ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the political history of comics in the United States through the case study of Art Spiegelman’s Maus. Focusing on its use of funny animal caricature, connections to comics history, and reception as an artistic and educational text, the chapter argues that comics like Maus represent history in pedagogical, personal, and political frameworks. Artists such as Marcel Duchamp, George Herriman, Bernard Krigstein, and Harvey Kurtzman shaped Art Spiegelman’s work and its reception as art and literature. Contemporary comics artists such as Emil Ferris, Sonny Liew, and Nate Powell continue the traditions established by Art Spiegelman’s Maus and the comics history it helped to define.
