Journal 3: Graphic Novel

In Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel, Maus the visuals interact with the text, and help to create a story line that illuminates the mood. Moreover, the author’s tone with the simple shading of characters, or background is more comprehensible through these techniques. Without the images the storyline would be much more difficult to follow along with, and the mood would be harder to interpret. The purpose of these images are meant to interact with the dialougue and present a reference to the reader to clarify some misconception about the author’s presentation to the story line. Spiegelman sets the tone through the text, by starting from a more present setting to reflecting back upon the events of the past. Moreover, through the visuals he sets up the tone with the shading of the characters, and background. The layers of meaning that is portrayed here through the text, and the visuals is of a terrible time, in which there was a lot of confusion and uncertainty. The shading gives the visual observer a sense of mystery, and uncertainty, whereas the narrative even makes the reader unsure when at the end of the comic it states, “To go, it was no good, but, not to go- it was also no good.” No specifying any lead as to where the plot of the storyline might end up.
The characters that are shaded are the ones that are either unsignificant in the current storyline, or are more part of the narrative then a main character. The introduction to the storyline was told by a character that is shaded, showing that he is more of part of the background to the main story. Spiegelman’s use of the comic strip form helps to make it easier to follow, and gives more visual refrences then a normal story with visuals does. The form of the graphic/ comic strip is also an enhancement to the author’s purpose to allowing the reader to fully comprehend what the author wants the reader to visualize as he tells the story. The people who are talking in the present are the ones who are shaded at the beginning of the story, and the one’s who are talking as the story unfolds are the characters who are not shaded.