Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis

In the year of 1979 all that Marjane knew what it was like to not have to be forced into wearing a veil. Before the Islamic Revolution she was able to attend a a French Non-Religious school where girls and boys were allowed to study and play together. Unfortunately her world of carefree ness ended once

Marji’s educated and “avant-garde” parents join to demonstrate against the Shah, supporting Marxist causes of classless societies and believing that this is a way to achieve a kind of government that will bring out the best in people. During this time, Marji starts to overhear their conversations about the harsh realities of violence and death in her world. Subsequently, she realizes how oblivious she had been and starts to read books to teach herself the truth. As Marji becomes cognizant of class struggles, “[she] finally understood why [she] felt ashamed to sit in [her] father’s Cadillac” (33.6). The recognition of “the reason for [her] shame and for the revolution [being] the same: the difference between social classes” (33.7) distresses her and drives her to protest. As her interest gravitates more towards these new ideas, she starts to view Marx as a god figure but much bigger, and eventually loses attention to God and her “prophetic destiny” (10.2). From this point on, God starts to slowly fade away. Though Marji is still naive and relies on God as a source of comfort occasionally, this signals that she is growing while discovering her country’s political and social concepts as she begins to become more determined with her actions against her

The reformation of the country of Iran toward Islam caused turmoil among the people because the drastic changes forced on the people were not easily accepted. One of the major changes is that

In the year of 1979 all that Marjane knew what it was like to not have to be forced into wearing a veil. Before the Islamic Revolution she was able to attend a a French Non-Religious school where girls and boys were allowed to study and play together. Unfortunately her world of carefree ness ended

Western culture has often misperceived the east and the way that their society functions. In Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Satrapi uses graphic novels as a way to demonstrate to the western culture how the east has been misrepresented. The use of media helps to depict to the west how their views of the east may have been unfairly formed in the past. The media has only revealed limited knowledge that only shows partial perspectives because it is difficult to get perspectives of the minorities although they are the ones who hold the most truth. In other words the use of graphic novels and a child’s perspective give the west a new idea on how it is that society in the east functions. This style of writing brings the connection between the two

This image represents a corruption of religion by displaying a certificate with indulgence written across the top. This shows a corruption of religion because during the Reformation, indulgences were sold so that citizens could pray to their god to forgive their sins. Because of indulgences and other corrupt events in the Catholic Church, Martin Luther wrote the 95 theses which started a revolution in the church which is why we chose this image to relate to the corrupt religious events in Marjane’s book. While Marjane is in school, she battles with her beliefs and her teacher’s lessons when they start conflicting with one another. In the passage, teachers force the students to rip pictures of the shah out of all of their textbooks. This made Marjane very bewildered about what to believe. In the text it says, “But she is the one who told us that the shah was chosen by God!” The teacher continues to say, “ Satrapi! You shouldn’t say things like that. Stand in the corner!” (pg 44) This shows corruption of religious figure in Iran during the time period which is why this book relates to the image we chose. Moreover, at the beginning of the book, Marjane believed she was the last prophet; however, as more of her family and friends start to move away or die, she turns away from her religion. The passage says, “ Shut up, you! Get out of my life!!! I never want to see you again!” (pg 70).

The book, Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi illustrates her childhood story while living in Iran. She witnessed a lot of struggles Iran had to face. The main struggle that stood out to me is people getting treated unfairly because of their social class. It should not matter what you wear or look like to be important to society, but in Iran social class is a form of identity. They are not able to be whom they wish to be; are forced to be in a certain social class for the rest of their lives.

Generally texts create a fine line between freedom and captivity, but Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi distinguishes itself by avoiding this cliche. Freedom often represents positive connotation while captivity implies a negative response. Within Persepolis freedom and captivity run dangerously close, showing the true emotional turmoil of a torn country. taking place during the Iranian Revolution, Persepolis explores both perspectives and sheds light on why freedom and captivity cannot exist independently. Through religious reform, war, and familial turmoil Persepolis gives the reader an opportunity to experience these gruesome events and how they define captivity and freedom in modern Iran.

In the graphic novel Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi. The main character Marji is growing up in Iran, where she is surrounded by war. She witnesses an unimaginable amount of horrid events. As she grows, she starts to “rebel” a as she tries to find herself. Eventually, her parents decide to send her to Vienna, Austria to get her away from the war. Marji isn’t happy about leaving but she goes anyway. She lives in Vienna for about 4 years and throughout those 4 years she is still trying to figure out who she is and goes through a series of ups and downs.

In the graphic memoir Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi, the citizens of Iran are divided into three separate classes; the lower, middle, and upper class. These distinct social classes determine the citizen’s life opportunities and freedoms. For instance, Iranians are advised to stay within their social classes and not interact with the lower class. The story takes place while Iran is engulfed in a war with Iraq and also facing a national rebellion. In times of war, it is important that a country must remain unified and fight for the greater cause; however, social classes divide the country which causes a break in society.

Over the following four years, Marji learned of how her grandparents were left poor because of the Shah, the leader of the Iranian government. Shah was well known for robing men and women of everything they had worked for and leaving them with nothing. Nevertheless, Marji was schooled on the different levels of society in Iran, which left her to consider her family as rich because her Dad drove a Cadillac. Despite being a child, Marji accused her dad of being anti-social towards a class that could not read and write. To clarify Marji helped out a friend with the writing of some love letters. Mehi was the family maid that could not read or write. Mehi fell in love with the boy

In the beginning of the graphic novel, the author is recounting her childhood before the Iranian revolution. As Marjane must wear the veil in her school, once she is out to

One of the more deep philosophical ideas that popped into my head while reading this story was the moral study behind Marji’s thoughts and what it stood to her. Persepolis presents storytelling in both literature and visual arts, the graphics drive a certain complexity to the story and give us a bigger character study to process. This is the state of mind an adult Marji wants to show to contrast her childhood stances with the stances the reader is thinking. Some small elements like the color, art style and character design put persepolis together to be Satrapi’s story.

Marji notices the many differences between equality for all genders, and how one sided and strict the rules towards it can be. The women must wear veils in public at all times and must refrain showing too much skin, so they don’t “tempt” men. This rule is not accepted by Marji and her family, and find the rule absurd. The opinion on the veil started as it was required to wear in school. In the first chapter, “The Veil,” Marji comments on the first opinion on the veil. “We didn’t really like to wear the veil, especially since we didn’t understand why we had to.” (Satrapi, 3). Marji really expresses her opinion on women’s rights and how strict they are compared to men’s in the chapter “The Convocation.” She points out to the administration how one sided the rights are and how things are unfair. In her own words “ Why is it that, as a woman, am expected to feel nothing when watching these men with their clothes sculpted on but they, as men can get excited by two inches less of my head-scarf?” ( Satrapi, 297). This explains that women are suppose to compose

Persepolis is a graphic novel written by Marjane Satrapi. The novel is Satrapi’s memoir about growing in Iran during the Islamic Revolution and the second Iran and Iraq war. She tells us the struggles of being a female in Iran. Satrapi shows us her life within the pages of this novel to show us who she really is, where she really comes from, and what her country is really like. She corrects the misconceptions and stereotypes made about her culture from the western world.