‘Maus’ author Art Spiegelman: Book bans show ‘yearning’ for authoritarianism

Art Spiegelman, who authored Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel “Maus,” which has faced multiple challenges in the U.S., is cautioning that the rise of book bans in libraries and schools shows the country has a “yearning” for authoritarianism. 

“It’s a real warning sign of a country that’s yearning for a return of authoritarianism,” Spiegelman said in an interview with Washington Post opinion columnist Greg Sargent published Wednesday.

In the last couple of years, Spiegelman’s graphic novel on the Holocaust has appeared on an increasing number of restricted-book lists. And some school boards have taken measures to pull it from library shelves.  

Most recently, a school board in Nixa, Mo., announced it would consider whether to pull the book after employees reportedly flagged it as a possible violation of a state law preventing sexually explicit material from being provided to minors, according to local reports.

Spiegelman dismissed claims that the novel contains sexually explicit material as a “pretense,” saying in his Post interview, “It was the other things making them uncomfortable, like genocide.”

“I just tried to make them clean and understandable, which is the purpose of storytelling with pictures,” he added.

“Maus” is a graphic novel that tells the story of the horrors Spiegelman’s parents experienced in the Holocaust. The story, however, is told through illustrations of animals. His parents — and all Jews — are depicted as mice, and the Nazis are depicted as cats. 

Spiegelman warned of the dangers of restricting access to literature, saying in the interview that the tendency to ban books is “about squelching what’s supposed to happen in school, which is an education that allows people to become one country that can talk to each other with a base of knowledge.”

As more conservative-leaning states take steps to restrict access to books they deem inappropriate, on Monday Illinois became the first state to outlaw the practice of banning books.