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Themes, Symbolism, and Motifs

Themes, Symbolism, and Motifs. Advanced Composition Maus. Theme.

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Themes, Symbolism, and Motifs

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  1. Themes, Symbolism, and Motifs Advanced Composition Maus

  2. Theme • A common thread or repeated idea that is incorporated throughout a literary work. A theme is a thought or idea the author presents to the reader that may be deep, difficult to understand, or even moralistic. A theme must be a COMPLETE thought. • In Maustheme is not presented in a preachy manner, such as in fables. In fact, it is not presented directly at all. You extract it from the characters, action, and setting that make up the story. In other words, you must figure out the theme yourself. A theme is not a word, it is a sentence. You don’t have to agree with the theme to identify it. Examples Money can’t buy happiness. Don’t judge people based on the surface. It is better to die free than live under tyranny.

  3. Themes in Maus Some possible main ideas in Maus? • Familial Guilt • Survival • Freedom • Faith • Identity • Conflicts between past and present • Fear • Family Relationships • Memories • Resistance • Friendship • Life’s Challenges • You must come up with the COMPLETE thought for the Overarching Theme.

  4. Symbolism • A symbol is a word or object that stands for another word or object. For example, a dove is a symbol for peace. • Symbols in Maus? • Prisons • Eyes • Anthroporphism- giving animals human characteristics • Cats- Germans, cats hunt mice, protect the home from pestilence • Mice- Jews; pestilence;; breed rapidly with large amounts of offspring, live silently among people, hard to get rid of • Pigs - Poles: Jews don’t eat pork and consider the pig a dirty animal • Fish- British: the British have been long renowned for their navy. • Dogs- Americans: “man’s best friend”; the liberators. • Frogs - French: double meaning – frogs are slippery, slimy, frogs can change into princes.

  5. Motif • A recurring object, concept, or structure in a work of literature. A motif is important because it allows one to see main points and themes that the author is trying to express, in order that one might be able to interpret the work more accurately. (I personally think of motifs as patterns) • Motifs in Maus? • Numbers/ Dates • Masks • Trains • Circles/ Cycles

  6. All three concepts seem to be similar- so how can I keep them separate? • Theme(s)- main idea(s). The big take-aways or applications to life. • Motif- can be a structure, an image, a color, etc. as long as it repeats throughout large portions of the text for a purpose. (Think…a symbol that repeats) • Symbol- an object, character, color, figure that helps to make an abstract idea more concrete. • Both symbols and motifs enhance and support the theme!

  7. Maus Theme Journal Page One: -Your Name -Your Main Idea -Your Overarching Theme (Complete Thought) • Each Chapter you must find a MINIMUM of FIVE panels to back-up your theme. The more panels you analyze, the better your Literary Analysis paper will be. Remember 5 is a minimum, but you are free to find more than 5. • Each panel analysis should be a lengthy paragraph response. • Your notebook will be collected and graded each week.

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