Maus Research

Spiegelman's Maus II is a graphic novel and I believe Spiegelman chose this format because it is the only way to discuss the Holocaust while simultaneously conveying the impossibility of doing such a task. The Holocaust was such a horrific event that there is no way of truly representing it. Spiegelman realized that everything is a representation. He also realized that representing every aspect of the Holocaust was something that simply cannot be done. It is impossible to capture something free of representation. Spiegelman wanted to write a story about the Holocaust but he was very cautious in his construction. Maus: Volume II is constructed with precise self-awareness and self-devaluation to tell to a story about the Holocaust, while also writing a story about the impossibility of trying to capture this tragic event within the extremely limited parameters of representation.
The plot of Maus II appears as a "frame story," or a story within a story. The graphic novel is not only a story about the Holocaust; it is a story that depicts Spiegelman writing his story about the Holocaust. This extensively self-conscious construction allowed Spiegelman to write a story about something as powerful and tragic as the Holocaust, yet still show his readers that his was merely a meager attempt at representing the unrepresentable. It was his goal to show that he in no way had the capacity to write a story that captured the pure essence of the Holocaust. However he managed to portray the Holocaust to his best ability, while still conveying how lacking his best ability was.
There are several examples of Speigelman’s careful self-conscious artistry and writing in Maus. In pages 41 – 46, Spiegelman describes his guilt and fear in writing his novel. In this section he depicts himself as a writer with the mask of a mouse’s face; the face that appears on his character in the graphic novel which actually is a mouse. This symbolizes the inability he felt in creating Maus. He did this