Congratulations are due for Vanessa Lopez who received
(from educator Michael Van Slooten --award is in honor of his late father a former professor at CSUN)
This was for her essay "The Effect of an Unconventional Narrative"
when she compared Henry Oster's memoir
The Kindness of the Hangman with Art Speigelman's
Maus II.
The Effect of an Unconventional Narrative
by Vanessa Lopez
Too often, when the Holocaust is covered in
school curriculum, teachers emphasize the historical impact, focusing on the
events prior and during World War II.
While the atrocities and genocide are covered, there is a failure to
delve deeply into the human experience and understand the impact on the
survivors. It is important to do this in
order to fully appreciate the way survivors overcame and triumphed over such
adversity. Two books that effectively do
so are The Kindness of the Hangman by
Henry Oster and Dexter Ford and Maus II:
A Survivor’s Tale: And Here My Troubles Began by Art Spiegelman. Though they are different genres, the books
work well together, sharing some similarities.
Both Vladek and Henry are imprisoned in Auschwitz and describe the
atrocities endured in the camps. They
are, nevertheless, written in different styles; one being a memoir and the
other a graphic novel. Both stories
provide extensive background into the daily life in the camps. The key difference between the stories,
however, is Spiegelman’s incorporation of the metanarrative which creates a
more emotional tone than Dr. Oster’s story and the fact that the anthropomorphized
animals in the graphic novel soften the subject matter in ways that Dr. Oster’s
narrative cannot.
Dr. Oster’s memoir delivers a style
that is straightforward and informational.
His co-writer Dexter Ford interweaves much historical background into
the narrative as a means of enhancing and contextualizing Henry’s experience. A key example early in the book states that “Hitler
believed that Jews had formed an international conspiracy. Allied with the Communists who had come to
power in Russia, they were, he fantasized, plotting to dominate the world’s
political and financial institutions and, eventually, the world itself. He also believed that some Jews allied with
the Communists, had caused Germany to lose World War I by fomenting labor strikes,
political subversion and revolutions…a myth known as Dolchstoßlegend: the Stab In The Back” (Oster and Ford 15). Here, the creators inform the reader of the
ideological propaganda fueling the Holocaust.
It is important to understand the historical underpinnings of the
genocide which consumed so many victims.
Readers are forced to acknowledge the fact that the Jewish people were
scapegoated, villainized and cast into the category of “the other.” Reader’s see no such contextualization in
Spiegelman’s graphic novel.
The beginning of Maus II delves immediately into
Spiegelman’s pathos instead of historical facts of the Holocaust, setting up
the metanarrative structure of the story.
After Vladek’s wife abandons him, Art and his wife François are
compelled to visit him. Their conversation
en route establishes his internal conflict regarding his work and his family.
When François asks Art if he is feeling depressed, he replies ‘Just thinking about my book… it’s
so presumptuous of me. I mean, I can’t even make any sense out of my
relationship with my father. How am I
supposed to make any sense out of Auschwitz?...Of the Holocaust?...”
(Spiegelman 14.3A-3B). Graphic novels
use visual rhetoric in conjunction with the actual text. When Art asserts that he is presumptuous,
readers see the outside of the car as they drive to Vladek’s house. The next frame, 3B, cuts to the car’s
interior. The shift from outside to
inside indicates a deeper understanding of Art’s emotional state. Once the focus shifts to the car’s interior,
readers understand the root his self-contempt.
This panel helps to establish, early on, the fact that Art faces
multiple layers of conflict; both as an artist and the son of a Holocaust
survivor. Though conflicted about
documenting his father’s experience in the form of a graphic novel, doing so
allows the story to reach a wider audience.
Additionally, the fact that people are represented as animals makes the
horror more bearable.
In The Kindness of the Hangman, Oster and Ford make no such attempt at
softening the book’s tone and subject matter.
Dr. Oster accounts one of the most painful memories as imprisoned youth;
a memory long withheld from anyone. He
recalls a dance with death. Henry was
selected for execution along with four other stable boys and many older men
from other barracks. Of that night, he
describes “two machine gun crews that had been concealed in the trucks started
firing, their muzzles flashing in the darkness, spitting bullets right into the
crowd of prisoners. Right at me” (Oster
and Ford 96). He continues with the
elaborate details explaining for the reader that “I had a fairly tall guy in
front of me who was hit in the first blast from the guns. He fell back on top of me, and I felt a pain
in my knee, and then I was under a pile of thrashing, heavy, dying men…I could
see that there were two German officers now, with heir pistols out, going
through the pile of dead and dying men.
