empathic unsettlement in art spiegelman's maus

how a frame-story structure and anthropomorphism prevent full identification with victims of trauma

This was an essay I wrote for an English class when I was a freshmen in college around 2018-2019. I decided to cut down the title, add sections, and share it here.

Content Warning: This essay discusses and displays scenes from Maus that some may find disturbing.

Maus and empathic unsettlement

Much has been written about the Holocaust trauma representation in Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel Maus. Hirsch coins the term “post-memory” to describe the transmission of trauma through generations, which she contends is seen in Maus through its use of photographs.See Hirsch (1992-1993), Hirsch (2008). Costello meanwhile believes that the graphic novel recontextualizes the traumatic memory of the Shoah through “performative memorialization”.See Costello (2006), 22-42. One trauma concept yet to be applied to the comic is LaCapra’s “empathic unsettlement”, or the lack of full identification with victims.See Lacapra (2001), 102. This paper intends to bridge this gap and explore how Maus is connected to the concept. It contends that Maus is capable of producing empathic unsettlement in readers in two ways: 1) through the “psychic distance” resulting from the book’s frame story structure and 2) through the substitution of human beings with anthropomorphic animals. It should be noted that this paper does not assume the response of readers to be empathic unsettlement, as doing so would lead to an affective fallacy, but rather argues that the comic has factors in play which may arouse such a reaction.

This thesis statement is proven through two parts. First, a summary of Maus is given, based on the edition published by Pantheon Books in two volumes, Maus: A Survivor’s Tale - My Father Bleeds History and Maus: A Survivor’s Tale - And Here My Troubles Began. Following the summary is a close reading of Maus to show how its frame story structure, psychic distance, and use of animals promote empathic unsettlement. Literary terms and other concepts mentioned in the discussion will be formally defined before use in analysis.

Maus follows Jewish cartoonist Art “Artie” Spiegelman as he produces a comic about how his father Vladek experienced the Holocaust. Art interviews his father over a series of visits in the 1980s to better understand the events to portray, and the setting shifts to the 1930s to 1940s whenever Vladek recounts his past. Vladek narrates how he met his wife Anja and how the two of them were displaced to the ghettos, hid from the Nazis, and were imprisoned in Auschwitz until the end of World War II. All of this is intercut with present day events such as Art taking Vladek to the hospital or the two of them walking to the bank. Eventually, Vladek passes away and the first volume of Maus becomes published. Maus ends at a time before Vladek’s death, with the Shoah survivor describing his reunion with Anja after Auschwitz to Art.

In arguing how Maus exemplifies empathic unsettlement, it is important to first formally explain the term. Aside from being a lack of full identification with victims, LaCapra writes that empathic unsettlement is a form of empathy that may result in trauma that is “secondary” or “muted.”Ibid. This is due to LaCapra stressing the major difference between the experience of Holocaust victims and recipients of their testimonies. Essentially, those whose experience of the Holocaust is only through testimonies cannot be considered as traumatized as the victims themselves, hence the former cannot fully identify with the latter.

Frame-story structure and psychic distance

One way empathic unsettlement can be seen in Maus is through the presence of a psychic distance. Psychic distance is a term coined by Gardner to describe the distance from the text felt by the reader.See Gardner (1984), 111. This paper contends that psychic distance can be seen in Maus due to its frame story structure, or “a story which contains another story or series of stories” according to Clute’s and Grant’s Encyclopedia of Fantasy.See Clute, Grant (1999), 365. Maus evidently uses such a structure as Vladek’s story is not told directly but rather is inserted into a larger narrative as an interview conducted by Art. By framing Vladek’s story as an interview with a separate protagonist, psychic distance is implied between the narrative and the reader due to the distracting topic changes, which are a part and parcel of interviews, that often disrupt Vladek’s narrative.

Vladek's past is framed as an interview in the present, which is often interrupted. This creates a "psychic distance" between the reader and Vladek's experiences.

One evidence of this is how in numerous instances throughout Maus, Vladek changes the topic of the discussion to his strained marriage with his second wife Mala. Sometimes this is unintentional, such as when reminiscing about Anja, he starts comparing her to Mala.See Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began, 25. Other times, he intentionally stays off topic to complain about Mala to Art, as he claims he “haven’t with whom else to talk.”See Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History, 67.

