Maus & White

• Typically, I'd pick up a fantasy novel at a local bookstore before I would a comic. So when I cracked open Maus by Art Spiegelman, you could imagine my surprise. The graphic novel was captivating. His illustrations were a brilliant take on a historical event such as the Holocaust.
  
  I was able to relate with his brave, yet, cartoonish characters -- Artie and Vladek. The two are mice in the novel who share an intimate and tragic family story with the readers. Artie's mother, Anna, committed suicide. She was torn about losing her son, Artie's older brother he never knew existed, in the Holocaust. Since Anna died while Artie was a youngster, he never really knew his mother. Artie depends on his father's memory to learn more about his dead mother and brother.
  
  The storyline was a clever way to teach young people like myself nearly fifty years removed from the Holocaust. Aside from dry history books and vintage black-and-white documentaries, I didn't know how truly devasting it was for those who died and lost relatives in the massacre. Even generations after the event took place. You can read books and watch films, but the comic made you feel connected with the characters. In this case, Artie and Vladek. So even though Artie wasn't alive during the Holocaust inadvertently his life was ruined as well. He lost his mother and a brother in the process.

• What is the significance of the animals (mice, cats, pigs) in Maus: My Father Bleeds History?

Mice were used to represent the Jewish people of the Holocaust. A mouse is looked at as a dirty rodent that needs to be exterminated. People pay top dollar to have them ripped, trapped, and poisoned from their homes. The Nazis did the same. Cats were portrayed as Nazis and the Polish officers were pigs. As for the cats, well, those are natural predators. They chase to kill. The Polish police are pigs who are usually the first to squeal or snitch on you. In all, it seems like no matter how determined you are, not all the mice in the world can be eliminated. Millions of Jewish people were killed in the Holocaust; this is one survivor's tale.

• What is the significance of the epigraph given by Adolf Hitler in this novel?
  

I think that Art Spiegelman chose to include the quote, “The Jews are undoubtedly a race, but they are not human...” because it sets the tone for this novel. While I was reading Maus, it dawned on me that these mice were real people. As the reader, we don’t see people based off of their race. We see mice, cats, and pigs. Art Spiegelman gives us the opportunity to challenge this quote.

Art Spiegelman's take on the Holocaust was innovative and a great way to storytell. He had the foresight to tell his story in a way that bridges the generation gap of older book readers and young tech savvy bloggers.