I almost feel ashamed for not reading this sooner. Like, what took me so long? I don't know.
But I'm happy I did eventually.
The movie version of 'Persepolis' did cut out some parts, elements and characters from Marjane Satrapi's autobiographical graphic novel masterpiece, for understandable reasons, such as keeping it at a two-hour length. The original artform tells the tragic, touching story of this magnificent woman with much more detail, and I think the result is better than the film adaptation.
'Persepolis' is very political and never boring. And historically significant. Each panel, deceptive with the art's soft cartoony roundness, in black and white, is memorable yet fleeting, like life itself. Miraculously, nothing feels wasted or unneeded, no matter how mundane an event might seem.
The brave and unstoppable Marjane Satrapi lived through a hard upbringing in Iran in the eighties and nineties, during the Islamic Revolution and the war with Iraq. Lots of people she knew and loved died under an oppressive, barbaric system. Growing up with rebel Marxist parents, and given her own outspokenness, it really does look like she was very lucky to have survived in her own country, which deep down she still loves despite everything (her living relatives are there, after all). She is always, honestly, refreshingly, a flawed human being.
The reader is shown Marjane's early life; from an ordinary child going through so many different phases in a warring country that wants to destroy her individuality and independent spirit, to a young immigrant in Austria sent by her parents for her to have a better and safer education where she can live free to be herself, and then back in Iran after a string of heartbreaks and living in poverty on the streets, suffering through an identity crisis and depression. Marjane's childhood, home circumstances, education, college years, projects, family bonds, friendships, and failed marriage are extraordinary to read about. These true events show her best and worst traits unflinchingly - she is a chainsmoker, she does drugs, and had attempted suicide at one point, among other things. She mentions she had sex many times before marriage and was never ashamed of it, not caring about other people's judgement, hypocrisies and prejudices. Marjane and everybody else are so human it's painful and adds to the tragedy.
But there is humour, on the upside. 'Persepolis' is one of the very few things I've come across that successfully manages that balance between showing death and horror, and having cathartic funny moments present on nearly every page. It's a 350-page comic strip that tells someone's coming-of-age story and makes you think. It is powerful enough to stay with the reader forever.
I learned a lot of things about Iran and its history in 'Persepolis', and that in the midst of war and thousands being bombed, shot at, executed, brainwashed, and sexually assaulted by soldiers and government officials in the name of a tyrant king and religion, there are a great many good people left in the world. In one's family, in fact. Marjane's parents, grandmother and uncles - distant or living or dead - are all fantastic. She and the women around her will stand up for women's rights.
Utterly human and utterly sick of double standards and women being objectified and blamed for it (the sight of women's hair turns men into rapists, seriously?!), Marjane Satrapi is a real feminist figure, angry and proud.
Beautiful, sad, witty, and true. Everybody should read 'Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood and The Story of a Return' at least once. Humanity will always suffer under an oppressive regime, and this graphic novel can help save lives. Comic books are art - a way to express thoughts and ideas, for ideas are harder to kill than a person. They are not just kid's stuff. They certainly don't have to be white male-centered power fantasies that depict harmful cliches and archetypes of women, who exist as either sexualized objects of heterosexual male desire or as on the receiving end of misogynistic revenge pornography. 'Persepolis' destroys this pattern and those assumptions about comics. Up to ten gay men are present in it, as well.
Vital for every comic book fan and collector.
Final Score: 4/5
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