Comparing Maus I and Maus II by Spiegelman Essay Example

Introduction

While Maus I and II were identical in many aspects, there were qualities that differed between the two. Maus II offered a better understanding of the atrocities that happened in the concentration camps during the time of the Holocaust, and because of this storyline, there is more emotion and symbolism found in the novel that doesn't compare to that of Maus I.

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With that said, Maus I and Maus II have numerous parallels between artistic and literary aspects in both novels. This page demonstrates the similarities and differences between both editions of Spiegelman's novels.

Color and Shading, Tone and Mood

The deliberate use of elimination of all color from this novel sets a heavy, dark tone for the reader. Both Maus I and Maus II omit the use of color and rely on black and white and a minimalist drawing style displaying heavy shading to set the tone of a scene.

In Maus I, the tone of the novel is set when the interviews begin between Art and his father. The first edition of this series is history-dense, as it gives an overall background of how the Holocaust came to be strung between Vladek's own experiences. The novel is shaded to be lighter than that of the second edition, while the tone and mood the reader sees and feels is still heavy.

In Maus II, the overall tone is different from the first edition as the reader dives into more personal experiences shared by Vladek. These more personal experiences, often times scenes showing anguish, defeat, depression, and pure fear and pain, are colored darker than previously seen in Maus I. The mood in which the reader feels is heavier, a feeling of disbelief as he or she witnesses through Vladek's eyes the atrocities that happened during the time of the Holocaust.

Lines

In creating his graphic novel, Spiegelman chose to use different borders when differentiating between past and present conversations or events. Most, if not all present scenes omitted a border, and his narrations almost always are shown without a speech or thought bubble. In doing this, it was likely his intention to show the difference in time being portrayed in his and his father's storytelling.

The speech bubbles in both Maus I and Maus II change from scene to scene to match the tone of the situation. Some narrations or dialogue show speech bubbles with jagged or sharp edges along with bold or harsh fonts, and in some scenes the bubbles have a softer look to them and the font returns to its normal form.

The font is consistent throughout both novels, and it is definitely something to be noticed by the reader. Spiegelman created his own font in the making of his story, and it is clear to the reader that the S's he uses are in the shape of half of a swastika. This intentional decision made by the author is a well-thought-out detail that emphasizes the tone of the novel.

Emotion on Faces

Because the author uses mice to illustrate Jewish characters, it is often times hard to differentiate between facial expressions without looking at raised eyebrows or emotion lines next to the character's face. Unlike the always-grimacing German cats, the mice are often left depicted as emotionless.

In Maus I, the readers are introduced to the Jewish population portrayed as mice. They are often shown without facial features, where really only the eyes and ears are detailed, which could be an intentional decision by the author to show that all Jews were treated as the same and that one's appearance did not matter to the Nazis. A Jewish man was a Jewish man and that man had no differentiating qualities between him and the Jewish man next to him.

In Maus II, as the events happening become increasingly darker, the emotions on the characters become more apparent. We are shown not just the eyes and ears of the mice anymore, but their mouths as they scream in agony, shadows highlighting their fear, and the cats grow angrier and angrier. The addition of emotions on the characters faces really emphasize the atrocities these mice went through, as they appear more and more human and less like a colony with the same identity.

Animals

The opening line in Maus I is a quote from Adolf Hitler, stating, "The Jews are undoubtedly a race, but they are not human." The intentional use of animals in Maus illustrates the stereotypes of the different races and classes involved in the Holocaust. The Jews are portrayed as mice and the Germans as cats, as taken directly from that of Nazi propaganda in which they believed the Jews to be vermin that were to be exterminated. The relationship between the cat and mouse is a metaphor for the Nazi and Jewish relationship, as the Nazis toyed with and tortured the mice before ultimately killing them. In the classic battle between cat and mouse, while the cat almost always comes out on top, there are some mice that manage to escape the cat's claws.

Racism is what ultimately fueled the Holocaust, and social class or a mixed race simply meant nothing to the Nazis. A German-Jew was a Jew, and they did not hold back when executing these kind of people. In Maus II, when Spiegelman is shown speaking with his therapist, he is wearing a mouse mask strapped to his face. He explains that the idea of race is only an artifice, and that underneath the masks we are all human, that we are all the same.

In both books one and two, the Poles were intentionally represented as pigs as a jab towards the population as a whole during the time of the Holocaust. Spiegelman states, "considering the bad relations between Poles and Jews for the last hundred years in Poland, it seemed right to use a non-Kosher animal." Regarding the Polish influence in the Holocaust, it was also said that, "While cats in Nazi uniform shoot, bash and exterminate, emaciated mice scurry terrified and screaming, and pigs collaborate, offer succour or avert their gaze to profess no awareness."

Along with the above animals, Maus II portrays the Non-Jewish Americans and African- Americans as dogs, the English as fish, the French as frogs, and the Gypsies as gypsy butterflies. It is in this novel that the reader sees more and more populations influencing or experiencing the Holocaust along with those who are Jewish.

Themes

Familial Guilt

While it seems the main focus of the novel is Vladek's life as a death camp survivor, the book is also a central narrative for the guilt shared between Vladek and his son. In this novel, three types of guilt are most prominently explored: Art's guilt over his actions towards him not being a good son, his feeling of guilt over the death of his mother Anja, and his reluctance after publishing his father's tale.

From the very beginning, the audience is introduced to the author's estranged relationship with his father. We are told they live relatively close to one another, although they do not see each other often. Art is depicted as having mixed emotions about helping his father around the house with chores and finally gives in to his guilt after denying his father at first.

In Art's "Prisoner on the Hell Planet" in the first book, Art is very straight forward by telling the reader he feels responsible for his mother's suicide. He shares his last memory with his mother-a conversation between the two when Anja asks her son if he still loved her, in which he replied with a cold "sure." This form of Art's guilt is noteworthy as he clearly states to the reader he believes it is his fault his mother is gone.

Art also feels an intense amount of guilt as he explains on pages 41- 48 in the second book as he is depicted in human form in present day wearing a mouse mask strapped to his face. He displays himself atop a pile of mouse corpses, shown to symbolize the six million Jews upon whom his empire was built. His therapist explains to him that some of his guilt may come from portraying his father in such a way as he did in the first volume. Art says that since he did not live through the atrocities himself, he has a hard time understanding or visualizing this "separate universe" and how he feels like he cannot portray it correctly. Although the first Maus was published in 1986, four years after Vladek passed, Art says, "My father's ghost still hangs over me."

Survivor's Guilt

It is commonly heard of that the survivors of atrocities such as that of the Holocaust suffer greatly after being saved, and wonder why they were saved and others weren't. This "survivor's guilt" is seen in both Vladek and Art's relationships with those who were affected by or experienced the Holocaust. While the motivation to get through the Holocaust was primarily survival, it is proven mostly in Maus II how much of a burden being a survivor really weighed down on the characters.

Art is the son of two Holocaust survivors, and he says in Maus II, "Somehow, I wish I had been in Auschwitz with my parents so I could really know what they lived through! I guess it's some form of guilt about having had an easier life than they did." He explains to the reader and to his therapist how he suffers from guilt over his dead brother and explains how he feels he can never live up to him.

Vladek, too, explains how he feels guilt for having survived the Holocaust and for outliving his son Richieu. He says to his wife after the death of Richieu: "to die, it's easy...but you have to struggle for life."

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