Tinsley614

MAUS has truly been an awesome experience in terms of reading. Never in my life would I have taken this book off a shelf on read on my own time, just because I would think it wouldn't be very good. This book disproves that thought by one-hundred percent. Despite the fact this was an assignment, I really got into reading this book because like I said in my previous entry I feel like the next link in the chain. I like this book a lot and will recommend it to a lot of people who I know haven't read it that will definitely enjoy it.

To not forget the technical aspects of the last part of the story, besides how much I like it, I'm still intrigued by the ways this author communicates with his audience. I think how he does it is awesome with his use of clever little symbols and underlying features in the images. Although there may not be any textual aspects requiring close reading, there are plenty of images that require a little bit of serious study. It is very difficult to read this book without looking at the images makes it very difficult to understand, however, looking at the images without the text will tell you the same story, with a little left for your imagination. I also thought it was cool how he was able to integrate real photos into the story, very cool. Great, complicated book at the end of the day, and I will probably read it again someday.

Again the monologues and the action continues. The descriptions that are given by the images continue to negate the purpose of descriptions in the text, but it is done anyway to emphasize certain aspects and details. The continuation of all the techniques Spiegelman has used have given a twist to the story to make it much more believable. Though there is always bias, I really see very little. I am confident that even if this story were to have been written by an SS guard, I am sure that it would be very close if not the same. The graphic novel is so cool, there really is no other way to say it, and it just captures you and puts you into the story. I have to admit, some of the time I was reading it, I stopped and looked around to realize I was actually in my room, or the bookstore, or school. It was really weird.

Though I do like to use my imagination to create my own scenes for stories, this really makes me feel like I am a part of this story, in the room that it is being told. I really like the concept of telling a story of a story because it make me as a reader feel like another link in that chain, rather than just reading this book because I have to.

MAUS has continued to grab my attention now that we are starting to get into some real action, drama, and suspense. I love the way the illustrations capture the exact thought that is in the authors head, and puts it into the reader's just as it was originally thought. I also like the way the comics aren't standardized. Rather than always having different panes to express an idea, Spiegelman uses words all the way across the page, and images that fit outside of panes, and even notebook sheets on top of and behind the panes themselves. I also like his subtle metaphor of making the Germans cats and the Jews mice, very fitting. It is a great integration of images that make monologues and character communication obviously different making something like a bit of narration to the story, like a novel.

MAUS II is probably going to have much more details about the holocaust, and I'm interested in seeing how his images compare to the images that are in my head from Elie Wiesel's book Night. The bad English is still getting on my nerves but I'm getting to understand that it actually helps the meaning of the story in some respects.

MAUS is without doubt the best book we've read this year. It's interesting, and challenging to read, and it is, in short, a comic book. I haven't been a fan of comic books with the exception of Calvin and Hobbes, but because this is a graphic novel, a step-up from a comic book, I enjoy the plot much more because it lasts more than a maximum of ten panes. The story development and text itself reflects that which you could find in a common novel. The things that make this stand out are the illustrations that help the reader to easily understand the author without techniques such as subtext and close-reading.

I am definitely hooked into this book and am fascinated with it because I'm interested in seeing how the details of the holocaust are explained in comics. So far, MAUS has proved to be an interesting read, but it will take some more time to get used to the bad grammar of a man who spoke bad English.

    I think that definitely explains why he writes the way he does. He makes it a challenge to know all the details, he doesn't just give them to you off-hand. Close-reading is a very clear example of what you have to do to find the meaning. It's absolutely true in AFA, because there is more when you reread and different things stand out because you aren't searching for the basic plot. He has definitely defined himself as a good writer, and though I may be able to decipher some of his work, I still don't know exactly how it's done. He achieved his goal of "making it" without us, the readers, knowing about it, at least not right away. There is more to his writing than hidden meaning, but these quotes make me absolutely sure it was all intended and that every minor detail, down to the thread count of a jacket, has something vital to do with some aspect of the story.

What are the themes and ideas that come out here?

    As the troops pass, just their mere walking past the trees, they start to die of suffocation from the dust on both their leaves and trunks. Only one place that was rich and thriving, whereas the mountains were dead and barren, where there was fighting going on. Rain took the leaves off the trees and left the tunks black after a loss for the Italians.  Every time high-ranking officers passed, or even the king, they would kick-up more mud then the camions.

How have they continued in the novel? 

    The rain has kept a negative connotation. 

    He really says that his intent is to make the reader feel exactly what is happening in the book, just as if it had happened to them in real-life. This shows that he probably did write about past experiences in fiction, because he wanted his point of view to become the readers so that the author and reader could have similar feelings about the specific events. I think he was saying that his main goal was to have his audience really, fully experience what had happened.

    In A Farewell to Arms, to the point that we have read, he really leaves the fellings out of the scene descriptions so that the reader can develop the feelings that he wants them to on his/her own. A great example is his dialoge throughout the story that you really have to think about, to the point at which you come back to the question, "How would I feel in this situation?" Applying this to my own writing would really help to get the reader involved and have a much more genuine appreciation for the work, and a firm understanding of it, having memories of something that "happened to them." The easiest way, and the most effective way would be to keep really personal descriptions out of the work.

First read:

    I get the feeling that she isn't exactly an optimist. This poem is kind of depressing. The first line talks about a fly on her dead body. I don't know if she means that literally, but she brings the fly  back in the end, when it blocks out all her light so that may be a key thing in terms of this poem not being literal.

 Second read:

     Well, I have to say I have the same opinion after reading it twice. I know there is some sort of hidden meaning, but for some reason I'm just not seeing it. Instead I'm getting an image of a dead person watching a fly from their grave, with all their precious belongings. I have a feeling that's not right, but if it is, it's definitely weird.

First read:

    I can definitely tell that this poem has power, I just can't put my finger on it. It has a rhyme scheme which obviously means something in terms of parallel meaning, something to look for the second time. The general feel of this poem after reading the first time is that it's really powerful and kind of gloomy.

 Second read:

    She is definitely defining individualism, and I think that she is trying to say that conforming to society is madness. I also got the feeling that she thinks conformity kind of locks you in, due to her reference of the chain. I don't think that it had a gloomy tone the second time, but the power of change is definitely there.