Why ‘Maus’ matters
The McMinn County School Board in Tennessee made national news this winter by banning the Pulitzer Prize-winning book Maus by Art Spiegelman, a graphic novel about his parents’ experiences during the Holocaust.
Oliver Knabe, a lecturer for the University of Dayton’s German and English departments, frequently uses Maus in his courses and believes it is a revolutionary book that should be shared.
“When it was produced, there was nothing comparable to it,” he said. “[Spiegelman] reflects a lot on the aspect of remembering [and] how we remember.”
“When it was produced, there was nothing comparable to it.”
According to an article by NPR, “The school board reportedly objected to eight curse words and nude imagery of a woman, used in the depiction of the author's mother's suicide.”
Since being banned by the school board, the book has been in high demand and has spurred discussions regarding censorship in education. The book is the first graphic novel of its kind and is distinct for its portrayal of the Holocaust, particularly with its focus on remembrance, Knabe said.
Knabe said Maus was the first book he ever checked out from his local public library in Germany at the same age as the McMinn County students affected by the ban.
“It was something I wanted to pick up at that age because I thought it was intriguing,” Knabe said. “Now in a more politicized environment [and it’s] all of a sudden now being put on the chopping block.”
Upon reading the McMinn County School Board minutes, Knabe noticed that the conversation focused on what is "pure." As a parent himself, Knabe said he shares similar concerns about what is acceptable for children to view. Knabe said that from a concerned parent’s perspective, he would have emphasized discussion over depictions of violence and suicide.
“I do want to think that at the heart of the decision was the idea to protect the children, but looking at how the national debates are going, the kind of things that have been happening recently, it just seems to be another piece to that larger picture,” Knabe said of the political debate over banning books.
Despite the recent backlash, Maus is a powerful and influential educational tool that has spurred the use of graphic novels in an academic setting, Knabe explained.
“I think the graphic novel, as such, has taken off, and you can fill entire classes with it, which is one of the things I am trying to do,” he said.
Knabe said he tries to incorporate graphic novels into his courses at UD as much as possible. Fall semester, he will teach German American Relations: Immigrants, Refugees, and National Images, a course that fulfills Common Academic Program requirements for its interdisciplinary approach. Knabe is also planning two courses for the future. One is an intermediate German course, and the other is an upper-level German course that looks at contemporary Germany and other aspects of German literature through graphic novels.
“Our German program is supposed to reflect the shifts we see in the field in general and comic studies, topics related to social justice, which is one of the big things that UD is trying to do, which I applaud them for a lot,” he said. “So our program is trying to mirror that, reflect these ideas. That's why Maus is on the curriculum.”