Maus: The extermination of humanity

Written and drawn by Art Spiegelman, Maus is a graphic novel that tells the story of his father and how he could survive to the holocaust. First of all we need to understand the concept of holocaust. “This word comes from the Greek words holos (whole) and kaustos (burned), it was historically used to describe a sacrificial offering burned on an altar. Since 1945, the word has taken on a new and horrible meaning: the mass murder of some 6 million European Jews (as well as members of some other persecuted groups, such as Gypsies and homosexuals) by the German Nazi regime during the Second World War”

The period of time between 1933 and 1945 gives us a feeling of sadness and disgust when remembered, as it was the result of total discrimination in addition loss of respect for ourselves and for others. Art Spiegelman in his graphic novel shows us his own vision of a family story, so how does he finally get to connect us with Maus? In my opinion it was all the way he decided to tell this story, a novel like this one (in this particular historical context) needs to be told as it is directly and straight to the point. My belief is that the author was trying to tell this story just in the way it was, not only for us to feel guilty as humans, but for us not to do it again. “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.

 

World War II was an attempt to destroy a culture; Jews separated from their people and murdered were treated like a plague. The lack of humanity and the concept of extermination made me think about the features given to the characters. To me it makes a lot of sense to draw animals instead of humans as this shows explicitly how human race has been destroyed and replaced for animals which only use their instincts.

Rats, cats, pigs, dogs, rabbits and frogs are characters of this graphic novel, all of them have individualities that made us think about each group of people they represent, although such massacre and brutality is way far from what animals can do and this contradiction was what I enjoyed the most in the book as I could feel characterized and linked to this story. The jumps from the present to the past made the novel difficult to follow, but as it was a comic, it helped me and made it a lot easier.

Above all I would like to say that I admire this writer and how he was able to share the past of the holocaust in a way in which people from all over the world would feel identified, to modernize this topic and make it tangible in a personal story was for me worth reading. I would like to end with some questions for you as future teachers of english: how would you deal with your students feeling limitated by fear ? What could fear can cause in students? is bullying another way to represent our lack of humanity or is it a human condition no to tolerate and respect others? 

Bibliography

(s.f.). Obtenido de http://www.theholocaustexplained.org/ks3/what-was-the-holocaust/#.VdNdjNgvX1U

(s.f.). Obtenido de (http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/the-holocaust)