Persepolis Essay

Marjane Satrapi’s memoir Persepolis is considered a “coming of age” story based on her experiences growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. This graphic novel explores the life she lead in Tehran which encompassed the overthrow of the Shah’s regime, the triumph of the Islamic Revolution and the devastating effects of war with Iraq. Undergoing life with such a chaotic environment, it took Satrapi courage to act and live as her “authentic self” and explore what it meant to her to be authentic. Similar to Aristotle, May and Medinas Persepolis examines the concept of courage, through the view of innocence; through Satrapi’s childhood.

As American singer-song writer Duncan Sheik once said, “It’s inevitable your environment will influence what you do.” It is not a secret that the environment a person grows up in helps shape their views of the world and how he or she perceives different issues. The United State of America are known as the melting pot. We have many cultures and races all living within the same cities working together peacefully for the most part. To outsiders America is the place to come to achieve the “American Dream”, and it is the place where fresh starts, entrepreneurship, and individualism are highly encouraged. There are freedoms in American that many other people across the world are not as lucky to have.

Throughout the Iranian Revolution, many events and changes took place that largely affected the views of Iranians by other nations. The graphic novel, The Complete Persepolis, written by Marjane Satrapi (Satrapi, 2003), conveys many of these events and changes through the eyes of a child growing up in the 1980s in Iran. Satrapi’s main purpose for this book is to describe how the Iranian government was corrupt, causing foreign nations to have a tainted view of all Iranian citizens. The Complete Persepolis does so by presenting major events and changes in a manner that is directed towards audiences that are willing to have an open mind about ethnicity and false stereotypes, and an audience that is young and can relate to the “coming of age” aspect of this novel. By exhibiting a credible first hand account of how Satrapi and many others were affected by the events that took place during the Iranian Revolution, The Complete Persepolis can effectively persuade a reader to eliminate the “Islamic extremist” stereotype that the corrupt Islamic Republic gave all Iranian citizens.

The graphic novel Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi is a political and personal account of a young girl’s growth to maturity. The novel serves as an autobiography of the author’s childhood in Tehren, Iran. It describes what it was like to grow up during the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the end of the Shah’s regime, and the war with Iraq. One of the most prominent themes in the novel is the clash between modernity and fundamentalism. The reader can observe this conflict through Iran's internal oppositions, the Satrapi’s modernity, and Marji’s western soci-political beliefs. This aspect of the novel is important because it shows the ideological diversity within Iran and the consequences faced by those in the opposition.

The novel “Persepolis” shows many life changes during the Islamic Revolution told through the eyes of a young girl. “Persepolis” was based on Satrapi’s childhood experience in Iran. Throughout the span of the 1970’s to the early 1980’s, Satrapi experiences many changes in her life, not only with the government, or her education, but also with herself. Although she witnessed many violent acts right in front of her eyes, these experiences helped Marji (Satrapi) grow as a young child.

Amazing, intriguing, and unimaginable are just a few words to describe how I felt about Persepolis while I read this true life story of Marjane Satrapi. This book has helped me to see all the life struggles, good times, and adversities that Marji faced between the ages of nine to thirteen. The Islamic Revolution had such a daunting effect in the Middle East, especially in the county of Iran where Marji and her family resided.

This photo of a family demonstrates the theme because it shows that mothers’ should be at home with the children, while their husbands’ are out working. This picture doesn’t show that women in Iran have to wear the veil, but in America, women in the 1900s should wear dresses and/or aprons. In Persepolis, gender roles talk about how women should always wear the veil, otherwise, they will get a beating. Satrapi explains one of the demonstrations she went to, “so I went with them, I passed out flyers…’guns may shoot and knives may carve, but we won’t wear your silly scarves!’ When suddenly things got nasty. ‘THE SCARF OR A BEATING!’’ (76). This theme connects to the thesis because Marjane shows her perspective on the scarves and how her family would go to demonstrations to show their feelings on the gender roles. This proves that Marjane’s perspective in her book is accurately showing gender roles in

As a kid I had always wanted to belong to something but I never really fit into any sort of category. There wasn’t even a name for the group I was a part of. I didn’t really know what I wanted to be a part of because I was never good at anything in particular. I had tried every sport and I was awful at all of them honestly. I was just a socially awkward kid that only existed. Satrapi in the book Persepolis, also struggled somewhat to fit in. On page 45, Satrapi shouts, about to punish someone “Ramin! Ramin! Come out of hiding! Don’t be a wimp!” with her friends in an attempt to fit in with them.

