Exploring Animal Imagery and Holocaust Themes in Spiegelman's Maus

This essay analyzes the use of animal imagery in Art Spiegelman's graphic novel, *Maus*, exploring how Spiegelman uses this technique to represent the Holocaust, race, and memory. The essay argues that the animal metaphors, such as mice for Jews, cats for Germans, and pigs for Poles, effectively convey the authenticity of the Holocaust survivors' experiences and the complexities of race theory. The essay examines how the animal imagery challenges racial definitions and dehumanization, emphasizing the absurdity and divisiveness of racial classifications. Drawing on critical sources, the essay discusses the impact of animal symbolism on the narrative, the characters' identities, and the overall themes of the graphic novel, concluding that the animal imagery enhances the story's themes and its impact on readers. The essay also draws a comparison with George Orwell's *Animal Farm* to show how animal imagery can be used to tell dark stories.

Running head: THE USE OF ANIMAL IMAGERY IN SPIEGELMAN’S WORK
The Use if Animal imagery in Spiegelman’s work
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THE USE OF ANIMAL IMAGERY IN SPIEGELMAN’S WORK
Student Name :
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The American Cartoonist Spiegelman has very beautifully created a graphic novel
that can be categorized into the genre of biography, fiction as well as history. Written in the
year of 1991, “Maus” had successfully been awarded the Pulitzer Prize in the year 1992. The
graphic tale deals with an interview that Spiegelman had with his father. The narrative
depicts the past experiences of the Holocaust survivors with the representation of a comic
fable. The thesis statement that the essay aims to analyse is that the use of the animal imagery
in the novel has helped the cartoonist to bring out the authenticity of the sentiments and the
memories of the holocaust and the past. The discussion also aims to argue that the animal
metaphor throughout the graphic novel also helps to bring out the race theory and how the
story talks about something dark and not smooth.
According to Kruger, the word fable, derived from the Latin word “Fibula”, means a
story. Acting as a literary device it helps the literature to depict a moral lesson with the use of
animal imagery. The feature of animals, and other inanimate objects helps the novelists
illustrate a fictional or a real story that is dark in nature, with severe impacts upon the readers.
It has been a question of several critics, that whether Spiegelman in Maus follows the lost
traditional use of incorporation of animal genre or of Aesop’s fables. Lawrence discusses that

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Maus seems to incorporate the animal imagery as metaphors because, the Jews are the Jewish
people who are represented or depicted as mice, in a very typical distinctive convention. In
“Maus”, Spiegelman has used cats to represent the Germans. The Polish people have been
represented by pigs and the Jews have been depicted as mic, and the Americans have been
represented by dogs. According to Gavrila, it has been argued by many of the critics that the
use of the animal imagery actually diverts the readers from the actual crux of the story.
However in this case, the use of the imagery becomes secondary to the interactive elements
among the narratives. One starts to classify the characters as humans and not as animals
because of its simplistic sketches that the author incorporates in the graphic novel and their
distinct human characteristics (Kruger). Only when the novelist Spiegelman deliberately
portrays and represents the animal face as a disguise, and unexpectedly introduces the human
sketched characters of “Prisoner on the Hell Plane, “ can one become fully aware of the
animatronics of the characters (Machado). Not only does such disturbances drive the reader
out of cynicism, they also induce the reader to decode and challenge the developed notion
that such' persons' are viewed as separate organisms. In this manner, Spiegelman points at the
absurdity and divisiveness of these definitions of race. According to Shores, the use of the
animal imagery of cats and mice is the most actual and direct way to deal with the harsh
gravity of the story.
The images used in the graphic novel actually helps to portray the narrative. The
characters that are used lack the acknowledgement of their character as animals, when they
are actually compared and juxtaposed with the species. This actually helps to form the
background of the narrative in which the story is spoken out (Machado). Furthermore, the
indifference of the characters often means that one's existence is subjectively defined by
experience, not only by the person but by acknowledgement of others of that identity. This is
very effectively understood by one of the instances of the novel when Vladek is seen wearing

