The White Album

It's often been heard that context is important. That current readers can't really understand the experiences of bygone times. The White Album proves that wrong in a strange way. When we looked up that list of terms, that was to provide context to the different essays in the album, but that context really doesn't seem as necessary as one would think. The context helps in a case specific way, but my reading of this collection may be wrong in this thinking, but to me this was all too familiar. I ended up reading these as more of a current reader than when it was published and that colored my perspective. Sure style's change and trends die, but fundamentally the world stays the same. The black panthers, Charles Manson and the people writing about them. It's just specifics of things we still have today. In a way that kin of makes these essays timeless. Except for the style, but whose complaining.

As for her writing, I take away more from the author than from the reading. We discussed several times about how knowledge of the author can color the reader's perspective of the work and with Joan Didion that seems very true. Unlike the rest of the readings, I personally got more out of researching her and her methods than I did the essays. I found it interesting becuase her perspective is very different from my own.

“I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.” - Joan Didion


I don't write like that, at least at face value. I write because I love stories, and I want to share them. I've never really attempted anything using her method, because before I never saw the benefit of that. Having read The White Album, now I think I may, and experimenting with this methodology will be interesting.


“We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” -  Joan Didion

Maus

Maus is heralded as one of, if not the greatest comic book ever written and it's hard not to see why. In a time where comics were snubbed and ridiculed, Maus turned snobs on their heads.

In terms of holocaust literature, I find this to be one of the best. So many holocaust works are from the camp out, or from an observer looking in. While both of these narratives are fine, Maus takes a more expansive look at the horror of the holocaust by taking more time for what happened before the camps. Vladek and his wife experience many troubles before they even arrive at the camp and this helps to paint a very broad picture of the times.

I also think that this is one of the best duel narrative stories I've ever seen. So many times, the dual narrative is just distracting, but in this story, I though it built a very nice contrast between a normal life, and a life during the worst atrocity in mankind's history. We as the reader are placed in Art's position asking about Vladek's experiences. It makes a very good window to peer into the story.

The novel also benefits from not holding any punches. Sure it isn't the most graphic depiction of the camps I've seen, but the violence is still there. Images of people being hung and gunned down in rows is no less disturbing than in any other work.

This is also helped out by Spiegleman's choice in making this story in the format of a graphic novel. Though often snubbed, visual mediums have a set of tools that can drive emotion into the viewer so much harder. Expressions and silences and implications can all carry so much emotions,  but subtly is perhaps its greatest tool. In a novel, things have to be declared and attention has to be grabbed. The chimney billowing smoke in the background is so much more powerful, when it is just simply there, whereas in a novel a line of text would have to be devoted to telling the reader it's there making the implication obvious.

I also think the use of animal metaphor was absolutely necessary. While a realistic depiction of this story could have been made, it would make the book a much harder read and could even deter people from reading outright. This is a dark subject and should be talked about and remembered, but Maus made a good choice in trying to be accessible. This is especially helped because in my opinion, the animal metaphor is a good one. People may criticize it for enforcing stereotypes, but in reality that's kind of the point. To show that people were murdered on the basis of stereotypes, and it forces you to recognize how completely bizarre  it is to profile people this way. Spiegleman even said that the animal metaphor is meant to self destruct.

In closing, I've seen recently some criticism against Maus, saying that to tell this story in this way is disrespectful, and in some cases it has been said that this story shouldn't be told. I strongly disagree. Stories like this have to be told, once as a record, and once as a reminder. All have stories to tell and its good that this story has been marked down for all time, and once again it was good to do it in this format. It widens the audience for something that should be read and should always be remembered.