Making it personal

Cats and Dogs

Mice are Jews. Cats are Germans. Poles are pigs. By making every race a different animal, Spiegelman wanted to show how absurd it was to divide people by these lines. In the end we are all human. 

Spiegelman uses three real life photographs in Maus book 2. One of his brother Richieu.  One of Vladek. One of him and his mother. Why? Why does he go from mouse to human?

Art dedicates Book 2 to Richieu and his own children. He provides us with the picture below. It is Richieu. We no longer think of him as a baby mouse but as a baby boy. The baby mouse was poisoned and therefore the baby boy was poisoned. Spiegelman gives us Richieu's picture to let us know the story real. Because it was real.

Vladek Spiegelman was not perfect, but he sure was a fighter. We get to know Artie's father through interviews and mindless banter. But we don't really know him until we see him. This is the handsome Vladek we know. The survivor. This picture is how we will remember him.

Another photo is of Artie and his mother Anja. Sitting happily with his mother's hand on his hand, Artie is blissful. We see this picture in "Prisoner on a Hell Planet". Artie feels responsible for his mother's death. In "Prisoner on a Hell Planet", he wears a jail uniform. He is convicted by his guilt and shame. It wasn't fair that Artie lost his mother. She made him happy. He loved her.

Three photos. Three memories. Three family members who have come and gone: Richieu, Anja, and Vladek. Why does Spiegelman just use family pictures in his book? Perhaps it's because his family members were the ones closest to him. In fact, for Artie and his family, the Holocaust was and still is a reality.

Whether Art draw mouse or human, we feel Spiegelman's pain. We already begin to associate the mice with humans as the novel progresses, so these human photos really make the story personal. They put faces to the characters and make the story credible. The photos bring a story about mice and nazi cats together in a way that makes Maus the survivor's tale.