Forty years on from ‘the first masterpiece in comic-book history’, the Pulitzer-winning cartoonist talks fame, switching styles and why he doesn’t want to draw Trump
Early in the second volume of Maus – the graphic novel about the Holocaust that made Art Spiegelman’s reputation – he includes a passage showing the reaction to the publication of volume one. The artist is sitting at his drawing board, perched atop a mountain of dead bodies, as a succession of importunate reporters crowd in bombarding him with questions: “Okay… let’s talk about Israel…” “Could you tell your audience if drawing Maus was cathartic? Do you feel better now?”
As the questions come in, he struggles to answer – “A message? I dunno…” “Who am I to say?” – and over the course of the following panels shrinks to the size of a toddler, marooned in his writing chair. “I want… ABSOLUTION. No… No… I want… I want… my MOMMY! WAH!” The reporters vanish, and mini-Spiegelman confesses: “Sometimes I just don’t feel like a functioning adult.”
