The Sara Frank Chapter of Hadassah book group in Burlington, VT  meets the first Monday of the month at 7:30 PM to discuss books chosen by attendees.  Meetings are informal and held at each others’ homes.  All are welcome to join for interesting discussions, tasty snacks, and socializing.    Please contact the host to let her know you plan to attend.  If you have any questions please contact Rebecca Sherlock at [email protected] , 802-865-2329, or  the host.   Looking forward to seeing you soon. 

 

TITLE- Maus I and Maus II by Art Spiegelman

DATE- August 6th

TIME- 7:30 PM

SYNOPSIS of Maus I  and Maus II-   Both books are graphic novels by American cartoonist Art Spiegelman.   They depict Spiegelman interviewing his father about his experiences as a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. The works employ postmodernist techniques and represents Jews as mice, Germans as cats, and Poles as pigs. Critics have classified Maus as memoir, biography, history, fiction, autobiography, or a mix of genres. In 1992, it became the first graphic novel to win a Pulitzer Prize.

Maus jumps back and forth often between the past and the present. To facilitate these transitions in this summary, the Holocaust narrative is written in normal font, while all other narratives are written in italics.  The narrative present begins in 1978 in New York City.  Spiegelman talks with his father Vladek about his Holocaust experiences, gathering material for the Maus project he is preparing. In the narrative past, Spiegelman depicts these experiences, from the years leading up to W.W. II to his parents’ liberation from the Nazi concentration camps. Much of the story revolves around Spiegelman’s troubled relationship with his father, and the absence of his mother who committed suicide when he was 20. Her grief-stricken husband destroyed her written accounts of Auschwitz.   The book uses a minimalist drawing style and displays innovation in its pacing, structure, and page layouts.

HOST- Barbara Wilde

RSVP-   [email protected]

FUTURE READS:

•   October [we are not meeting in September]-The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadesh
•   November-The Book of Separation by Tova Mirvis
•   December-I Am Forbidden by Anouk Markowitz
•   January-After the Fire by Loren Belfer