Maus A Survivors Tale by Art Spiegelmal - 597 Words

Various characters change drastically throughout the book. The person who changes the greatest amount during the book is Vladek Spiegelman. In the beginning, before the Holocaust, Vladek is married to Anja and they have a son, Richieu. Vladek has a successful textile factory that was given to him by Anja, his wife’s father when they became married. During the Holocaust, he became an incredibly resourceful man and had a strong work ethic. This is made evident due to the fact that he is able to acquire food and shelter, even when the Nazis are trying to control the amount of food and shelter available to the Jewish people at the time. He became incredibly adept at saving everything due to the fact that anything that he had during the invasion of Poland needed to last as long as possible and not be wasted. Therefore, his personality changes by the end of the Holocaust because he has become obsessed with saving everything, even his possessions he had no need for, like outdated new spapers. The manner by which Vladek changes throughout the book is reflective of several of the experiences of other Jewish Holocaust survivors. Even after the Holocaust, he, and countless other survivors were stuck in the same state of mind that they were on right before and during the Holocaust. They are unable to move past their experiences and they were trapped in the past. A main example of this is when Vladek called Art â€Å"Richieu† shortly before his death. This illustrates the fact that many