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Vladek Maus Changes

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The character Vladek in Art Spiegelman’s Maus greatly changed throughout the book. Events due to the Holocaust shaped Vladek into the person he is at the end of the book. The Holocaust caused Vladek to become extremely frugal, to have an obsession with tidiness, and to not be able to trust anyone.

Vladek became extremely frugal from living through the Holocaust. In the beginning he was poor and couldn’t buy extravagant things. The event that led him to become so frugal was when Art’s store was robbed. All of Vladek’s possessions were taken from him. He was scarred from that situation because his family had to starve between meals. They had to live off of rations and food coupons and Vladek could not help his family. His family suffering like that had a serious effect on Vladek. It shows how frugal Vladek is when Mala makes a lot of comments about how Vladek has a lot of money saved up but never spends any of it, like not buying her a comb. The author also shows how frugal Vladek is when he refuses to spend money on necessary items. When he is an older man he becomes pretty wealthy but due to the Holocaust his mind is greatly impacted by it leaving him in the mindset of being frugal. Another example of Vladek’s frugality is when Vladek tries to return half eaten boxes of cereal. …show more content…

The Gestapo were very hateful towards the Jews event to the point where they would kill the Jews if they made the tiniest mess. Vladek’s obsession with tidiness came from the fear of making the Gestapo angry and possibly losing his life from it. His obsession with tidiness was instilled in his mind and stuck with him even after the Holocaust was over. Vladek shows his obsession when Art would mess up a book or when he spilled ashes, Vladek would order Art to clean up his mess

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