How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Page Number). Page numbers refer to The Complete Maus.
Quote #1
“No! You don’t know counting pills. I’ll do it after … I’m an expert for this.” (I.2.32)
Art and Vladek seem to be competing all the time over the smallest of tasks. Here it’s counting pills.
Quote #2
“You should know it’s impossible to argue with your father.” (I.3.45)
Art isn’t the only one who chafes under his father’s stubbornness, as these words from Mala show.
Quote #3
“It was this parsha on the week I got married to Anja … And this was the parsha in 1948, after the war, on the week you were born!... And so it came out to be this parsha you sang on the Saturday of your bar mitzvah!” (I.3.61)
The fact that Art only learns now the significance of the parsha he read at his bar mitzvah says something about Art’s lack of connection to his Jewish heritage.
Quote #4
“To your father you yell in this way? … Even to your friends you should never yell this way.” (I.6.161)
A loaded statement, considering how Vladek’s Holocaust memories show the fragility of family relationships and friendships under pressure.
Quote #5
“I mean, I can’t even make any sense out of my relationship with my father … how am I supposed to make sense out of Auschwitz? … of the Holocaust?” (II.1.4)
These are questions that Maus doesn’t answer – and perhaps that’s the point.
Quote #6
“The photo never threw tantrums or got in any kind of trouble … it was an ideal kid, and I was a pain in the ass. I couldn’t compete.” (II.1.5)
You thought sibling rivalry was tough. Imagine competing with a dead child, a child so young that he died before he could do anything really bad or disappoint his parents by, oh, becoming an artist.
Quote #7
“Always Artie is nervous – so like his mother – she also was nervous.” (II.1.10)
Art’s similarity to his mother in temperament suggests that he is continuing her work. We may have lost Anja’s diaries, but Art, like Anja, wants to write down and record the Holocaust.
Quote #8
“It’s so claustrophobic being around Vladek. He straightens everything you touch – he’s so anxious.” (II.1.12)
It’s ironic that Vladek, in Quote #7, talks about how “nervous” Art is, when Vladek himself is so neurotic.
Quote #9
“Sometimes I just don’t feel like a functioning adult. I can’t believe I’m going to be a father in a couple of months. My father’s ghost still hangs over me.” (II.2.33)
Tellingly, Art depicts himself at this point as a small, child-sized mouse. He needs to come to terms with his relationship with his father in order to come into his own as an adult.
Quote #10
“So, only my little brother, Pinek, came out from the war alive … from the rest of my family, it’s nothing left, not even a snapshot.” (II.4.106)
With so many family members lost in the Holocaust, keeping a sense of continuity with one’s past is a struggle.
Quote #11
“I’m tired from talking, Richieu, and it’s enough stories for now.” (II.5.126)
These are Vladek’s last words, which may suggest that Art has lost the battle of the photograph (see Quote #6). On the other hand, Art dedicates Book II to Richieu and his own children, and even provides a photograph of Richieu. So, what’s that about? See our “What’s Up With The Ending?” for a more extended discussion of these lines.