The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

I mentioned in my review of Iran Awakening that I had read Persepolis recently. Sunday morning the house was quiet with my boyfriend and the kids…uuuh, cats still sleeping. I decided to use this time to write some reviews, starting with Persepolis. Well, let’s just say I didn’t get much writing done: I ended up reading the entire book again from cover to cover. And enjoying it as much as I did the first time.

Persepolis is the author’s story of growing up in Iran in the 1970s and 1980s. It is not just any memoir, though, as the author tells her story in the form of a graphic novel. As an aside, I dislike the term graphic novel a lot, because it sounds like porn. And that is not what it is at all. Are there any alternative names for this genre of books? Well, apart from comics, which doesn’t sit well with me either, but for completely different reasons.

Late last year, Persepolis was made into an animated movie. I haven’t seen it, but would love to. If you have seen the movie: I’d love to hear your opinion.

Satrapi grows up in an intellectual, fairly liberal family in Tehran. Her great grandfather was one of the country’s rulers in the early twentieth century, before he fell into disgrace when the first Shah came to power. Satrapi recounts what it was like to be a child before and during the Iranian Revolution (Satrapi was nine years old in 1979), not understanding everything that she hears or that happens around her. As the Islamic Republic takes shape and with it the restrictions on the lives of women, Satrapi has to find a way to combine the values that her parents and grandmother instilled in her at home with the extremely conservative and female-unfriendly world outside. Young Marjane also has to learn to keep her outspokenness in check; she has a tendency to fail miserably in this, which makes for some hilarious, absurd and sometimes heartbreaking situations.

The drawings are fairly sober, black and white. But they are not boring or monotonous, there is a lot to see in te drawings. The artwork and the text belong together, they complement each other. Satrapi tells her story in an honest and direct way, not shying away from difficult topics and taboos, but at the same time with lots of humor and perspective. She is not afraid to show her own mistakes and “failures”: her drug use and living on the streets in Austria, her attempt to save her own ass by having an innocent bystander arrested, her failed marriage after her return to Iran.

Of course, a large part of the story is very specific to Iran, but it is not just a story of a girl growing up in (pre-)revolutionary Iran, it is a story of a girl growing up. Period. Many topics will be recognizable for any woman who was once a teenager: loneliness, trying to fit in, relationships, uncertainty, thinking you’re not pretty enough, etc.

Persepolis is a wonderful book that will make you laugh out loud and think deeply at the same time. I am pretty sure it will end up high on my list of favorite books of 2008. If you are one of the two people left who hasn’t read Persepolis, please get hold of a copy and read it. If you have never read any graphic novels and think it is just for kids, forget all your previous notions, pick up a copy and read.

This was the first graphic novel that I read (apart from the comics when I was young), and I’d love to read more. The same bookshop where I bought Persepolis also has a copy of Art Spiegelman’s Maus II. Unfortunately, they don’t have the first part, so I will leave it at the bookshop for now.

You can read other bookbloggers’ opinions on Persepolis here:
Dewey (the hidden side of a leaf: here and here
Bethany (B&b Ex Libris)
Rebecca Reads: here and here

If you reviewed this book as well, but your link isn’t in the list, please leave a comment or send me an email with the link to your review so I can add it.