Maus

Art sits at his desk, struggling to complete his memoir about Vladek. It is five years after Vladek’s death; Maus I has been published and is a commercial success, but Art struggles with mixed feelings—he is being accused of profiting from the suffering of Holocaust victims and survivors.

He goes to a therapy appointment. His therapist, Pavel, is a Holocaust survivor. They discuss Art’s complex feelings about Vladek and the tensions surrounding the success of Maus I and Art’s struggles in writing the second volume. Walking home after the appointment, Art acknowledges that he feels better after talking with Pavel.

At home, he begins to work on a scene depicting Vladek in the Auschwitz tin shop. As he listens to Vladek’s voice on the recordings he has made, Art begins to feel incapable once again.

The narrative shifts back to Vladek’s time in the tin shop. Here, he is berated by the Russian in charge, who is named Yidl. But Vladek is able to obtain food from local non-Jewish Poles and uses this to win Yidl’s favor. When Art asks Vladek about Anja, Vladek explains that he was able to smuggle letters to Anja—who was imprisoned in Birkenau, the woman’s section of Auschwitz, via a woman named Mancie.