood, a personal experience is not formed. However, I do think it is better to acknowledge the trauma and to never forget about it, use it as a stepping stone to reach a more connected and understanding community that will never repeat the same mistakes as the perpetrators who gave the trauma in the first place. With the addition of modern technology and education, even if the trauma that comes from war and conflict affects newer generations less and less, it will never be forgotten. It will be used as a lesson to teach peace because of people’s efforts to spread awareness of human rights globally, transcending language and culture.

boston123
Boston, MA, US
Posts: 10

The Use of the Comic Form

Art Spiegelman’s use of the comic form is extremely effective in conveying the emotional and historical weight of the Holocaust. The use of animal characters serves as a powerful metaphor for international relationships and power dynamics between different groups in World War II. The Jews are depicted as mice, who are targeted by the Germans depicted as cats. At the end of Maus II, the Americans depicted as dogs scare all of the cats away. This creative choice effectively conveys the weight of the Holocaust, as it highlights oppression and victimization that the Jews experienced during the Holocaust.

Several of Spiegelman’s illustrations portray the horrors of the Holocaust, evoking powerful and reflective emotions in the reader. Furthermore, Spiegelman’s movement between the past and present provides the reader with a grasp for how the Holocaust continues to affect Vladek during the present day. This sheds light on the psychological impact that these awful events had on survivors, and how they carry the weight of that experience with them every day. For example, in Maus II, present day Vladek states, “The Germans didn’t want to leave anywhere a sign of all what they did. You heard about the gas, but I'm telling not rumors, but only what I really saw. For this I was an eyewitness” (Spiegleman 69). In this quote, Vladek is portrayed with a fearful expression, truly revealing how his experiences continue to haunt him.

Some may argue that Maus I and Maus II lack the seriousness needed to talk about the Holocaust, however, I disagree. Spiegelman’s cartoons still convey the gravity of the Holocaust, while being sensitive to the fact that he is describing events that are very hard to hear about. Furthermore, it would be extremely hard to read a comic that had realistic illustrations of victims. The animal cartoons provide a different perspective while still maintaining the emotional and historical weight of the Holocaust.
Watermelon
Posts: 11

The Use of the Comic Form in Maus

The comic form allows Art Spiegelman to convey emotions that would be lost if he only used pictures or words. This can be seen when Vladek wants to send Richeu away and Anja refuses. Anja’s eyes grow a dark, almost evil shade as if she would take on Vladek to keep her baby with her. The use of drawings combined with words also allows Art to inform the reader of how the camps were set up and how his parents were able to survive. This is evident when Vladek’s friend is describing the bunker to him. The readers are able to actually see what a group of Jews had set up (on multiple occasions) in order to evade Nazi detection. One of what I believe to be the most intricate is the bunker in the basement surrounded by coal. This one was particularly interesting to me because the dogs could smell them, but the Nazis were unable to find them because of the piles of coal they had made. Another example of the comic form being crucial to the story is when Vladek is walking around and there is a round up happening, startling him and he is drawn inside of a Star of David to show the stress and anxiety Jewish people felt during this time simply because they were Jewish. Putting drawings in Maus also allowed Art Speigleman to effortlessly weave the past and present together. Not only are the drawings important in creating this timeless effect, but also the layout of the page as “[t]he visual intersection and present appears throughout in the architecture of the panels” (Chute 13). One key example of the layout revealing time has passed, but the effect of the war is still felt is when Valdek is talking about family pictures and those lost in the war. In this part of Maus, Vladek is literally cut up by the panels symbolizing how he feels cut up because of the loss he has experienced. The use of the comic form in Art Spiegleman’s Maus allows Art to convey deeper feeling and get his and his father’s story across more effectively.
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