The Complete Persepolis: Volumes 1 and 2

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.

Preparing to see the movie, I read this. Wow. This is a great graphic novel depicting a young girl's life in Iran (Tehran), through the wars. A must read!

It's tempting to say that Satrapi chose to write her memoir as a graphic novel because she's not very good at narrative writing, but to say that would be to completely undercut what this book has to offer. Satrapi tells her story through brief narration and elegant black and white drawings, illustrating the repression in Iran (veiled women and bearded men drawn with no mouths) and the freedom of Europe.

Satrapi takes us from her childhood in Iran under the Shah through her experiences during the Islamic Revolution. Her parents send her to Austria when she is 14, and she stays there for 4 years. An outsider in Austria, she returns to Iran, only to continue to feel like an outsider, because she did was not in the country through most of the Iran-Iraq war, and therefore didn't suffer through the bombings and terror that her fellow Iranians did.

Back in Iran, Satrapi continues to be a rebel, but is able to enroll in college to get her degree in graphic arts. Throughout this section of the book, she depicts her personal struggle to reconcile her values with her life in Iran, and to find meaning in her life. She discovers that, for her, meaning comes through education, both personal and institutional, and leaves Iran again to pursue her studies in France.

Through both her drawings and her words, Satrapi tells not just her own story, but that of others affected by the repression in Iran. That this is a graphic novel gives the reader the feeling of a special insider's look into that world.