'Maus' author helps U. mark Holocaust

Whoever thought that a comic book full of cat and mouse drawings could be considered powerful? The answer: Pulitzer-Prize winning cartoonist Art Spiegelman. Speaking at Chats Thursday night as part of Holocaust Remembrance Day, Spiegelman revealed the secrets behind his 1991 book Maus to a standing room-only crowd of 350 students, faculty and community members. The annual lecture marking the conclusion of the day -- known by its Hebrew translation as Yom Hashoah -- was co-sponsored by Hillel's Holocaust Education Committee and organizations including Connaissance. Maus tells the story of Spiegelman's father's Holocaust experiences in a cartoon format. The work is unique because the cartoonist metaphorically portrays his characters as animals. Jews are drawn as mice, Germans as cats and Poles as pigs. Spiegelman chose animal representations because they "give me the distances necessary to become close to these characters." Additionally, mice are "kind of blank faces for you to project onto," he noted. College and Wharton junior Rifki Zable, a Holocaust Education Committee member who helped organize the event, explained that the work's "unique type of genre" helped attract a large crowd to the event. College and Engineering junior Ethan Isenberg, the co-chairperson of the committee, agreed, noting that Maus has "been taught in a lot of courses here." The cartoon format of the book is essential to its message, explained Spiegelman, who currently contributes art to The New Yorker. "Comics are to art as Yiddish is to language -- a vernacular," he said. Furthermore, he said they create "a way of seeing past, present and future at the same time." To enhance his presentation, Spiegelman showed slides of his drawings and described the technical aspects of his work. In particular, Spiegelman said he worked to achieve a balance in the story between words and drawings. Later in the lecture, he played an excerpt from an interview he conducted with his father. "It's shocking to actually hear the real thing," College freshman Tamara Kushnir remarked. Arranging for Spiegelman to come to the University was no small feat. Due to his chain-smoking habit, Spiegelman requires that the lecture venue allow smoking. Chats accommodated Spiegelman's demand. Not coincidentally, nearly all depictions of Spiegelman in Maus picture him with a cigarette in hand. His autograph is a mouse with a cigarette hanging from its lips. The book "would have taken 11 1/2 years [to complete]," Spiegelman joked. "But I stopped smoking for a year and a half." Since its original publication in 1991, the book has been translated into more than 20 languages and a Polish edition is forthcoming, he said. The artist is currently writing an opera about the history of comic books. In typical Spiegelman fashion, he is undertaking the project "only because I know nothing about it." Several audience members said they enjoyed Spiegelman's lecture, with College senior Laura Siegel joking that "it was neat to see the man behind the Maus."