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the mark of the pig, representing a particular identity, he is recognized by the Polish pigs as
one of their kind. According to the discussion of Lawrence, it can be said that although the
story of Maus has been inspired by a lot of fables, and tales, Spiegelman here tells the story
of a gruesome reality and not of any whimsical fantasy comic story. Fatema also discusses
that the actual story of the Maus is not like any other smooth or funny comic stories. It
depicts the harsh and horrible history that had been suffered by the Jewish people.
The metaphor of the cats and mice that has been used by Spiegelman in Maus is
strong and controversial. The original concept of this divisive portrayal effectively describes
the political connections between the Nazis and the Jews and indicates the Nazi oppression's
violent existence. However, Montogomery argues that it is very natural for the cats to attack
the mice, which means that the metaphor is natural and it depicts the natural roles. In a
specific sense, Jews and Nazis are just mice and cats respectively in comparison to one
another. The metaphor used in this context is not a straightforward representation, but rather a
perception of unjust human relationships. AlsoShores discusses that the analogy might also
relate to the dehumanization of refugees that could lead to holocaust. In an alternate context it
can reflect on the bestial and uncivilized actions of the Nazis.
Throughout the entire graphic novel, the use of the animal imagery into a fable
narrative actually serves to challenge and weaken the notion of the racial theory. As per the
discussion of Gale, while Spiegelman forbids presenting every character as individual, he
juxtaposes the characters with feelings and human traits and modes of thinking so that the
audience may recognize and interpret them as the representation and expression of humanity.
His animal representation of these creations illustrates Hitler's wilful ignorance and
deception. According to Hitler, the Jews were definitely a race, but they could not be
considered as humans (Moreno). Spiegelman deals specifically with this absurdity by
presenting the characters as creatures. Arti's struggle in determining how to portray his

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spouse, who was not only a Frenchwoman but also a former Christian, shows the developed
and subjective understanding of culture, ethnicity and nationality and their relationship.
Therefore, Fatema effectively puts forwards her argument that the ingenuity of the animal
symbolism and imagery does not belittle the Holocaust, but contributes to Maus's underlying
themes and after effects. One of the examples of a literary work, where the author extensively
uses animal imagery and animal characters to bring out a dark story is the “Animal Farm
(1945)”. Machado here discusses that in this fable, the author George Orwell speaks of a
political satire, with sophisticated tradition of using allegorical devices. The fable effectively
criticizes the exploitation of the political authority in Stalin’s Russia. The animal characters
that rae used in the story are based upon few historical characters of the then times which
include Karl Marx, Lenin, Trotzky as well as Stalin. Kruger, observes that these use of
animal imagery as metaphors is a tradition followed by the authors because they reflect upon
the differences, the similarities and the relationships that animals have with human
characters.
Thus from the above discussion it can be concluded that even if the use of the animal
imagery in the graphic novel is controversial and criticized, it helps to portray the
significance of the Holocaust and the gruesome reality of it. Through the use if the animal
imagery, Spiegelman is able to show to the readers what actually happened in the events of
holocaust without losing the focus from the relationship between the memory and the
character.

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Works Cited
Fatema, Rumnaz. A critical study of graphic novels: spiegelman’s maus and satrapi’s
persepolis. Diss. BRAC University, 2016.
Gale, Cengage Learning. A Study Guide for Art Spiegelman's" Maus". Gale, Cengage
Learning, 2016.
Gavrilă, Ana-Maria. "Holocaust Representation and Graphical Strangeness in Art
Spiegelman’s Maus: A Survivor’s Tale:“Funny Animals,” Constellations, and
Traumatic Memory." Acta Universitatis Sapientiae Communicatio 4.1 (2017): 61-75.
Kruger, Liam. "Panels and faces: segmented metaphors and reconstituted time in Art
Spiegelman's Maus." Critical Arts 29.3 (2015): 357-366.
Lawrence, Julian. "IDENTITY IS A MASK: ART SPIEGELMAN’S TREATMENT OF
METAPHOR IN MAUS." (2014).
Machado, Rust Costa. "Rewriting the self: re-framing narrative identity via metafictional
resources in art spiegelman’s maus and jonathan safran foer’s everything is
illuminated." (2018).
Montgomery, Shaunté. "If He Wasn’t Wearing That Mask Would I Know and Would I Even
Care: The Performance of Race in Art Spiegelman’s Maus The concept of this project
began with this panel from Art Spiegelman’s Maus."

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Moreno, Pablo Villa. Cartooning the Unspeakable: A Literature Workshop on Maus by Art
Spiegelman. Diss. PONTIFICIA UNIVERSIDAD CATÓLICA DE VALPARAISO,
2015.
Shores, Corry. "The Minor Machinery of Animal Packs: Becoming as Survival in
Spiegelman’s Maus." Graphic Novels as Philosophy (2017): 150.