What made this book so powerful?
I thoroughly enjoyed reading Maus. Not surprisingly, when our class was asked "how many of you liked Maus", almost everyone raised their hands. But what is it specifically that we like about
this book? What makes it so powerful?
The selection of mice with little detail wasn't made with little thought. Having been in the
group that was assigned the original Maus graphics, I can say that what Spiegelman ended up going with makes for a much more enjoyable read. The originally planned style added much more
detail to the mice, and made us visualize the gruesome events that we were reading about (i.e; one of the pictures had a Jew being threatened with a gun to his head). The issue this poses is that it distracts me from the reading (my eyes naturally gravitate to the picture first), and it's also too intense and graphic for me to want to continue reading about these characters I've become attached to. But what makes the final art-style so effective?
I believe by having little detail, it enables us to better place ourselves in the characters
shoes. This differs from an extremely detailed and struggling character in which there's few ways in which we can relate. As discussed in class, humans seem to naturally be a little
narcissistic, so we see ourselves/ faces in almost everything. Having little detail in the mice allows us to do this. This makes the art-style of the book satisfactory and enjoyable; but what makes the story so effective?
Part of this is due to the hilarious dynamic that keeps people's attention. Vladek and Mala whining, and Art being in the middle of this. We crave those moments where we break from the story and get to learn about their personal lives. I also believe that the story of how Vladek keeps being clever over and over, always escaping from danger keeps us wanting to read. It's
a survival scenario and we want to see how he makes it to the end. Whether his story is completely true or not we can't be certain, but he did survive. These reasons combined makes what could be a very sad and depressing read an enjoyable one.
Overall, I believe the art-style, the relationship between Art Vladek and Mala, and the hard
to believe survival story of Vladek make this an interesting and powerful read.
