It is often hard for a comic that draws its material from real events to succeed in an industry that favors super heroes, grown men in tights and mythical battles, but fortunately it is also far from impossible. Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, combining ingeniously the dramatic life story of a young girl in Iran with political remarks, smart humor and an astonishing innocence that comes out of any page, never ceases to amaze the reader and make him wish there was more.
Marjane was born in Tehran, Iran and witnessed the huge changes that altered her country in her lifetime, such as the fall of the Shah, the regime of Ayatollah Khomeini and the beginning of the Iran-Iraq war. She lives in a progressive family while around her fanatics ruled, fundamentalists roamed and every day was harder than the previous, and everything she saw she judged with her unique way as a child. The first book of Persepolis describes those years and her experiences in Iran while the second one continues from her 14th year when she left to Vienna, Austria. Later she moved back to Iran to attend college where she met her first husband, she divorced and moved out again, this time in Strasbourg, France. She currently lives in Paris where she writes and draws children books, and of course Persepolis which is her most esteemed work until now.
Persepolis is charming in a profound way, it may speak of things ugly, evil and traumatic but it does it in an innocent way that leaves the reader with a bitter smile of not understanding but at least empathy. Marjane learns how her world works (make no mistake, your world has little in common with hers), speaks with political refugees, reads, speaks with God, wonders if the veil is right or wrong, dreams, falls in love, hates, makes mistakes and mostly acts like any other person would in her position. Astonishingly beautiful from the first page to the last Persepolis is a comic that might change your perspective in some matters.
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