Maus, by Art Spiegelman

At first glance "Maus" is a biographical graphic novel about the father of the author's survival of the holocaust, but I think at the heart of this narrative is the effect that adversity and loss can have on people and their families. In a story dealing with such events as the Holocaust you would think that the hardship of the horrific event would be the main conflict, but this story in my opinion focuses more on the after math of such an event as it's effects creep through time into future generations. My main reason for thinking this is how the story so haphazardly throws away characters, sometimes before I even really knew their name. My experience with the novel "Night", by Elie Wiesel showed the Holocaust in a stomach turning fashion where relationships are broken down and twisted by pure hatred and ignorance and it made me feel the pain of those events and made me empathize with the victims of such a tragedy. In mouse we see a character get introduced and die within pages with little development or attachment established, but I think that this is partly intentional. "Maus" makes the viewer feel a different kind of pain, a less direct pain that one rarely hears or talks about, the subtle pain of surviving a tragedy and having to live on with so much damage. It is made clear that Art's father Vladek's personality has been effected by the events of the Holocaust in ways that make it hard to live a "normal" life. The story constantly presses the viewer with tense interactions between the father and his family. Through these interactions we see the residual damages within the author's father, who is obsessed with money and has trouble accepting his son and wife's actions and behaviors. Spiegelman offers the audience a chance to look at how tragedy can change a person and the awkward and sad reality of trying to deal with that. We as an audience are forced to be a part of this life where you want to love a family member, but some exterior force has made that much harder and  has put you in a place of "I can't stand being around this person, but I know what they've been through so how can I be mad at them?" After reading this book I was somewhat unimpressed by the dry nature of it and the inconsequential stance on the entire issue, but as I write this analysis I can see more of what the author intended and can appreciate this piece much more because of that.