Whether intentional or unintentional, the fact remains that Vladek’s narrative is repeatedly interrupted. This is a thought shared with Brown, who writes that Maus, being an “oral history account and also an account of oral history”, frames Vladek’s history and often disrupts it through the relationship between the interviewee and interviewer.See Brown (1993), 1669. Because it is repeatedly disrupted, Vladek’s recollection can then be considered “further away from audiences” or more difficult to properly observe, producing the aforementioned psychic distance. This psychic distance resulting from the framed history leads to the book’s represented trauma not being directly witnessed and instead being “secondary”, which is in line with LaCapra’s empathic unsettlement.

Contrast in anthropomorphic animals

Empathic unsettlement also seems to be implied through Spiegelman’s use of anthropomorphic animals. Throughout almost the entire graphic novel, animals take the role of humans. Jews are mice, Germans are cats, Americans are dogs, the French are frogs, and so on and so forth. This paper argues that the use of animals contributes to the potential arousal of empathic unsettlement through the stark contrast between qualities associated with humanoid animals and those of the trauma represented by the book.

The typical association between anthropomorphic animals and fantasy and humor dampens the traumatic events in Maus by portraying characters as animals.

The anthropomorphism of animals is commonly found in children’s literature, and among Markowsky’s explanations for this are the emboldening of fantasy elements and humor.See Markowsky (1975), 461. Markowsky appears justified in these arguments in examples of the fantastical talking rabbits of Rabbit Hill and the humorous Toad of The Wind in the Willows.Ibid. However, when anthropomorphic animals are used in Maus, there remains nothing fantastical or humorous about the horrors Vladek experienced, which include witnessing a Nazi swinging a child against a wall in the ghettoSee Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History, 108. and walking on the heads of corpses crowding the lavatory corridor in Auschwitz.See Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began, 95.

The personal thoughts of both father and son further reflect the tragic nature of the events that the former had to endure. Although thanking God in the past that his first son Richieu did not suffer the fate of the child swung against the wall (although in reality Richieu did indeed die, albeit through poison),See Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History, 108. Vladek in the present ruminates how in Auschwitz, “God didn’t come.” This change in perspective on God between the past and the present implies that the trauma experienced at the camp was enough to disturb Vladek’s faith. When Art’s wife comments “It’s a miracle he [Vladek] survived,” Art replies “Uh-huh. But in some ways he didn’t.”See Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began, 90. With this statement Art may be referring to how his father continues to be haunted by the Shoah. After all, Vladek has been moaning in his sleep since as early as Art’s childhood.Ibid., 74.

The fact that both Vladek and Art allude to the intensity of the father’s psychological trauma seemingly corroborate the utter cruelty of Vladek’s experiences. The grim tone of the events Vladek underwent is evidently far different from the fantasy and humor associated with anthropomorphic animals. These lighter elements can be seen as a counterweight to the darker elements of trauma to make the horrors of Maus more removed from audiences. In writing about Maus, although not connecting it to empathic unsettlement, LaCapra has a similar idea, describing the use of animal figures as a distancing device.See LaCapra (1998), 169. By lessening the impact of trauma with anthropomorphic animals which are associated with more positive qualities, the trauma represented in Maus appears to be “muted”, once again coinciding with the concept of empathic unsettlement.

Never fully identifying

In conclusion, this paper, while not assuming the reactions of readers, asserts that any empathy aroused in readers by Maus may be empathic unsettlement. It argues this through revealing how the trauma expressed by the work is secondary (due to a psychic distance resulting from its frame story structure) and muted (due to the contrasting nature of animal use in literature and the traumatic events covered in the book). The study of empathic unsettlement is significant as LaCapra believes that such a type of empathy prevents objectification of suffering while still allowing exposure to it.See LaCapra (2001), 102. All this means to say is that in cases where the only knowledge one has of the Shoah is through testimonies of actual victims, the most desirable way for them to respond would be to remain empathically unsettled. Never fully identifying, but nonetheless, still understanding.