Art Spiegelman - The Complete Maus

Date of Birth :15th February 1948 Place of birth: Stockholm, Sweden

Family Background: - Art’s parents changed their names to “Vladek" and "Anja", which he believed would be easier for Americans to pronounce when reading his story.- Art’s parents wanted him to become a dentist, after rejecting their request he proceeded to attend art school.- Richieu, Art’s brother was poisoned during the war by his aunt in an attempt to protect him from suffering- After the war, the Spiegelman’s, unable to accept that Richieu was dead, searched orphanages all over Europe in the hope of finding him.- Spiegelman had a sibling rivalry with his "ghost brother"—he felt unable to compete with an "ideal" brother who "never threw tantrums or got in any kind of trouble". - Of the 85 Spiegelman relatives alive at the beginning of World War II, only 13 are known to have survived the Holocaust.- Art Spiegelman’s relationship with his father ‘Vladek’ is rocky and unstable. Throughout the novel we sense hatred

between the pair which gives us a sense of tension.Here we can see the lack of respect between Art and Vladek, they don’t speak to each other very nicely. In the first set of comics, we see that Vladek threw Art’s coat out because it was old in his opinion and this sparks an argument which demonstrates to the readers that there is tension between the pair. In the second set of comics, Vladek admits to Art that he burned Anja’s diaries she wrote during the war. Art refers to his father as a ‘murderer’ and once again, an argument begins.

Art’s Writing- Art Spiegelman is an American cartoonist, editor and comics advocate best known for his graphic novel Maus.- Art Spiegelman's conceptualisation of Maus began in 1972 when he decided to do a comic strip about racism based on his Father. He started out just wanting to make his father’s story into a comic strip but it turned out to be a complete book with chapters and 2 parts.- ‘The Complete Maus’ was published in 1996.- Art Spiegelman won the ‘Pulitzer award’ which is a very famous author award.