Maus Questions

When I began reading the Maus series, I was very curious as to why Art Spiegelman used mice to represent the Jews and cats to represent the Nazis. How does the use of these animals as the characters that they are in the two books affect the story as a whole or how it depicts the story?

While reading the story, you can see how the Holocaust affected Vladek. On page 90, Francoise states that it is a miracle that Vladek survived and in response Artie says, "but in some ways he didn't survive"? What do you think he means by that quote? Use examples from the book to prove some of the ways that Vladek did not survive the Holocaust.