Throughout the year, our ASTU class had a large frame focusing on memory. During our ASTU class these days, we’ve been focusing on the graphic novel Maus. A graphic novel was written by American cartoonist Art Spiegelman that published in 1991, depicting Spiegelman father’s interview about his experiences as a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. The graphic novel implies postmodernist techniques and represents Jews as mice, Germans as cats, and Poles as pigs. As one of the most representative novels that demonstrate the tragedy of the Holocaust, it was interesting to read my interesting to read my classmates’ blog posts about their opinions towards the representation of memory in Maus.

In Diego’s Blog Etana’s Blog, he focused on the significance of “mice and cats” in Maus. Normally, a mouse is described as dirty creatures that are useless in society. Just like a mouse, Jews were seen as invasive species that were detrimental to human society, in which the Nazis’ perspective of the Jews during the Holocaust and treated them like animals. Also, Etana added up a point that although there are diverse species for mice, people still categorize them as “mouse”. As the identification of mice, Jews were recognized just by their race. As result, people were more desensitized and dehumanized towards the Jewish population. Cats on the contrarily, are totally different from the mouse. They are demonstrated as a lovely and adorable creature that removes mouse for their owner. Like the relationship between cats and mouse, Nazis can be viewed as cats and heroes that executed the Jews, and the idea that cats can be portrayed as graceful and noble, which can be connected with the belief of Aryan supremacy.  Furthermore, Spiegelman used animals rather than humans in her graphic novel is because it is easier for the readers to accept serious and dark topics from the past, to remove the discomfort towards the event.

The discussion of Maus was also mentioned in other student’s blogs, about the representation of “time”. There were 2 eras, one is when Artie is interviewing his father, and the other is when Vladek’s memories were portrayed during WW2. From Amanda’s blog, she was able to notice that the author connected past and present timelines by the use of chapters to demonstrate certain events to the readers. Also, Spiegelman uses the gutter, technique of a comic strip structure, which can make the readers have to fill in the space between panels. This would let the readers connect the images even if the image is irrelevant to each other. She used implied page 14 frames don’t have any borders that show the contrast between storylines. Conversely, from Isabel’s blog, she mentions that the characters are portrayed differently from different timelines. This can be shown from changing attitudes of Vladek when he treated his former wife better compared to his new wife and his son. In addition, based on different time eras, Vladek becomes older and younger.

Personally, I personally enjoyed reading this book knowing more about more about the Holocaust in a comical and a light way. However, as we read the graphic novel more in detail, readers can find out how Spiegelman implied different techniques and symbols to illustrate the representation of memory in Maus.