Let’s Chat: A cat and mouse game

By Linda Tooth on September 17, 2025.

You would have to have had your head buried in the sand these last few months to not know of the controversy the UCP government’s proposed book banning created for schools in this province.

As you know from previous columns I have written, four semi-autobiographical graphic novels are at the centre of this government’s mission to control what students can access at their school libraries. Again, those novels are Fun House, Blankets, Flamer, and Gender Queer.

The UCP government in its divine wisdom gave a deadline of Sept. 30 for all schools to remove books that were not age-appropriate from their shelves. Well, Edmonton Public School Board over the summer did as it was mandated to and compiled a list of 200 books that fell within the parameters set by the UCP government for removal from school libraries.

This caused the UCP to publicly accuse Edmonton Public of vicious compliance. Hats off to Edmonton Public for taking the lead on this. Now I am not a huge fan of Edmonton (Oilers or Elks) as I was born in Calgary, and I bleed red, but I will give credit where credit is due.

Anyway, a mother of a Prairie Rose Public Schools Grade 11 student reached out to me recently regarding a novel their child was to read for an English 20 class. Folks, it is another graphic novel. But this time it is about Hitler, titled Maus by Art Spiegelman. Maus in German means mouse, and Jewish people have taken on the form of mice as Spiegelman recounts the atrocities his people faced during the Nazi regime of WWII.

The cover of the book has a swastika, which for many of us is a symbol of hate and antisemitism, with a cat’s face in the centre and two mice cowering below it.

You see, German Nazis have taken on the form of cats and this is what we would know as a cat and mouse game. I know cats are predators and mice have fallen prey to them, but comparing them to Nazis makes me nauseous.

I think what really makes me angry in this graphic novel is that real people who have lived and died during these real events are depicted as animals. Jewish people are mice, German Nazis are cats and wait, Polish people are portrayed as pigs. Give these people human faces and make it real.

In this graphic novel, mice both adults and their children were being shot by Nazi cats or choosing death by suicide, families were being separated and sent to places like Auschwitz. Nazi cats were throwing young mice against the wall to kill them, it is all quite sad really.

If we are going to have graphic novels depicting real world atrocities like Spiegelman’s Maus on the shelves for students to read, why can we not have graphic novels like the four mentioned above that depict real life experiences?

Have a Meowtastic Day and keep reading.

Linda Tooth is a philanthropy and youth support worker, YMCA of Southeastern Alberta