Analysis Of Art Spiegelman's Killing Jesus

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An important part of storytelling is making determining what method is best suited for the content. In Killing Jesus, Bill O’Reilly tells the story of Jesus’s execution in a descriptive and factual manner; everything is researched and based only on evidence. However, Art Spiegelman tells the story of his father surviving through the Nazi concentration camps. Spiegelman writes this story as a graphic novel based on his father’s narrative. Maus II’s focus on the dialogue makes the story much more personal and emotional; while Killing Jesus’s factual method of storytelling comes across as analytical and removed from the actual story.
Art Spiegelman makes the decision to write Maus II in first person perspective. This choice forces the reader …show more content…

Killing Jesus focused on how the environment reacted to Jesus’s radical teachings and blasphemous behavior. O’Reilly placed the spotlight on the Sanhedrin and the Roman government. The Sanhedrin was repulsed by Jesus’s claim to be the Son of God and Roman officials were bothered by the “King of the Jews.” Jesus was fighting the system that was in place and his action were radical and unheard of for his time. He was purposely putting himself in the way of danger in order to make a change. His actions are reflected in the world in the form of Christianity. The entire book was about the world’s reception of Jesus; it is the story of how this one man affected his environment. Meanwhile, Maus II was about how one man, Vladek Spiegelman, was affected by his environment. Maus II was about the effects of the Holocaust on an individual. Vladek is trying to survive in the situation that he has no control over. He is not fighting the system.He is being compliant so that he may survive. Vladek has to adjust to the conditions of the concentration camp and even lies for the sake of his safety. Art Spiegelman shows how the Holocaust had ramifications on his father in the way that Vladek is obsessively conservative, and refuses to waste food ever since he experienced a real shortage of food during his time in the concentration camps.. Vladek tells his son “Ever since Hitler I don’t like to throw out even a crumb.” (Spiegelman 78) . The men of these stories are in different functions in their environment; Vladek is the product of his environment, while Jesus’s environment is a product of his

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