Ivanna Hidalgo - Question Commander

Ivanna Hidalgo
Week #3 - Pages 129 - 159
Job - Question Commander
Maus by Art Spiegelman

"Art v. Family." Mausandthemask. 01 Dec. 2011. Web. 01 Mar. 2015. <https://mausandthemask.wordpress.com/art-v-family/>.

Why is Vladek married to Mala?

           Initially, I agree with the character Mala, about Vladek only marrying her because she is Anja's size. This is justifiable because the only thing they do is fight. Sometimes, parents say it's healthy for married couples to fight, but Vladek and Mala alwalys fight, literally. Besides, I also think they are married because they need each other's company. Particularly, it’s not that Vladek married Mala because of Anja's size, but because it makes Vladek fill fuller on the outside. However, he is still depressed because he is not complete in the inside. This concept goes back to my blog post #2, when I said that Mala only physically replaces Anja without acutally replacing her by heart. Wherefore, Vladek fights with Mala all the time, but still are together. As a personal theory, speaking logical is another answer to this question. By what this means is that locically, Mala cannot get a divorce from Vladek because he insists on having a heart attack. In my opinion, saying he has a heart attack makes me think he wants to run from his divorce, with out him acutally knowing. From what I've explained, Vladek uncuntiously replaced Anja for Mala, therefore his inner self does not want a divorce because of the emptiness he is going to feel again. As a result, he ends up telling Mala he is having a heart attack as an argument so Mala doesn't do anything that can lead to a divorice. On the other hand, his inner Vladek tells him that Mala needs to stay to replace Anja, and thereafter stay with the idea of having a wife. If Vladek really thinks like this, he is making up things to avoid a divorce. In short, this is my theory of why they are still possibly together, after their unbearable fights.

Why was Anja so terrified of Vladek being away from her?

           While reading Maus, I came across the scene were Vladek was managing to survive with Anja in Kawka's farm. These scenes struck me because I saw the time were Anja became terrified of Vladek leaving her alone. Even if Vladek left for a couple of hours, Anja seemed to get extremely desperate. To me, this became an important scene caused to the expressions on Anja's face. In detail, it seemed as if she was told to expect her death. Now, I think that she was so terrified because she thought she wasn't enough to take care of herself. In this case, I do agree with this idea because I recall back in the book where someone said that Anja was around 39 kilos. As a matter of fact, this impressed me because not even people in the 7th grade weigh as little as that. Therefore, Anja wouldn't be able to deal with hiding or acting in times of crises. As a personal opinion, Anja would still be alive for the reason of Vladek's reasoning and decision taking. Moreover, another reason why Anja was so afraid without Vladek's company was because of her anxiety problems. If put in mind, on page 31, the fact that Anja wanted to commit suicide when Richieu was born made Anja a lot weaker by mind and body. To conclude with, her birth made her a ball of apprehensiveness and panic.

What does Artie think of his father, after all?

           To start of with, we have seen a lot of what other people think of Vladek, but there was never a single word from Artie. However, there was this one word, which was the final word in the book, "Murderer". Specifically, this is the last word Artie said about his father in the book. Not because he was a real murder, but because of the side events that happened, that Artie witnessed. I think that Artie thinks his father is the rightest man, but he is somehow really wrong. Additionally, I can justify this answer based on page 6, where I have read the wisest saying. "If you lock them together in a room with no food for a week... the you could see what it is, friends!” This quote really intrigued me because I perceive that since then, Artie has had the greatest respect for his father. Nevertheless, Artie in the end expresses how his father is grumpy, unreasonable, and a bit mad. This burnt diary scene told me he felt a certain way about Vladek when spilled the unfortunate news. As a final point, Artie shows this anger towards his dad that he had never had before. In my opinion, this was all a build up of all of the bad events that had happened between them, and Artie finally let it out. Subsequently, the book ends in the note of "murderer" to show his real, inside feelings towards his father, which do not necessarily have to be inferior thoughts.

 

 "Disasters as Art?" Zerto. Web. 01 Mar. 2015. <http://www.zerto.com/blog/videos/disasters-as-art/>.

I chose this image to show how, at first, Artie was really calm and patient with Vladek, but he afterwards exploded with anger.