How Is Artie Spiegelman Selfish

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“Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny.” Artie Spiegelman is a man who has always been underestimated his whole life because his parents were the Holocaust survivors and lost their first child during the war. Because of this background, growing up was very difficult for Art. he couldn’t have bad days because according to his parents his problems were not severe or big enough to bawl over. This caused Artie to become very self-centered in his life and blame others for his mistakes. He became selfish and was also very curious about certain things that involved him. Artie’s childhood shaped who he is today and why he didn’t reach resolution with his father at the end of the book Maus. Since his childhood was very …show more content…

Even though it is healthy being a little selfish and self-centered sometimes, if this is what is mainly in your life than it can be very dangerous. Artie has reached that point in life in which he does everything for himself. This shows that he has stranded himself so much that all he thinks about is his success and his happiness. Like when he got the idea to write the book Maus, a story about life during the Holocaust only then did he go to visit his father. The only purpose to see his father was the possibility of writing a world class novel which will bring him fame and fortune. This also caused him to lie to his father and since he didn’t have a very strong relationship to start off with it really didn’t bother him. Like on page 23, Artie is writing down the personal details of Vladek’s life such as his relationship with Lucia and suddenly Vladek tells him not to involve those in the book because he doesn’t want to be disrespectful and it also doesn’t make sense putting something like that in a book about the Holocaust and the war. Even though on the spot Artie promises he later ends up breaking the promise just so that his book looks more human. This shows that humans have a habit of using others and once they are useless throwing them away like a piece of