A Liberal
Dose
February 3,
2022
Troy D.
Smith
“A Graphic
Novel, A School Board, and Confronting History”
30 years after winning the Pulitzer Prize, Art Speigelman’s
graphic novel Maus: A Survivor’s Tale
is back in the news (and back on the bestseller list). Spiegelman, who got his
start as an underground comics artist and publisher in the 1970s, spoke at
Tennessee Tech a few years ago about his work and about the history of comics,
and is a wealth of information. His award-winning Maus was autobiographical. The framing story was about Spiegelman,
the artist, trying to get his elderly father to tell him his story -while also
trying to understand what caused the suicide of Spiegelman’s mother and the
emotional and personality issues of his father, with whom he had a very
tempestuous relationship.
The heart of the book was the story his father told him,
detailing the experiences he and his wife had as Jews during the Holocaust who
ultimately ended up in a concentration camp. Spiegelman depicted Jewish people
as mice, playing on the fact that Nazis referred to them as “vermin,” and
Germans as cats (with other nationalities being represented by other animals).
He has stated that his reason for taking such an approach was to show how
absurd it was, and by extension how absurd it is to divide people by race and
ethnicity. Another effect is that seeing the intense suffering of such “cute”
animals makes it easier for the (presumably human) reader to sympathize with
them and be shocked by their treatment.
Obviously, the book has some extremely mature themes. On the
other hand, you can’t talk about the Holocaust WITHOUT having extremely mature
themes. Many teachers of middle school, high school, and college (myself
included) have used it as a medium to delve into those themes, which are
extremely important for our young people to learn about. The Holocaust, like
slavery, segregation, the Trail of Tears, and many other things, is something
that all citizens should know about and think about, and it needs to start when
they are young. If that doesn’t happen, you wind up with the situation we have
now.
A poll of Millennials and Gen Z people (so folks from their
late teens to their late 30s) two years ago showed a “worrying lack of basic
Holocaust knowledge.” 10% had never even heard of it. 63% did not know how
severe it was (that 6 million Jews were killed), and more than half of those
estimated the number at less than 2 million. More than half could not name one
concentration camp. 11% (higher in some states) believed that the Jews caused
it. That was two years ago -imagine how it’s going to be now, with state
legislatures in red states passing laws banning “critical race theory” or
anything that could cause anyone to feel guilty or be uncomfortable. This has
led to, among other things, a school principal insisting to teachers that they
now have to give equal and fair consideration to the Nazis, and a
superintendent advising students they need to ask their parents whether the
Holocaust really happened, not their teacher. Principals and teachers who
continue to try teaching the truth about history, meanwhile, are getting fired.
The school board in McMinn County voted to remove the book
from their 8th grade curriculum, despite the fact teachers supported
the use of it, ostensibly over a couple of swear words and a crude
representation of a naked mouse (Remember, this is the Holocaust, where people
were stripped naked and sent to their deaths). One board member thought that
people being hanged or committing suicide should not be discussed in public
education. 13-year-olds can handle a lot more than 5-year-olds, and they
shouldn’t be treated the same. It was very unfortunate (for the reputation of
Tennessee, such as it is nowadays) that this vote took place on International
Holocaust Remembrance Day.
That is the situation. Next week I will explain why it
matters so much.
--Troy D. Smith,
a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech.
His words do not necessarily represent TTU.
A complete list of Liberal Dose columns can be found HERE
A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE
Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com
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