The NZA Posted October 21, 2003 Share Posted October 21, 2003 It occured to me that one of comics' most famous & well respected works - it's even taught in a number of university english courses - Maus: A Surivor's Tale, did not have a thread here yet. Maus is a passed-down, Pulitzer-Prize winning tale of Art Spiegelman's father, Vladek, and how he managed to survive the holocaust, after losing his family to Aushwitz. It's a powerful tale for any medium, much less an indy comics creator, though Spiegelman is certainly not a hack. In an attempt to lighten the tale, a la Animal Farm, characters are symolized by respective mammals: the jews are mice, the germans, cats, the poles are pigs, french are frogs, etc. The story is broken up across two volumes: I: My Father Bleeds History and II: And Here My Troubles Began, and the set of the 2 can often be found boxed together for less than $20. I fear much of what I'd say here would only make light of some very human and very serious storytelling, and since I dont see many people unfamiliar with the book browsing this thread & deciding to pick up the series, I've opted to post a review & some art, and simply ask for reaction from other comic fans who've managed to read this touching tale. Some historical events simply beggar any attempt at description--the Holocaust is one of these. Therefore, as it recedes and the people able to bear witness die, it becomes more and more essential that novel, vigorous methods are used to describe the indescribable. Examined in these terms, Art Spiegelman's Maus is a tremendous achievement, from a historical perspective as well as an artistic one. Spiegelman, a stalwart of the underground comics scene of the 1960s and '70s, interviewed his father, Vladek, a Holocaust survivor living outside New York City, about his experiences. The artist then deftly translated that story into a graphic novel. By portraying a true story of the Holocaust in comic form--the Jews are mice, the Germans cats, the Poles pigs, the French frogs, and the Americans dogs--Spiegelman compels the reader to imagine the action, to fill in the blanks that are so often shied away from. Reading Maus, you are forced to examine the Holocaust anew. This is neither easy nor pleasant. However, Vladek Spiegelman and his wife Anna are resourceful heroes, and enough acts of kindness and decency appear in the tale to spur the reader onward (we also know that the protagonists survive, else reading would be too painful). This first volume introduces Vladek as a happy young man on the make in pre-war Poland. With outside events growing ever more ominous, we watch his marriage to Anna, his enlistment in the Polish army after the outbreak of hostilities, his and Anna's life in the ghetto, and then their flight into hiding as the Final Solution is put into effect. The ending is stark and terrible, but the worst is yet to come--in the second volume of this Pulitzer Prize-winning set. --Michael Gerber, Amazon.com I'm working on Fax from Sarajevo; ill post back here if it's truly in a similar vein. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ganny McVagflaps Posted October 21, 2003 Share Posted October 21, 2003 Maus is fucking class. I know people that wouldn't be bothered reading a comic but love Maus... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The NZA Posted October 21, 2003 Author Share Posted October 21, 2003 Yeah, its one of those indy ones its safe to push in bookstores & such, mention for social/history reasons, etc. I remember liking that its disturbing as hell, but doesnt get overly graphic about it to make the point...eerily subtle during its darker moments. I hear Spiegelman passed away a lil while back, not sure if that's true or not. Again, I wanna read Joe Kubert's Fax From Sarajevo & see if its on the level. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mysterytramp Posted October 22, 2003 Share Posted October 22, 2003 Maus is still the only comic that has ever made me cry. The panels where it shows one of the cats swinging a small mouse against the wall by its legs, cracking its head open in the process seems cartoony enough. We've seen worse in Tom and Jerry cartoons. But then you realise that this probably did happen in real life, Nazi soldiers probably did kill Jewish children just for crying because they were scared. I think thats the power of Maus. If you let it, it completly disarms you for what you're about to read, allowing to see the situation like its for the first time, shocking you like it should. BTW I'm nearly sure Art Spiegelman is still alive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JunkerSeed Posted October 22, 2003 Share Posted October 22, 2003 Yeah, I thought Maus was amazing. I remember TD got it for an English class and I was lookin through his comic and just kind of picked it up and read the whole thing right then, absolutely fucking amazing, right on the level of stuff like Schindler's list and the Pianist in my opinion. I haven't read the second volume though, I really should get that cheap pack you're talking about. Maus is a hell of an arguement for the medium of comics in general, it's a shame that people have taken to saying that Maus is some sort of exception as far as comics go, that it's like some freak accident that Maus is art, but that's where it stops as far as comics go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silent Bob Posted October 22, 2003 Share Posted October 22, 2003 The second volume is even more moving, Junker, as it describes (in heartbreaking detail) Vladek Spiegelman's experiences in Auschwitz. This is one of the most incredibly moving pieces of literature of any type that I have ever read. Definitely a classic in any medium. I'll be back to praise it some more but right now, food beckons. And yeah, I think Art Spiegelman is still alive because I knew someone who went to hear him speak less than a year ago. If he passed away recently it's an enormous loss. