Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi
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Book Reviews of Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood
Book Review: Graphic novel of highest caliber
Summary: 5 Stars
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi is the story of a young girl, the author, from ages 6-14 as she grows up during the Islamic Revolution in Iran in the early 1980s. Marjane's parents are progressive and attend protests as well as support their Communist friends and family members in their struggles to be free. The story is told in black and white simple drawings that somehow manage to capture Marjane's innocence as well as the tragedy and violence of her country's upheaval. The book, almost a collection of vignettes reads beautifully as a child's memories. We only get pieces of stories without always her complete understanding and the story jumps occasionally, but still flows smoothly. Marjane goes through complete confusion as to what is going on through supporting her parents to disbelieving her parents to rebellion against her parents and the world, all of this against a background of riots and oppression. She and her schoolmates are forced to wear veils and beat their chests daily in memory of those lost in the war against Iraq. Marjane loses family and friends in the war in ways that strip her of her innocence and ultimately her own parents. The last frame is devastating. Before reading this graphic novel, when I thought of Iran, I pictured the Shah, Ayatollah Khomeni, and President Ahmadinejad, but this story shows the country through the eyes of a young girl who loved her home and aches for its demise into something unrecognizable. While written several years ago, it has become extremely timely with the events in the news today. There is some light profanity, but nothing worse than any PG-13 movie. This should be required reading in high school Civics classes. Book Review: A Must Read for People of All Ages!
Summary: 5 Stars
A memoir unlike any other I've ever read, Satrapi's story comes across in the pages of a vividly crafted graphic novel, another form of writing I have only recently discovered. The black and white images of Satrapi's early childhood emphasize her feeling of entrapment under an oppressive Islamic regime. Forced to shed all traces of individuality and Western culture, Satrapi finds that even her outspoken, activist parents can't save her from the fate of their country and the reality of her departure to Austria. Harrowing images of destruction and death, mixed with uplifting and humorous interludes of happiness and hope, mark this unique graphic novel. Confined by prescribed gender roles and expectations of social class in Iran, "Persepolis" reminds me of other narratives like Hosseini's "The Kite Runner" and Azar Nafisi's "Lolita in Tehran" that shed light on the experiences of young people growing up in the face of fundamentalism and extremist mentalities.
Yet unlike these stories, Satrapi's autobiographical text seems more powerful in the way it's presented to readers in the graphic novel!
Book Review: very nice
Summary: 5 Stars
This is probably the first graphic novel i have read in my life...well i did read something we use to call "comics" but i think this has a bit different style. Given that I myself not being persian, but i know plenty of persians..i can't believe how similar it can be...it seems like i am seeing some of my friend's life in there..Book Review: It's a Comic Strip!
Summary: 1 Stars
Man, was I disappointed. This book is a comic strip. It may have had a lot of meaning, to those involved at the time it was written, with many government stings hidden in the strip, but for enjoyable reading, it stunk. I got through it in half an hour, hardly my idea of buying good reading.Book Review: A teenager's memory of revolution and war . . .
Summary: 5 Stars
Readers of the graphic novel "Maus" will find themselves in familiar territory with volume I of Marjane Satrapi's autobiography. Here a tumultuous and violent period of recent political history is told with both horror and humor. And told from a child's point of view, it is deeply personalized, so that we see both the broad outline of a revolution and a war, and their impact on the lives of individual people. Meanwhile, there is the business of growing up, which takes place no matter what happens, and our young heroine demonstrates all the trials and tribulations of becoming a teenager in the midst of a world that is being turned upside down.
While the book is a quick read - and suitable for readers young and old - there is much in it to ponder long afterward. For those who know little of what life has been like for Iranians living in the Islamic Republic, especially during the 1980s, the years of Khomeini and the war with Iraq, this book will begin to fill in some gaps in history, particularly as an understanding of Iran becomes increasingly important today. Also recommended: Roya Hakakian's "Journey From the Land of No: A Girlhood Caught in Revolutionary Iran."