Monday, February 25, 2008

Graphic storytelling

First, the obvious question: What did you think of the "comic-book" treatment of this serious subject matter?
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11 comments:

Erin said...

It felt really strange to me at first. I think the use of animals was the strangest part. I'd like to see what Spiegelman had to say about why he chose to use animals and what the significance was. You generally only see anthropomorphized animals in Disney movies and other children's stories. It felt incongruous with this subject matter. I never did really get used to it.

9:43 AM, February 26, 2008
kc said...

I agree. The animals took some getting used to, especially because they weren't individualized. Every mouse looked pretty much like every other mouse. I read somewhere that using animals was meant to highlight the absurdity of racial/ethnic categories. That made sense for me.

I also liked the use of the "comic-book" form because it called into question the Holocaust as tragedy (in the classical sense, where there's a tragic hero, a fatal flaw, a sense of nobility) and put it in the category of base, brutal animal farce. This, for me, has the effect of sapping all power from the Nazis and their "story."

11:47 AM, February 26, 2008
rev amy said...

Is it possible the comic form made it too easy to read?

A week or so after I read Maus I watched portions of "Schindler's List" for a class I am teaching on film and theology. We were talking about sin/evil. I had watched it before (and swore, incidentally that I would never watch it again.) The movie is brilliant film making but it also struck me how much more revolted I was at watching it than reading the comic.

Perhaps Spielgman has actually shorted us in both media, the comic does not have the visual impact of film, nor the literary impact of novel.

Or is this a case of "knowing too much?" If Maus is your first encounter with Holocaust storytelling does it make a bigger impact?

11:04 AM, February 27, 2008
kc said...

Why did you swear never to watch "Schindler's List"? Just curious.

11:36 AM, February 27, 2008
kc said...

Amy, is your concern that the graphic form isn't really graphic enough to convey the horror?

There may be something to that. It's certainly a concern I had, and yet I found the books exceptionally moving and I think they've made as deep an impact on me as anything I've ever read about the Holocaust — possibly because it's not just a story about the Holocaust, but it's a memoir of process — of how Spiegelman processed his father's and his experiences in this deeply personal way. He's letting us see the sausage being made, as it were.

I have recently gotten into graphic works, but I've noticed that the only ones that really move me are the personal memoirs — people writing and drawing about their own lives vs. made-up superheroes or whatever. Drawing, to me, seems like the most primitive storytelling — it's how kids tell stories — and it has a primal power that lingers. And when combined with words there's a wholeness and individuality to it that I've found deeply affecting. And it also, for me, shows a "whole" person — the kid in the adult and the adult in the kid.

Speigelman mentions that he won't sell the movie rights. Any thoughts on that? My impression is an insistence that the story be told in a singular way.

11:53 AM, February 27, 2008
rev amy said...

I swore to never watch the movie again because it was so painful, so horrifying. I don't fault it, needs to be, the story is. I think everyone should watch it once. I kept reminding my class that Spielberg didn't take creative license. That what we were seeing happened!

In snipets it was okay. But all told? Three hours worth again? I don't think I could sit through it. The enormity of the evil is too much. Maybe I'm a wimp but I have found since becoming a pastor I have a harder time with moments of deep human pain and tragedy in film/tv/story.

Maybe we can only ingest so much grief at once and then we start to compensate in unhealthy ways. I want to save my absorbtion capabilities for the people I pastor, to be with them in their suffering and grief.

I don't know if that makes sense. I am planning to go to the Holocaust Museum when I am in D.C. in April. I've never been and really want to go. Not sure that is consistent with the above comments ...

12:50 PM, February 27, 2008
rev amy said...

kc: I appreciate your refelections on the power of drawing. Image does convey truth for which we lack words, or which language cannot convey. That said, I don't know that the cartoon panel accomplishes that for me. I'm going to go home and look at the book again with that in mind. Maybe I am just too text focused to fully appreciate it.

12:55 PM, February 27, 2008
rev amy said...

Oh, obviously Speiglman is an artist, he draws. That's his gift. So he used it to tell his story. I can appreciate that. I doubt he could have done it any other way.

12:56 PM, February 27, 2008
kc said...

Maybe I'm a wimp but I have found since becoming a pastor I have a harder time with moments of deep human pain and tragedy in film/tv/story.

I totally understand that. There are certain forms of violence that I just can't bear to watch, that I refuse to sit through. I wouldn't censor it; but I won't personally endure it.

As for the comic form, I don't expect it to appeal to everyone. I think one's response to it is bound to be highly personal.

9:59 PM, February 27, 2008
Erin said...

I saw a quote from Spiegelman about how the comic form -- and the use of animals -- did dull the sharp horror of the subject matter, purposefully. He said it helped make the story possible to handle. He compared it to looking at the sun through a pin-hole, which I thought was brilliant.

Here's another quote I found from him about the comic form:

It's important to me that "Maus" is done in comic strip form, because it's what I'm most comfortable shaping and working with. Maus for me in part is a way of telling my parents' life and therefore coming to terms with it. ... It's not a matter of choice in the sense that I don't feel I could deal with this material as prose, or as a series of paintings, or as a film, or as poetry. ... In looking at other art and literature that's been shaped from the Holocaust - a historic term I find problematic - that material is often very high-pitched. ... I feel a need for a more subdued approach, which would incorporate distancing devices like using these animal mask faces. Another aspect of the way I've chosen to use this material is that I've entered myself into the story. So the way the story got told and who the story was told to is as important [as] my father's narrative. To me that's at the heart of the work.

10:42 AM, February 28, 2008
kc said...

Yes! Excellent. That's what I meant by a memoir of process. Only he said it better. Thanks for sharing that, Erin.

11:08 AM, February 28, 2008

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