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TulipO Posted October 23, 2003 Share Posted October 23, 2003 I remember in 8th grade I did a paper on Night by Elie Weisel (sp?) The assignment was to read a work that portrayed an historical tradgedy. Being somewhat limited in my historical knowledge at the time, and kinda lazy about research, chose the Holocaust. Later I found Maus. I wished I'd known about it before. I felt it was 10 times more moving than anything I had read in the past. Now of course as a history major, with an interest in things that have a morbid bent, I have access to a lot more in terms of disturbing, gory and scarily accurate, and yet nothing since has struck me the way seeing it in a comic medium did. Whenever I read a creative work about the Holocaust, Maus is always my basis for comparison. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The NZA Posted October 28, 2003 Author Share Posted October 28, 2003 This is the story of Art Spiegelman's father, who survived Auschwitz and Dachau. It is also the story of how Art Spiegelman's father explained all this to his son, and how Spiegelman watched and learned of the damage that the experience continued to wreak all around his life. And, in yet another detachment from the central narrative, everyone is depicted in cartoon terms. All Nazis are depicted as talking cats. The Poles, pigs. And the Jews, mice. It's a Krazy Kat level of separation. But it works. It works visually because it makes all the emotions big and transparent, and makes the reader consider the horror rather than react to its surface. And because it speaks directly to the way the Nazis dehumanised everything around them. A Polish dignitary once questioned Spiegelman on this, uncertain whether the stink of racism was on MAUS, explaining that the Nazis called the Poles pigs. "And they called us (the Jews) vermin," was Spiegelman's response. Contrary to the simplistic nature suggested by the art, there are no simple demarcations here. Spiegelman's father is a monster. His brave, delicate mother committed suicide twenty years after Dachau. Spiegelman himself becomes fenced in by the bared wire of familial ties and the borders of success. This relentlessly emotional story became the first graphic novel to win a Pulitzer Prize. - Warren Ellis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mysterytramp Posted November 14, 2003 Share Posted November 14, 2003 There was an interview with Art Spiegelman on the radio here in Ireland on Sunday just past, apparently he was in Dublin for some arts council thing. There was a great moment when the interviewer asked him "Do you write poetry?" and quick as a flash Spiegelman replied "Yeah. They're called comics". He wasn't being snotty though, it was a great interview. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unidentified Source Posted November 14, 2003 Share Posted November 14, 2003 Interesting concept, I'm surprised I've never read it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverend Jax Posted November 18, 2003 Share Posted November 18, 2003 Finished reading it a few weeks ago. Brilliant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silent Bob Posted November 18, 2003 Share Posted November 18, 2003 Interesting concept, I'm surprised I've never read it. Me too. It did win a Pulitzer, you know... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverend Jax Posted November 18, 2003 Share Posted November 18, 2003 A well deserved Pulitzer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fakename Posted November 18, 2003 Share Posted November 18, 2003 yeah, I remember Maus, certainly one of the best comics I've read (and it probably still would be if I had already read alot of comics in the first place..) I was assigned to read in back in the.. 9th grade? I recall... yea it was actually set as an experimental book in our English course, part of the faculty was reluctant to showcase it as an educational basis because it was a comic, but that must've stirred among those who hadn't attempted to read it... it was probably the only book that practically any student would read in one sitting and be highly attentive to. I haven't seen it in a while though, but I always pick it up whenever I'm in the book store. So yea, point. go read it, even if you're just standing near it @ B&N's waiting for your significant other to return from the bathroom... you'll probably get so interested to finish it least half way through before leaving. I was watching Life is Beautiful (Benigni) the other week and it reminded me of Maus, I think works such as these try to place the concepts of such a surreal history of the holocaust in a more digestable manner. and yes, it did still make me cry however to whoever noted that (i'm too lazy to go back and quote) good art and moving. fakename Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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