Maus a Survivors Tale: My Father Bleeds History
Spiegelman, Art. 1991. Maus a Survivors Tale: My Father Bleeds History. Pantheon Books.
Rating:
8
Summary:
surprisingly engaging
Art (Artie) Spiegelman is a cartoonist and the son of holocaust survivors, Vladek and Anna Spiegelman. Despite a rocky relationship with his parents (resulting in years of therapy), Art eventually makes the decision to tell his parents’ story in graphic novel (comic book) form. (I’m including what would generally be considered background information because it is actually included in the novel.)
Art’s mother, Anna, committed suicide, and now he has only the recollections of his wealthy but super-frugal father upon which to base the story. Through repeated visits, Art gets his father to recount his World War II experience.
Vladek’s begins with his pre-war life, which barely pre-dates his meeting Anna. Once Vladek meets Anna and they marry, Vladek is quickly taken in by Anna’s parents who help him set up a factory near where they live (in Poland). But the War is rapidly approaching and Vladek is drafted into the Polish military, which quickly fell. He was then a prisoner of war for a number of months before returning to his family. The family is then torn apart as they move from ghetto to ghetto, doing their best to stay alive, in large part due to Vladek’s resourcefulness. Vladek and Anna even send their firstborn son to live with relatives as they think he will be safer. As it turns out, the son dies, but he probably would have with them as well.
Despite doing their best to avoid it, eventually Vladek and Anna end up in Auschwitz, but that is covered in the second book: Maus II.
Review:
I wasn’t expecting to find this book as engaging as I did, though I’m not sure why. Eventually, I was drawn into the book and was disappointed when it ended just as the Spiegelman’s are sent to Auschwitz.
Initially, I was distracted by the approach of the book as it bounces back and forth between the author interacting with his father as he is interviewing him (quasi present day) and the father’s account of his experience during the war (~30 years prior). But it quickly becomes clear that this is included for a reason – to illustrate what the father has become (likely in large part due to the experience he is recounting).
I was also surprised by the author’s willingness to reveal so much about himself. Rather than present himself as ‘the good son’, he is quite critical of himself. His character in the book is constantly complaining about his father and even goes so far as to call him a murderer when he discovers that Vladek burned Anna’s journals from just after the war.
Keep in mind this book is only the first 1/2 of the story. Without reading the second book the story wouldn’t be complete. Thus, while this book is interesting, it is really just setting the foundation of what becomes a compelling love story between two survivors and their son’s attempt to deal with his parents and childhood. I think this book could serve well as an introduction to the holocaust for young readers as it combines an actual account with thoughts, comments, and pictures. Of course, additional books should be used to supplement this one, but it would make a good primer. And, for those that have read quite a bit about the holocaust it still is a powerful tale about what it took to survive (luck and an insurmountable desire to love and live).