Persepolis

by Marjane Satrapi

   
     This week was a study of women's influence on Comics and the Graphic Narrative. I chose Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi. I chose this work because I knew nothing about it. After and during reading it I could not help but relate it to Maus. It was set in the Iranian Revolution of 1980 and takes place from the perspective of the Author (who at the time was 10-ish years old). It imparts on me a feeling of liberation of women in general from all forms of oppression, or at least women who are not sucked up into the ideologues of the machine of religious reform.
   A part of the book I found very interesting and similar to Maus was that at one point her mother is criticizing others for taking to much when there is no food on the shelves in the sores, and when they get outside she asks how much rice she managed to carry out. When she sees that it is enough to last them she then says they need to go to the next store to see if they can find more. Much the same way in Maus that the Grandfather was criticizing African Americans while explaining the persecution of his Jewish people by the Germans.
     I think this book sheds a whole new light on Iran for me. In fact I never new it to be the progressive nation that it was. Even if that was due to European Imperialism. It is nice to have the story told to me from this angle because it gives me another perspective to consider when thinking about how I feel about Iran in the current role it is playing in Geo-Politics.