english quotes

“they hanged them near to my workshop… they hanged there for a long, long time, sigh”

• page 239 panel 7

• four pairs of feet hanging in the woods next to the roads that the car is driving on.

• Vladek cannot escape the past, it is always haunting Vladek

• sorrowful, restrained voice communicates the difficulty of moving beyond the past and trauma

• audience feel compassion and recognise the enduring psychological effects of the Holocaust and trauma

“I cannot forget it… ever since Hitler i cannot throw out even a crumb.”

• pg 238

• theme- trauma and lasting effects of Holocaust- his experience in WW2 has created habits- trauma drives a wedge in relationships

• anxious, traumatised voice communicates the trauma of surviving

• his memories reveal how past suffering affects current life

• values: preserving resources

• attitudes: frugality, cautious about waste and believe resources should be preserved.

• audience response:
  - compassion for Vladek and recognise the enduring psychological effects of Holocaust
  - frustrated as his frugality can be excessive which complicates the audiences sympathy, challenging assumptions that suffering makes you virtuous.

“always you must eat all what is on your plate,”

would argue until Art ran to his room crying.

• theme- trauma and lasting effects of Holocaust- his experience in WW2 has created habits- trauma drives a wedge in relationships

• values: preserving resources

• attitudes: frugality, cautious about waste and believe resources should be preserved.

• frustrated as his frugality can be excessive and effects his relationships which complicates the audiences sympathy, challenging assumptions that suffering makes you virtuous.

• angry, unempathetic voice builds audience response

Mala- “Pragmatic? Cheap!!! It causes him physical pain to part even with a nickel”

• Mala’s perspective: she sees Vladek as pathologically stingy, claiming his frugality goes far beyond common sense.

• Mala’s voice is frustrated and fed up.

• angry brows. fists clenched.

• all caps, bolded.

• Vladek’s perspective: a crumb, or a coin could be the difference between life or death. he sees his ‘cheapness’ as a vital survival habit that he cannot forget.

• frustrated as his frugality can be excessive and effects his relationships which complicates the audiences sympathy, challenging assumptions that suffering makes you virtuous.

Vladek on the stationary exercise bike.

moving on the bike as he explains the story, but stops when he mentions Richieu’s death.

“well it’s enough for today artie”- after explaining getting passports stamped in Sosnowiec

• motif- recurring symbol. the sense of movement yet getting no where.

• no matter how hard he tries to move beyond the past, it is inescapable.

• The bicycle represents how recounting his Holocaust horrors to Artie traps Vladek repeatedly in his psychological scars. telling the story does not heal or bring him closure

• Vladek pedals furiously, yet he physically goes nowhere. This mirrors his post-Holocaust existence—he is stuck in the past and unable to truly move forward, despite all his physical motion.

a bleed depicts four men being hanged.
“they hanged there one full week.”

panel 1 pg 86. four victims faces hanging over Vladek as he sits at his desk mourning while anja comforts him
“and maybe one of them could have talked of me to the germans to try to save himself”

• carrying guilt- survivors guilt.

• thinks about them saving his life by keeping his name secret- surviving off luck

• “they hanged there for one full week.” - pragmatic, refrained voice - voice over/narration

• bleed - emphasises. forces audience to reflect.

• compassion. relfect on trauma

panel 5 pg 232. people being burnt alive, screaming faces in pain and piled into each other. voice over- “fat from burning bodies, they scooped and poured again so everyone could burn better,”

pg 233- art is distraught from vladek’s recount “Jesus”. Vladek is more worried about the time.

• voice: matter-of-fact, pragmatic when recounting horrific events

“but in some ways he didn’t survive”

• recognises that survival can cause lasting costs

• distinguish physical survival from the lasting psychological consequences of trauma.

• vladek survived the holocaust yet the experiences continue to affect his behaviour