(A personal story, it will not be my entire post.)

I grew up without cable T.V., and the only channel I watched growing up was CBC. At 5:30 every night, The Simpsons would air, and I watched it religiously. As a child, I thought that because The Simpsons was a cartoon, it was for children- even though my mum constantly told me it was “a cartoon for adults”.

I grew up in a non- religious family, but I watched the Simpsons a lot. In fact, I was told the story of Adam and Eve through the Simpsons, in their 10th season, episode 18- “Simpsons Bible Stories”. In the Simpsons version of this essential, cultural, religious and foundational story, Homer actually eats all the apples from the tree, but blames Marge when God comes around to condemn them! From then on, I was sure that Adam blamed Eve for eating the apples, and that God was mistaken.

My Lit 12 teacher told me that the Simpsons is a rich source of social satire and irony. Looking back on my conception of Adam and Eve from the Simpsons, I see the social satire, and the questioning of themes that form the foundation of society and culture (originating from long ago).

I like the Simpsons version of Adam and Eve better, but I digress.

Maus and the Simpsons are similar in that they perform important cultural work in the form of a comic or cartoon. The Simpsons subersively interrogates society by poking fun at family values, cultural traditions and american stereotypes, while Maus, is an autobiography of the holocaust told through the form of a comic, a less traditional and respected medium.

Maus is an autobiography struggling to tell a tragic narrative concerning modern, western genocide- an atrocity and a subject that is as sad as it is unbelievable. When approaching the holocaust, the historian’s approach is, widely, fact based. The American Holocaust Museum does not use adjectives in any of its descriptions of the event. Although disputed, it is believed best practice not to include personal opinions in the form of emotionally charged descriptions and adjectives.

However, Spiegelman’s job is different, as he is writing an autobiography of his father’s life and holocaust experience, and one would expect a more emotionally charged and biased telling.  Michael Rothberg writes that “Spiegelman transgresses the sacredness of Aushwitz by depicting in comic strip images his surviver father’s suffering and by refusing to sentimentalize the survivor (665).” The medium of the comic allows Spiegelman to escape from the sensitive and tragic sentiment of the camps, and portray his father as a real and flawed person, instead of the tragic victim. He constantly portrays his father as flawed, petty and frugal, commenting that “in some ways he’s just like the racist caricature of the miserly old jew” (1, 131). Vladek is also seen as racist, himself, despite being in the camps, in book II when he is upset that they pick up a black hitchhiker.

The comic form allows Art to break away from the sentimentalized and traditional holocaust memoirs and their subjects, and in doing so, he also creates a popular and accessible medium for a larger variety of readers. The comic, as a subversive text, filled with social commentary, attracts readers- but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have value. Perhaps younger readers, or those interested in comics and art will pick up the book and learn about the valuable cultural narrative that is Maus and Vladek’s story.

Comics, as Maus was, are seen as fiction. However, if they are fiction or not, comics and cartoons, in their various forms allow for a transgression of accepted social sentiment- they have more leeway and less of a traditional framework than written mediums. In doing so, they can do important work, making pointed social statements, satirizing society and social tropes, and even telling tragic stories.

Works Cited:

Rothberg, Michael and Spiegelman, Art. We were talking Jewish: Art Spiegelman’s Maus as Holocaust Production. Contemportary Literature Vol. 35 (Winter: 1994). 665.