War. That is a word many adults and children in America have a picture of but have not lived through. America has been in a great deal of wars especially in the last hundred years but none of those wars were on American soil, with exception to pearl harbor. Marjane Satrapi has has grown up and lived through revolutionary Iran. The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi is a memoir discussing Marjane’s life during the Islamic Revolution.

Another historical event that we see is the rise and effects of the Islamic regime in Marjane’s life. This event is arguably the central issue that affects Marjane during her upbringing in Iran. Marjane shows how the regime begins to control schools, and how this affects her life by separating her from her friends (4, 3-4). We also see how the regime decides to close universities as they “educate future imperialists.” (73, 1-3) This demonstrates the negative effects that the regime has on society, as they prioritize Islamic values over education. The Islamic leaders portrayal shows them as upset and bored, and are given much different facial expressions than those that Marjane sees as intellectual (such as Uncle Anoosh (54/3) or Marjane’s grandfather (23/8)). This imagery communicates the backwards-thinking of these leaders, and as such, also effectively communicate Marjane’s opinion of the leaders without needing to discuss it with text. Additionally, we see both of Marjane’s views: Marjane not understanding the veiling and separation (3/5) as well as Marjane’s depression over the closing of the universities (73/7). The text here illustrates her opinions on the situations that she experiences, and the imagery allows us to see a visual representation of her basic thoughts and emotions, which are well communicated. A final example of the regime’s changes is the difference between the fundamentalist and modern women

In The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, the genre choice of the graphic novel vividly portrays the life-experience that Satrapi herself gone through as a youth growing up in Iran back in the 1980s. Satrapi utilizes a unique drawing style to emphasize the influence that the Islamic Republic has brought to her. The recurring action of teachers implanting Islamic values in children throughout Marjane’s education in Iran is demonstrated through a set of related images, which implicitly reflect on the destruction of childhood that is caused by a totalitarian regime. For instance, the teachers force the girls to wear veils on page1 and tells the parents that “either [girls] obey the law, or [they are] expelled” (Satrapi, 98) later on. Also, the background of these images takes place where Iran is involved in both revolution and war; it contributes to children’ miserable situation even more.

Satrapi begins the novel with “The Veil” to introduce her first set of ambivalent feelings about the new regime, describing the stark differences in her personal world before and after the revolution. The scene begins with a depiction one of her first memories under the new republic, in which all females at school are forced to wear the veil. Paying attention to the visual aspects of the class photo on page 3, readers can only see Marjane’s left arm, with the rest of her body cropped out. The remainder of the panel shows her classmates posing for the class photo, identical in posture and attire. Her classmates each wear

She is allowed to be mindful of the world around her, and is even encouraged to. In comparison, politics play a gargantuan role in Marjane Satrapi’s childhood, and she embraces it, just like the girl in the photo. Her parents, Taji and Ebi, were avid and ardent demonstrators. Satrapi explains, “To enlighten me they brought me books, about the revolutionaries of my country...”(12). Marjane was brought up in a family of activists, who all showed her the importance of political knowledge. Not only this, but her grandfather, Mohammed Mossadeq, was the prime minister of Iran in the 1950’s. Her life, whether she likes it or not, is endlessly tied to politics. Due to this, her family’s history had a principal part in influencing how she views the idea of political awareness. Her perspective, as is anybody’s, is a conglomeration of her background and her experiences. Subsequently, she approaches the concept of political awareness with excitement, with necessity. She needs to be active, as it is the only way for her to understand her past, present, and future. She is the person her parents raised her to be: rebellious, socially conscious, and well-versed in the politics of Iran. To sum up, Marjane Satrapi’s perspective as a young girl, royal by blood, and born into an active family, impacts her political awareness in major ways. To continue, the image at left displays people bravely protesting against corrupt powers. This demonstrates revolution, as it shows the courage

In the graphic novel Persepolis, author Marjane Satrapi shares her first-hand account of the herself as a young girl growing up in a war zone. The Islamic Revolution molded Satrapi’s identity of how life should be--the righteous path of Islam. Children were taught the morals and ethics of society through adults who looked to guide them down a strict, religious path. Furthermore, the education system and government were against any form of self-expression in children, even if they didn’t know any better at such a young age. In the graphic novel Satrapi demonstrates the effects of the Islamic Revolution in Iran and how the implementations obstructed personal growth of identity in young children.

In the graphic novel Persepolis, written by Marjane Satrapi, the author tells her personal life story of growing up in Iran during the breakout of the Iraq and Iran War. Her use of black and white comic strips makes her story come to life in an entertaining and attention-grabbing way. Marjane growing up can be examined by using Erik Erikson’s theory of the eight stages of life. Persepolis shows how a young girl can overcome and turn into a woman that has self-love and finds who she is meant to be in life.