Marjane Satrapis Persepolis - Essay Example

of Reflective Essay on Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis Revolutions often cause widespreaddehumanization. Because of the thousands of lives that get destroyed during the course of revolutions, we tend to view these deaths more as statistics than as real, ordinary lives lost. The papers publish these numbers and we tend to get used to reading about twenty more, a hundred more lives lost, without really wondering about it at all. Marjane Satrapi tries to undo this effect in several ways in her graphic novel, Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood.

The first device she uses to do this is to use the child’s perspective. The story of the revolution re-told through the eyes of an Iranian ten-year old girl makes it very poignant. She provides a fresh perspective on what the ideals of the revolution meant to those who initially opposed the Shah’s regime. The little girl is unusually conscious and well-read for her age: “But my favorite was comic book entitled “Dialectic Materialism”.” (Satrapi 12). Class differences bother her and she repeatedly protests against it, as in the case of the brief love affair between Mehri and the neighbor’s son (Satrapi 37).

Satrapi also uses a sparse, bare style of drawing to add to this poignant tone. This is especially evident in some of the illustrations like that of the Rex Cinema being burnt down where the flames resemble the skeletons of the people who must have died inside (Satrapi 15) and in her depiction of the massacre that begins the section entitled “The Party” (Satrapi 40). The faces of the dead revolutionaries all resemble each other, emphasizing the great number of people who died for this cause.

Satrapi also uses a humorous, light tone throughout the first volume which makes the transition to the more serious volume all the more shocking. On page 41, for instance, there is a scene where the Shah is apparently searching for prime ministers. His responses are recorded as: “A Freemason? That’s not suitable. You remind them too much of my father! Too thin! Too short! One-eyed! .” The last response is especially satirical, and serves to help the reader understand the bitter irony of the situation.

Satrapi does not need to use violent words or hateful propaganda to make her point; her simple style and use of irony make the story more effective. Marjane Satrapi also puts the comic medium to good use. She uses the visual to sometimes support and sometimes contrast what the text says. For instance, when Marjane’s mother says, relieved, “Now that the devil has left” (Satrapi 43), one would assume that the devil truly has left. But there is an ominous, black snake that surrounds the frame, that lets the reader know that this is in fact not true, even though the characters in the comic do not seem to know it.

The use of only black and white for coloring also make the pictures stark and the story-telling more effective. Discussion Question: What if this was not a comic book: Would Persepolis still be as effective: Work Cited Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood. New York: Pantheon, 2003. Print.