Comparing Hemingway's Stories And Maus By Art Spiegelman

The Nick Adams Stories by Ernest Hemingway and Maus by Art Spiegelman deal with the atrocities of war and demonstrate what one human being is capable of doing to another. But both stories provide a sense of salvation, especially through the way their main characters escape. In Hemingway’s The Nick Adams Stories, the salvation that Nick finds refuge in is nature. Throughout Hemingway’s anthology of stories about Nick, the reader sees how Nick is injured quite a number of times during his duty in the army during World War I. In “Nick Sits Against the Wall,” Nick has been shot and is currently leaning against the wall away from enemy fire. In “Now I Lay Me,” Nick is unable to sleep due to his recent bout with death and in “A Way You’ll Never Be,” Nick encounters a field full of dead bodies recently killed during a battle. Nick
experiences many close calls with death and he finally gets his reprieve in Nature in “A Big Two-Hearted River.” When he first reaches Seney, he finds it in ruins because of the war, a constant remind of the atrocities he saw. But once he’s alone in the woods, he’s able to free himself and take in the nature around him while healing. He’s able to leave behind everything, especially the war, and find his way to getting back to normal.
In Spiegelman’s Maus, we are told the story of Vladek’s experiences of World War II through his son, Art. Their family is Jewish and therefore Vladek and his wife Anja (along with her family) deal with many prejudices against them. While Vladek works as a prison of war of sorts after being drafted, he uses his strengths to not only stay alive but also escape and get back to his family. Vladek fights for survival (something he still does in the present of the story—taking a load of pills in order to stay healthy and alive.) Maus suggests that there is salvation in begin with your family and surviving. Vladek’s goal is always to be with his family and keep them safe. After he’s been working at a German camp, the one thing he desires to do is be reunited with Anja and Richeu. He buys goods on the black market to help them survive and even gets into food smuggling for a while. Even though it ends in his death, Anja and Vladek decided to send Richeu away in order to protect him in chapter 5. Everything Vladek does is for the benefit of keeping his family alive. His salvation lies in them. He clearly still loves Anja dearly, even years after she’s committed suicide. Vladek’s determination to survive and be with his family despite experiencing first-hand the atrocities of the Holocaust show Maus’ definition of salvation.
2.
The female view in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes were Watching God suggests a changing sense of attitudes in American culture in many ways. Firstly, the story is told in third-person point of view from Janie, the main character’s, perspective through her narration to her friend Phoeby. She’s not only a woman, but African-American. The story is about Janie’s trials and tribulations in her life, including her three marriages. The novel is a celebration of African-American characters and is formulated around its female point of view. It showed a change in the attitude in American culture because of the way it portrays its characters. Hurston gives context as to why the major characters do what they do. Janie is searching for both love yet independence, Logan was looking for a wife, Joe wanted to be powerful, and Tea Cake’s need to travel. All in all, these characters help project Janie’s growth into finding herself by the end of the novel. It shows a change of attitude because of how all these characters help Janie develop as a character. It shows a in-depth story of a woman who faces many trying times but overcomes them in the
end.
In Jack Keroac’s On the Road, the male point of view shows a change in attitudes of American culture because of the way these men are portrayed. Instead of living the American dream, where these men work a 9-5 tedious job that they would despise, they instead give into their desires. The view of America that Kerouac is presenting is one that indulges in what they want. These men act like they want and travel where they like (a main premise of the novel.) When Sal and Eddie are offered a job, Sal decides to sleep in instead of accepting it. They go off and party and drink and live their lives to what they believe is the fullest. The shift in attitude in American culture is shown through Sal, Dean, Ed, among their other friends, in the way they indulge in what they want. It’s a shift from the American dream mentality. On the Road characters indulge in what they want and don’t care about the consequences, if there are any. They’d rather do what they want because they can and should be able to. It shows a shift in culture because of the way these characters are portrayed. The men indulge in what they want and the female charactesr are used as a catalyst for their male character counterparts, specifically Camille and Marylou. Also the fact that this was written and told during the Beat Generation, a time after World War II shows the way that this presents a change in attitude.
3. A limited set in the three plays helps add to the themes of each one in many ways. In Streamers by David Rabe, the play primarily takes place in a large Cadre room where the audience/readers are introduces to the main characters: Richie, Billy and Roger. The small, limited set gives way to the themes of Streamers because of the confinement in presents. These boys are about to be presumably shipped out to fight in the Vietnam war and this room heightens their alienation and upcoming fears about fighting. The limited set presents an all-male, intimate setting. We see them reveal their thoughts and their personalities clash, like with Richie and Billy and Richie’s undermining homosexuality and Carlyle’s irate behavior. This limited set eventually gives way to a cataclysmic end in which Billy and Rooney are both killed. The set heightens their emotions because of how condensed it is. In The Dining Room by A.R. Gurney has the limited set of a just a dining room (though the furniture in it is lavish.) The limited set of Gurney’s play brings forth the fact that the underlying theme of the play is the question of how much a room effects someone. The play is a play on WASP society, filled with upper-class families that range from housing affairs, a father who is slightly chastising his maid because he found a seed in his orange juice the morning previously, two siblings arguing over who gets the furniture, and a nephew who is filming his aunt because she is, or her WASP tendencies, are a dying breed. The limited set allows an intimate viewpoint into these different families where the audience/reader are able to view them and see how much the dining room plays a role on them. It gives insight on more well-off families and the social constructs that surround them. In Painting Churches by Tina Howe takes place in the Churches’ townhouse, in their living room. This limited set helps highlight the theme of the daughter, Mags, want for her parents’ acceptance and for her to be able to have a sense of independence in their home (despite being an adult.) The home setting helps provide a closer look into their family, showing how Fanny disregards Mags as an artist, giving off-handed comments about it. The set plays a part because the audience is forced to see how Mags’ parents still treat her as if she is a child, because of how up close and personal the limitedness is. The set helps show the characters and the fact that Mags lives in her father’s shadow and is trying to get out of it. She wants to paint her parents because it’ll show them exposed. The house setting brings forth her parents actions to her and Mags’ desire to be finally accepted by them.