| Product: |
Maus: A Survivor's Tale - Art Spiegelman |
| Date: |
03/07/01 (2902 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Stunningly original, an exceptionally moving testament to the survivors of the concentration camps and their families
Disadvantages: The acclaim the author received for these books drove him to despair
What would be your reaction if I told you someone had produced a comic book about the Holocaust? One that actually employed cute-looking animals as metaphors for the protagonists? Probably the same as mine was - shock and disbelief. I mean, how could such a medium adequately portray one of the most horrific events in history without appearing flippant and irreverent? The very idea seems profane.
If the person who first drew "Maus" to my attention hadn?t been an individual whose opinions I have always held in great esteem, I would have steered well clear of it. Instead, I went out and bought these two volumes, not knowing really what to expect, except perhaps that I was sure I would end up condemning them for their indecency and unbelievable insensitivity.
What I actually found took me by complete surprise. These are truly extraordinary books. They will amaze you, shock you, jolt you from your complacency. They will change the way those of us fortunate enough never to have experienced such mind-numbing horror think about this subject. They will show you how the survivors and their descendants will never, ever be free, that the death camps insidiously reach out to them still, long after their closure.
Who on earth would dare to write such books? His background gives us some clues. A man whose parents, having survived the Holocaust, were taken to Sweden after WW2, where he himself was born in 1948. A man who, having moved to New York, USA, with his parents, suffered a nervous breakdown and was hospitalised in the 1960s. A man whose mother found it impossible to live with her appalling memories so she committed suicide in 1968. A man who took 13 long years to write what is considered his finest piece of work and an outstanding testament to survivors of the Holocaust. A man called Art Spiegelman.
A skilled graphic artist, Spiegelman needed to act out the drama of his parents' lives in order to try to unders
tand why they behaved and thought as they did. These books are an act of catharsis for him, as he works through his own trauma. They feel very personal to him indeed. Reading them seems akin to voyeurism, as though we are intruding on his own private grief.
"Look, Maus's success sent me into a shrink's arms. It's just a process of trying to understand, trying to understand myself and trying to understand other things, and my medium for understanding is comics." - Art Spiegelman
As well as being the medium with which Spiegelman feels the most comfortable, the comic book style is surprisingly effective.
For instance, what better way to relate the unspeakable than through images instead? What better way of educating people about the effect of the Holocaust, thereby reinforcing the very necessary message of "never forget", than choosing the familiar cat-and-mouse scenario, which distances the reader from the horror just enough to enable them to face what they may otherwise have felt unable to.
But, as the note on the cover states, this is "not Tom & Jerry", these cats and mice are not the same as those we encounter in our own homes. And the unconventional, unfamiliar use of them as characters in these books serves to heighten our sense of discomfit and unease.
What's more, Spiegelman uses animals to stereotype nationalities - cats for Germans, mice for Jews and pigs for Polish - just as the Nazis encouraged the dehumanising and stereotyping of the Jews. Of course, another very obvious reason for portraying Nazis as cats and Jews as mice is that they are natural enemies, mice being considered vermin and fit only for extermination.
"...are not my images. I borrowed them from the Germans. . . Ultimately what the book's about is the commonality of human beings. It's crazy to divide things down along nationalistic or racial or religious lines. . . These me
taphors, which are meant to self-destruct in my book - and I think they do self-destruct - still have a residual force and still get people worked up over them." - Art Spiegelman
And, of course, Art feels an overwhelming need to pay homage to his father, to forever preserve his story, his pain, his suffering. This is a common feeling shared by children of Holocaust survivors.
I hope that I have given you some idea of why Spiegelman wrote "Maus" and why he chose such an unconventional medium. Now I think it?s time to tell you a little more about the books themselves. I feel very strongly, however, that I should not dwell in any depth upon the contents. The less you know, the more likely these books are to stun you as you read them. I would not wish to detract from that and so I shall concentrate only on the basics.
"Maus" comes in two separate volumes: "Maus I - A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History" and "Maus II - A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began".
The first book runs from the mid-1930s through to winter 1944 and covers Vladek's (Spiegelman's father) first meeting with his wife-to-be, Anja, in times of relative prosperity, their first glimpse of a swastika, life in the ghetto, and ends with Vladek's arrival at Auschwitz.
