Points of View
Persepolis
Persepolis is Marjane Satrapi's inventive, wry, and tragic memoir of growing up in Tehran in the 1980s—the tumultuous years when the Islamic Revolution took hold in Iran and the country fought off an invasion from neighboring Iraq. Using a striking black-and-white comic strip format, Satrapi chronicles daily life from the perspective of a middle-class schoolchild, as well as cataclysmic events such as the overthrow of the shah and the long, bloody war with Iraq. Persepolis is at once a story of growing up and a reminder of the personal costs of war and repression, convincingly related by a perceptive girl caught up in the raging currents of history who also has time to listen to Michael Jackson and dream of a better life. In the aftermath of the Arab Spring of 2011, Persepolis feels even more timely, insightful, and essential.
New York: Pantheon Books, 2003
Author
Marjane Satrapi was born in Rasht, Iran. She now lives in Paris, where she is a regular contributor to magazines and newspapers throughout the world, including The New Yorker and the New York Times. She is the author of Embroideries and Chicken With Plums (translated into English in 2005 and 2006, respectively), and several children's books. She cowrote and codirected the 2008 animated feature film version of Persepolis.
Related Resources
How to Cite This Page
"Muslim Journeys | Item #96: ", April 24, 2024 http://bridgingcultures-muslimjourneys.org/items/show/96.
Tags
colonialism, culture, gender, Iran, Islam, nationalism, revolution, shah, veil, women