MAUS; The Line Between Unity and Disunity

Art Spiegelman beautifully utilizes elements of a graphic novel to represent Vladek’s experience in Maus. When I began to analyze these specific series of panels (116), the lightbulb clicked for a great prompt.

In the page, the last four frames join together to makes a giant picture of Vladek on the couch. Through the dialogue, body language, and expression of Vladek, the sadness from his memories are depicted. The somber emotions reinforce how Vladek is haunted by his detailed memory of the losses of loved ones. The frames representing a single image symbolize how Vladek’s family is still a part of his life. The survivor’s guilt that Vladek feels can be inferred from the language and visual. Even through this guilt of being the only survivor out of his immediate family, Vladek continues to fight for his life. Experiencing the death of his friends made him cherish life even more for himself and their sake. This represents the unity portrayed in this page.

However, the image of Vladek shows disunity and detachment through the gutters between the frames as well as unity. Art Spiegelman effectively partializes Vladek through the physical characteristics of a comic. This separation can be interpreted as many aspects of Vladek’s life. One explanation is that Art represents the broken memories of Vladek in his time at Auschwitz. Vladek tells that the duration of his stay at Auschwitz is unclear, and when Vladek tells his story to Art, the story is very nonlinear and interrupted often. It could also symbolize how the broken memories breaks Vladek physically and mentally. Vladek faces a long list of health complications likely caused by the Holocaust. On top of this, Vladek carries with him the memories of what happened to his loved ones which breaks his fragile mental health. Even if Art couldn’t relate to his father’s experiences in the Holocaust, he could still see the brokenness in him hence the depiction in the comic.

The sheet of ice between unity and disunity portrayed in this page can be a great essay topic that could be argued which is more prevalent. This prompt would set the writer up to not only discuss rhetoric and visuals, but relate some of the brokenness caused by memories to his/her own life as well.

Comments

  1. UnknownOctober 15, 2017 at 2:19 PM

    I like the way how you contrasted the differences of unity and disunity and how they tear Vladek's life apart. The frames do a great job of that as they show the shattered nature of Vladek's life and memories but also how his life is pieced together through these memories. I also like how you turned a topic specific to these frames and connected them with the entire novel. Nicely said!

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  2. UnknownOctober 15, 2017 at 2:46 PM

    What a great analysis! You took the most obvious parts of the panel and extended your thinking. I really love the point you made about the disjointed character of the border separation and how it connects to Vladek.

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