Maus :: essays research papers

Maus is one of the most celebrated of recent graphic novels. Winner of the prestigious Pulitzer prize for literature, its the harrowing on-key story of a Jewish holocaust survivor, retold to his son decades later.The story has dickens main threads. The foremost is the true story of Holocaust survivor Vladek Spiegelmans experiences as a young Jewish man during the horrors leading up to and including his exertion in Auschwitz. The second intertwining story is intimately Vladek as an old man, sex act his history to his son Art, the author of the book, and the complicated relationship between the devil of them. Its a difficult process for both father and son, as Vladek tries to bring sense of his twighlight years, indelibly marked by his experiences and a slave to the processes he had to resort to in order to shake it through. On this level, its also about Art, as he comes to terms with what his father went through, while still decision the more irritating aspects of his father s personality difficult to live with.Maus uses anthropomorphic characters, development different species of animal to represent the different characters race or nationality - Jews atomic number 18 mice, Germans are cats, Americans are dogs and the Polish are pigs. This doesnt always quite work, though Spiegleman is acutely aware of this as he struggles with whether or not to make his French wife, converted to Judaism before they got married, into a mouse or slightly other species. Please dont instantly dismiss this as childish hogwash though - it owes more to Animal Farm than Mickey Mouse.Its a execrable tale, as although Vladek survives the Holocaust, the shadow of the great swathe of humanity that was butchered by the national socialist killing factories hangs over the entire book. It is also haunted by the ghosts of Vladeks first wife Anja and their son Richieu the former surviving Auchwitz but eventually committing suicide, the latter(prenominal) not making it out of Poland .This book, originally a two meretriciousness work is now available in an excellent complete edition in the UK, which binds both chilling volumes into one and is an excellent way for new readers to go far hold of this classic work of literature.