School District Bans Holocaust Graphic Novel “Maus” From Curriculum

New episode of the ongoing school war in conservative American states. School authorities in a southern US county have banned the acclaimed Holocaust graphic novel Maus for its content judged “inappropriate”. In this book, Art Spiegelman recounts the memories of his Holocaust survivor father, in which the Jews are represented by mice, the Nazis by cats. Awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1992, a first for a comic book, Maus has been translated into more than twenty languages.

But its content is “vulgar and inappropriate” for 13-year-old middle schoolers, said the McMinn County School Board in Tennessee, which voted Jan. 10 to remove it from the curriculum until it finds another Holocaust book. “There is rude and unpleasant language in this book”, explained the director of the council, Lee Parkison, according to the minutes of the meeting. Eight vulgar words and an image of a naked woman are concerned.

Interviewed Thursday by CNN (in English), Art Spiegelman said he was immersed in a “total confusion” before’“try to be tolerant with those people who might not be Nazis”, corn “who focused on a few rude words”. As the 77th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau is marked on Thursday, the Holocaust Museum in Washington pointed out on its Twitter account that Maus was playing “a vital role” for teaching the Holocaust “by sharing detailed and personal experiences of victims and survivors”.

The decision comes in a context of questioning of school curricula in conservative states, which attack books dealing with social issues such as racism or gender identity. Another classic, Beloved by African-American Toni Morrison, has recently been the subject of controversy. A Virginia student mother says her high school son had nightmares after reading the book, which tells the story of a former slave choosing to kill her child to save him from the atrocities of slavery .