Skip to main content

How Different is it?

By
Persepolis, a graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi is about her experience during the Islamic Revolution, and that is where we’re heading next. We’ve been covering Western graphic novels, but now it’s time to turn to different cultures. It can be difficult to understand because believe it or not, cultures can be very different from one another.

While reading Persepolis, Satrapi mentions wanting to celebrate the fire ceremony during the Zarathustrian holidays as well as the Persian New Year called Norouz which is the first day of spring. (Here’s a link to a page that explains what Zarathustrian and the fire ceremony are better than I ever could). I know, same here. I didn’t understand what she was talking about at first, but not knowing actually made me feel like reading more because I wanted to understand. Another thing that is also very foreign to me is growing up in a time of revolution where the people of Iran were forced to wear veils and it was common to hear about bombings. In the chapter titled Shabbat, Satrapi describes how she finds her neighbor’s bracelet still on her hand, but the hand is no longer attached to the rest of her body, and that’s when she realizes that her neighbor is dead.


Satrapi, Marjane. The Complete Persepolis, L’Association, 2003, pp. 52. 

The image on the panel above seems really foreign to me and maybe it will to you too. Does it? Well, the reason that I find it foreign is because it is an image of a man cut into pieces. Satrapi is literally showing us this, and all I can think about is her actually going through all of it. She experienced the Islamic Revolution and heard about all sorts of unfortunate events at a very young age.

But even though we’re talking about a different culture here, there are many things that I was able to relate to. Growing up, for the most part, all we want to do is rebel. It’s part of being young. Chapter, The Cigarette talks about Satrapi cutting class and her smoking for the first time ever. I’m not saying I’ve done any of it, but of course, as a human being, I have rebelled. Also, as a Hispanic, religion is a huge part of our culture, so I could most definitely relate to the parts where she speaks to God. We’ve gone over McCloud’s claim on how we are able to fit ourselves into a graphic novel because of the simplistic style of art, so when I saw Satrapi conversing with God, I really felt like that was me. 


Satrapi, Marjane. The Complete Persepolis, L’Association, 2003, pp. 43. 

The panels are pretty much the same as Western graphic novels, and we read them from top to bottom, left to right, but there is something unique that I came across in Persepolis. The panel above is bordered by a creature that seems to look a lot like a snake or a dragon. In that panel, Satrapi’s mom says “Now that the devil has left” referring to the Shah, but that snake is the devil, and from everything that comes after that, we know that the devil never left. I found this border very unique, and it was a great form of foreshadowing.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Iconic Abstraction and the Vocabulary of Comics in Hellboy

By Anonymous
In Chapter 2 of Understanding Comics , McCloud talks about two key concepts I’d like to discuss: he identifies reality , language , and the picture plane as a representation of the pictorial vocabulary of comics, and he expresses a scale for iconic abstraction of comic art. As readers following the action in comics, we are guided by what objects and events cartoonists decide demand focus in each individual moment or panel. This focus via simplification of reality - referred to as abstraction - provides a rhythm of reading the visual representation of a sequence of events, controlling the timing of action and dialogue through spacing of panels and objects on a page. McCloud makes it clear that abstraction in comics is really just about the representation of ideas . Conceptually, we can perceive a specific drawn event, such as an explosion or a fight, without that event being pictured exactly or photorealistically. Rubble or glass flying midair can represent the impact of fights depi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is Maus a Non-Fiction Graphic Novel?

By
Art Spiegelman’s Maus is considered to be a non-fiction graphic novel, but is creating a graphic novel based off a true story even allowed? Maybe you thought graphic novels were meant to be fiction. Well, I think the form of a graphic novel should not be restricted to only fiction. It is known for graphic novels to be fiction rather than non-fiction because that is what a novel is, fiction, but the name shouldn’t be a limitation of what can and cannot be told though this medium. There are many reasons for why telling a non-fiction story through the form of a graphic novel is beneficial. Spiegelman was able to share the story of his father’s holocaust experience by creating a graphic novel of it, and from the looks of it, it’s been very successful. Telling a story through the form of a graphic novel allows the creator to deliver it in a unique way. We are able to understand the plot because of the language that is used along with the accompanying panels. In Maus , Spiegelman writes e...
Post a Comment
Read more

Walking Through Fire: "Sita's Ramayana"

By Anonymous
Ramayana stands among India's oldest epic poems, one of the two surviving stories dating as far back as the seventh century B.C. Unfortunately, its protagonist has not stood the test of time. The poem tells the story of Rama, an exiled prince whose wife, Sita, chooses to accompany him despite not facing the same punishment. When Sita is kidnapped, Rama rescues her more out of a sense of obligation than love, ultimately questioning his wife's virtue and casting her away through no fault of her own. Rama is upheld as the ideal man, husband, and king throughout his tale. Samhita Arni, the author of Sita's Ramayana , clearly thinks otherwise. Sita's Ramayana , as one might suspect, is a graphic novel retelling of the epic poem shared from Sita's point of view. The original poem leaves little room for the exploration of her character, treating her more as a blank slate meant to represent the ideal wife of the time. She merely exists to shape her husband's characte...
Post a Comment
Read more