Maus (1980-1991)

January 27 is the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust, also known as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Though those numbers are thinning, their stories should never be forgotten.

Spiegelman has captured one of those in his Pulitzer Prize winning Maus.

The account is to comic books what Schindler’s List is to movies.

Art Spiegelman released his father’s pain over an 11-year period – serialized in the pages of Raw – a legacy of humanized suffering. The tale does more than relate a first-hand account of Jewish life under Nazi rule; it offers Spiegelman a chance to understand and connect with his father as he was never able to growing up.

Readers begin the journey in 1978, but soon are transported to pre-war Czestochwa, Poland. Papa Spiegelman, Vladek, paints a backdrop of normalcy that paves a path to Auschwitz.

Neither elder or young Spiegelman shy from the horrors learned or passed on.

Vladek’s story was later collected in two volumes and has been lauded by the National Book Critics Circle, American Jewish Committee, Christian Testimony, Angoulemem International Comics Festival Awards, Urhunden Prize, Max & Mortiz Prize, Eisner Award, Harvey Award, Los Angeles Times and with a Pulitzer Prize.

Maus: A Survivor’s Tale is a monument to the victims who died within the concentration camps and those who died after. One is Art’s mother who committed suicide when he was 20.

It is estimated six million Jews were murdered under the Nazi regime.