Maus 1

1.) the book "maus 1" by Art Spiegelman was about the holocaust and what he and his family went through during those hard times. In the book he chose mice, pigs, and cats as the characters as a sense of disquise. The jews were the mice, the nazi were the cats, and the polish were the pigs. the reason i think he chose these animals to act as a disquise and sense of identity is because cats (nazis) chase mice ( jews) in which run and try to hide from the cats in whom are more dominant. the reason i think he chose the polish as the pigs are because the go both mays they can be chased by cats and start running or chase the mice themselves.

2.)i think the reason why he chose to tell his story in a comic book format was because it is such an emotional and serious and traumatic topic and event that occured during his life time it was kind of too much to tell in a regular format of a book or biography. maybe it was the only way he felt comfortable expressing what he and his family went through.

3.)the "noose" is tightenig in this chapter because as of then it was just beginning they had started gathering the jews and putting them into ghettos and the jews really dont know whats to come. They dont know that next the are going to be sent to work camps and death camps. the dont know that death is approaching and they are going to be seperated from their family.

4.)when spieglman uses people as characters rather than animals like he does in other parts of the book is because he is talking about a traumatice expierence he went through and seen as a child and that is the suicide of his mother. the death of his mother was very unexpected. she slashed her wrists and overdosed on a bottle of pills. she left no note. this was a time where he broke down and let his emotions out but afterwards he became numb to any future pain.

5.)i think he calls his dad a murderer because his dad burned the only memories of his mom.