Book II covers Vladek's horrific experiences in Auschwitz (Mauschwitz), liberation from the camp and finally reunion with Anja.
Not having much experience of reading graphic novels, I'm not in a position to compare Spiegelman's artwork with anything else in this medium. Personally, though, I found the imagery could be both stark (Vladek and Anja standing on a giant mousetrap, the metal snapper poised, ready to fall on them), and cleverly imaginative (Jewish mice wearing pig masks in an attempt to appear Polish). One particularly memorable and effective drawing shows Art's overwhelming desp
air at his father's story, at his mother's suicide, at his own life, at the contrast between the horror of the Holocaust and Maus I's critical acclaim, all piling up around him. These emotional agonies are depicted as the dead bodies of Auschwitz piled around his desk as he draws. It leaves you with a very powerful and lasting impression.
As for the text, each book is written in a fragmented style, going back and forth through time, mainly between Art and his father's often painful interactions, as he gathers the information he needs for his books, and his father's past experiences. There are two very clear narratives - Art's story and his father's story. The frequent contrasts between life in New York and life in Auschwitz, brought about by this to-ing and fro-ing, seem almost unbearable at times.
Art is forced to rely on his father (Vladek) for details of his mother, who committed suicide. Although their relationship is not a good one, he must keep up their interaction, as he so desperately needs to know about her. This is extremely difficult for Art, who finds Vladek's actions impossible to understand, thus an undercurrent of conflict between the two is ever present throughout both books.
Art's anger at Vladek's eccentric and unreasonable behaviour tended to make me feel annoyed and frustrated with his treatment of his father at times, but how would we feel in his situation? His father's behaviour IS unreasonable (especially towards his second wife) but, as we read on, we gain a glimmer of understanding as to why this is just so. But we can never fully understand, as we do not share Vladek's experiences.
Let me give you an example of Vladek's way of thinking with an incident that happens at the very beginning of "Maus I":
Art is ten or eleven years old, roller-skating in the park with his friends. He falls off his skate and his friends run off, laug
hing. For comfort, the sobbing Art goes to his father, who is busy sawing some wood?
"Artie! Come to hold this a minute while I saw."
"Snrk..."
"Why do you cry, Artie? Hold better on the wood."
"I-I fell, and my friends skated away w-without me."
"Friends? Your friends? If you lock them together in one room with no food for a week - then you could see what it is, friends!..."
Vladek's obsessions - with neatness, with extreme frugality, with distrust of anyone at all - are a constant reminder of his days in Auschwitz. These things are important to him because these are the means by which he survived. Every decision during that time was momentous because any one of them could have resulted in his death.
Auschwitz will never let him go. In a way, in his mind, through his obsessions, he is still there, still suffering. And Art, who wasn't even born during the Holocaust, finds his life influenced by it to an enormous degree through his father's behaviour. Thus the trauma is passed on, inherited.
I will not describe any of Vladek's Auschwitz experiences here. I feel that it would not be right for me to do so - besides, Vladek, through the talents of his son, tells them so much more effectively than I ever could.
Please read these books and let Art and Vladek share their intertwined stories with you.
Let me leave you with an image, which I shall describe for you, and two quotations.
Vladek and Anja, wearing pig masks in an attempt to pass themselves off as Polish, are on the run from the Nazis. They are embarking on a Swastika-shaped path, knowing that there is nowhere for them to go, that capture by the Nazis is inevitable. There are factory chimneys in the background, belching smoke, echoing what is to come.
"Yes...about Auschwitz, NOBODY can understand." - Vladek speaking to A
rt in "Maus I"
"Mickey Mouse is the most miserable ideal ever revealed... Healthy emotions tell every independent young man and every honorable youth that the dirty and filth-covered vermin, the greatest bacteria carrier in the animal kingdom, cannot be the ideal type of animal... Away with Jewish brutalization of the people! Down with Mickey Mouse! Wear the Swastika Cross!" - newspaper article, Pomerania, Germany, mid-1930s (taken from beginning of "Maus II")
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"Maus I" - ISBN 0140173153
"Maus II" - ISBN 0140132066
Both published by Penguin
The books are also available in a combined US edition: "Maus" - ISBN 0679748407
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