Writer/Artist: Marjane Satrapi.
Publisher: Pantheon Books (ISBN 0-375-42230-7)
"There was a huge line. Lots of people were leaving the country. Especially young boys. Considered future soldiers, they were forbidden to leave the country after they turned thirteen.”
"You'll see. Everything will be ok. Don't cry. Think of your future. Europe awaits you."
"As soon as you get to Vienna, go and eat a sachertorte. It's the most delicious chocolate cake."
"And in six months we'll come and see you."
What I had feared was true. Maybe they'd come to visit, but we'd never live together again."
Just as I hit my teens, a classmate told me his mother and father had just fled Iran. Neither History nor Geography were high my school's agenda (1½ hours of History, ½ hour of Geography versus 8 hours of Latin and 4 hours of Greek - so yeah, I did know what I was typing for that LONEWOLF review, but I'm buggered if I know where Luxembourg is). All I knew at that point was that the Shah - I guessed he was some Persian form of king - was about to be deposed, and life for westerners - and in particular my friend and his parents - would have become very dangerous there. I knew nothing about the country's previous history, I knew nothing of its current politics, and it never occurred to me to think about the indigenous population's plight. A popular revolution must at least be to their benefit, surely?
Marjane was nine years old at the time. After years of living as Marxists under the original Shah's reign, ushered back in by the west after his son nationalised the oil industry, her family also thought the revolution was going to liberate the country.
They were wrong.
Comparisons to Spiegelman's MAUS have inevitably gathered swiftly around PERSEPOLIS, nor are they unjustified. The visual style is simple and figurative for maximum empathy with a young Satrapi's perspective, the absence of tone leaves the black to enhance mood, or, in the clothing, a muted individuality before the Islamic revolution, and the imposition of stricter conformity afterwards. And, as with MAUS, what might initially seem a bleak or unengaging subject is made compelling by the reader's learning curve being shared by the author - in this case a particularly endearing and affectionate one. For precocious as she may be, Marjane here is still a child - exuberant, vulnerable and antagonistic - and the shades of grey, not instinctively seen, need to be shown to her by her parents. Indeed the power of this book comes from the overwhelming sense of family - hers and her friends' - under the crushing pressure of two successively ruthless political states, then a devastating war with Iraq.
That this is autobiography is the key to the book's success, to its accessibility and vitality. Overwhelmingly episodical in nature, Satrapi leads you through a daily reality full of public repression (with patrolling groups or troops of both sexes, of whom Marjane nearly funs afoul whilst wearing a pair of forbidden trainers - and we've seen the potential consequences), private acts of rebellion (while the borders are still briefly open, her parents journey to Turkey, determined to bring Marjane back a poster of Kim Wilde and Iron Maiden; her mother sews it into her Father's coat lining to get it past the authorities - he looks comically stiff, but they just get away with it!), very real risk (when they are almost caught with alcohol in the house, saved at the last moment by her grandmother's quick thinking), and, unbelievably, moments of pride, love and joy.
This is an education. It is, as Sacco concludes, ultimately "shattering". Really, how could it be otherwise? And it is also an "important" work, but it is neither difficult nor didactic nor dull. It is a testament to this work that I left it full of love and admiration for Satrapi's stoical, passionate and beautiful parents, with a very real sense of all their personalities, and with a desperate thirst to know what happened next. And it's about time I understood exactly why my childhood friend's family left when they did, and what happened to those left behind.
I think I've found my book of the year. And it's only May.
Visit Page45 Online
What did you think of this book?
Have your say at the Line of Fire Forum!