The Complete Persepolis

This gives one an inside perspective of an Iran that most of us will never know. This is a must read.

I read the 2 volume version. Often stuff is removed from reprints. Mainly controversial stuff that will offend people. Pertaining to gender and race, but I don't know how much will be removed from this comic as it's quite inoffensive.

I read it a long time ago. Then reread it. It's still very good, but there are a few things new readers need to keep in mind before blindly reading it. Firstly there are a ton of copy-cats now and some are even better. The Arab of the Future is similar yet about childhood in Syria and Europe not Iran and Austria. And it shows you that the format is amazing. It's the best comic book format ever bar none. Out of top 100 comic books ever half will be in this format about a true story. Each page is a story with a point and moral lesson with a fun comedic ending. Each chapter an overall message. Each book a presentation of a country. Its crude drawings perfect for a story focusing on the message and nation.

With these Persepolis type comics it's always about the lead character an the parents. Here she presents her parents are infallible. Not a single personality error is shown. Clearly this is not a real life situation yet it's understandable why someone who is starting this comic style has many reprehensions about what she can talk openly about. New imitations are brutal and honest, she's not. There is plenty of history and her own story sounds truthful. She is a liberal in Iran. Yet fascist or radical compared to modern thinkers. She for example claims they had to kick out the Shah as he burned down a cinema with people inside - something he never did. She mentions how much she and her communist friends and family hated him and wanted him out. Then replacing him with a radical Islamist regime that was 100 times worse and put many more people in prison and killed protestors. The replacement regime they were fighting to death for made millions of Iranian miss the old system as at least the Shah wasn't a psychopath and women had full rights and could wear Western clothing. Her history depiction of what happened is false. She hates the Shah so much she blames him for crimes the Islamic radicals committed. Similarly her dad tells a lot of stories about Israel and USA that are painfully false. They hate both nations yet there are plenty of real war crime stories they could have used instead. I would advice the comic book to be updated with footnotes to correct the false statements, but I assume she wouldn't want this to happen.

It's very good. I would consider it a mix or fact and fiction. And there are plenty of better biographies in this style now. But all have to stand on the shoulders of a giant.

I read this for a Banned Books Book Club. I don't know why it would be banned. Yes, she had sex before marriage. Yes, it has a different take on Iranian history than we teach, but that it a plus, not a minus. In my view, it's always good to see what someone else thinks, and then look at the objective facts, motivations, etc.... Also, she used the F-bomb a few times. Now, it WAS banned in Iran and Lebanon, understandably. And it was banned in Chicago school libraries, but after students objected to the banning of a book about freedom of speech, it was brought back.

It's okay. I enjoyed learning the perspective of an Iranian about Iranian events. I also thought she was a bit of a brat, and was lucky that she was able to live through her rebellious personality in Iran. And, like her grandmother, I was dismayed that she wrongly accused a non-involved male bystander so that she could avoid being punished for her choices. (No, I'm not saying that she should have been punished, just that she caused presumable serious consequences for a man who was just sitting on the steps minding his own business.)

I read these for my English class in high school and am very thankful I did. It helped me to put myself in someone's shoes who lived a completely different life than me and I enjoyed learning about and connecting to the life of a stranger who I've never met and probably never will.

Many powerful messages resonated within this graphic novel. Satrapi tells the story of her youth and early adult hood in Iran, during the dramatic cultural shifts of the 1970s-1990s. She hides no atrocity under the guise of cultural appropriateness, but the cartoons speak openly about the assassinations and oppression of anyone who opposed the regime. So many of these were events that affected her immediate family. Imprisonment, torture, death. All taken in stride. Marjane is sent to Austria for her own safety as a young teen, and even this experience can't quench her thirst for learning and her sassy resistance.