They were going one by one, shooting the wounded lying helpless on the ground
in the backs of their heads” (Oster and Ford 96). Dr. Oster’s description is blunt. He admits later the terror he felt, but
describes that only briefly. Instead, his interest is in transmitting the
information, the tragedies sustained in camp life. He does not place a heavy emphasis on his own
emotional state. Reading those words
forces the reader to picture the atrocities and try and imagine what it might
be like. Ironically, the sharp, direct
writing style appeals to the reader’s pathos, inevitably evoking an emotional
reaction, though the words are not heavily infused with sentimentality.
Spiegelman’s retelling of Vladek’s
life in the camp also covers the cruelty and abominations sustained. A particularly powerful moment was after
Vladek tells Art about the wave of Hungarian Jews that arrived at the camps; so
many that prisoners were forced to dig cremation pits. Vladek is pictured in page 72.2A, describing
the scene. In 2B, Spiegelman draws
prisoners in their uniforms, toiling as they drag dead, naked bodies. In the back, there is smoke and a prisoner
spraying liquid, presumably gasoline.
The caption above reads, “And those what finished in the gas chambers
before they got pushed in these graves, it was the lucky ones. The others had to jump in the graves while
still they were alive…” (Spiegelman 72.3B).
The combination of word and image limits the reader’s ability imagine
much more than what is described. Spiegelman’s
drawings create for the reader their sense of reality. They can stomach such images only because
they are caricatures of animals. Were
they real images, it would be unbearable, especially considering the following
image. Vladek tells that “Prisoners what
worked there poured gasoline over the live ones and the dead ones. And the fat from the burning bodies they
scooped and poured again so everyone could burn better” (Spiegelman
72.3A). This caption is coupled by the
image of many mice, writhing in agony as they burned alive. Spiegelman effectively draws the reader in
with his impressive artwork. He conveys
the severity without causing fright, making the story more enjoyable despite
the horror.
For these reasons, Maus II, is a more accessible text. It
focuses on the generational impact of the Holocaust, broadening the issue from
simply one man’s perspective, as seen in The
Kindness of the Hangman. The
metanarrative structure throughout the story provides a kind of depth lacking
from Oster’s book. Maus II highlights Spiegelman’s
own insecurities apart from his father’s issues. He draws himself looking miserable at his
desk. One change is particularly
significant: He is no longer a mouse.
Instead, he is a man, wearing a mouse mask. We see then another level of detachment from
the story he created. He feels like a
fraud. On page 41.3A he reflects on the
fact that “at least fifteen foreign editions are coming out. I’ve gotten 4 serious offers to turn my book
into a T.V. special or movie. (I don’t wanna.)
In May 1968, my mother killed herself.
(She left no note.) Lately I’ve
been feeling depressed.” He sits, head
hanging down at his desk. It is atop a
mass of decomposing corpses piled high.
Clearly, he is dealing with guilt, feeling that he exploited the agonies
of others. The fact that he wears a mask
indicates a need to hide, a sense of insecurity, and an element of fear that
defines his position as an individual with this backstory. He struggles in a very pure sense, with
multiple generations of survivor’s guilt.
The visual rhetoric and semiotics within
Art Spiegelman’s Maus II: A Survivor’s Tale: And Here My Troubles Began, are
appropriate and perfect for this generation.
Through a new sort of lens, the graphic narrative, these stories
continue to be told over seventy years after the Holocaust. The shift away from a conventional narrative
style could attract an audience that might otherwise be disinterested in
literature, something that would not have been possible years ago. Ultimately both conventional and
unconventional Holocaust narratives are an essential part of education. Especially in a political climate infused with
bigotry, racism and hatred, understanding these atrocities––however the stories
are told––are essential for the emotional growth of society. These stories demonstrate for the audience
that ignorance and fear of others can spawn hatred, war, and genocide. For younger readers, Spiegelman’s work is an
ideal way to introduce these ideas to them.
Works Cited
Oster,
Henry and Decter Ford. The Kindness of
the Hangman. Higgins Bay Press, 2014.
Spiegelman,
Art. Maus
II: A Survivor’s Tale: And Here My Troubles Began. Pantheon Books,
1986 – 1991.
