ipl-logo

Persepolis Influences

525 Words3 Pages

Growing up, young people are exposed to varying influences. How adolescents construe these messages affects their personality greatly. In the graphic novel Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, Marjane is exposed to a multitude of influences throughout her childhood. Marjane’s story pertains to growing up during the Islamic Revolution of Iran, and it applies to using all of the messages she is given to shape her personality and political views. Marjane’s parents oppose a harsh leader called the Shah; when the Shah loses power, the even more brutal government of Islam takes over Iran. As a child and young woman, Marjane uses her parents as a primary source of information and doesn’t allow the oppressive Islamic Regime to influence her. A major influence on Marji is …show more content…

For example, when Marji is with a friend who’s mother told her that her father is on a trip, Marji assumes that the right thing to do is tell her friend the likely truth -- that her father is dead. After she does this, her mother scolds her. Marji mumbles “Nobody will accept the truth.” (pg 48) Marji believes that her parents would be proud of her for telling the truth, but instead they scold her because children her age are too young to understand that their parents are imprisoned and killed by the government.
Marji’s parents also influence her by swaying her political beliefs. One way her parents influence her is by buying her books that support communistic beliefs. Marji explains “To enlighten me they brought books. I knew everything about Fidel Castro…” (pg 12). In addition, Marji idolizes them; “Don’t you think I look like Che Guevara? Maybe I’ll be even better as Fidel Castro!” (pg 18). Marji’s parents demonstrate a passion to make Marji side against the Shah. Marji

Show More
Related
482 Words | 2 Pages

Marjane parents often attended political protest and they supported the revolutionaries when they had a chance. Her uncle Anoosh fled to the U.S.S.R because the Iranian authority believed t he was a spy. Later she got close to her uncle and he was executed and she was very devastated. Marjane at a young age wanted to fix community inequalities and make the world a better place so the elder would not suffer. Although it is hard for her to do that because the bombs falling on Tehran and killing her friends and family.

Read More
1136 Words | 5 Pages

Getting through a war is hard enough and maintaining your childhood at the same time is not an easy concept for anyone to do. Marji hears her parents talking about the revolution and instead of just being the average teenager and not caring she goes into reading books to figure out information. Figuring out what is going on within her society and the world is a clear characteristic of coming of age because at that age all kids care about is toys. After getting yelling at Marji for bullying her mother points out the ignorance that the other kids: “My God! He repeats what they tell him” (Satrapi 46).

Read More
1439 Words | 6 Pages

It’s written on the first page of our schoolbook’ [said Marjane]” (Satrapi 19). Marjane’s perspective before imperialism is shown in this quote, and here the reader can see how Marjane is not yet ready to speak out against what she is told to believe.

Read More
895 Words | 4 Pages

Again, considering her age, Marjane didn’t understand the concept of war; bombings, explosions, and fatalities. As she grew older, she started to research more to understand exactly what was going on around her. “I read all the books I could” (Satrapi 32). As she does more research and grows older, she grasps more of an understanding and becomes more politically and socially aware. Her perspective then begins to change more and more as she understands the difficult surroundings she 's living in.

Read More
1216 Words | 5 Pages

Family, government, and religion shaped the development of Marji’s rebellious nature and her ability to question life by presenting unique obstacles

Read More
182 Words | 1 Pages

When Marji come back from the trip with her parents, and learn that they at war she shows strong patriotism toward her country. She immediately became furious because it was the second invasion by the Arabs in 1400 years. Marji says, “I was ready to defend my country against these Arabs who keep attacking us” (79). As Marji put on her soldier hat, she senses her country is in need of help she suddenly develop the envy to show support. Without doubt Marijane express how she cares about for her country, and wants to stand and defend no matter what.

Read More
555 Words | 3 Pages

Some people might say, that her parents are not creating a particularly safe environment, because if the government were to discern their western actions, Marijis family would be punished for going against the extremists values, yet this is incorrect because her parents are upbringing Mariji to be a respectful and intelligent woman within western values.

Read More
1263 Words | 6 Pages

Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi is a graphic memoir that reveals the life of a woman growing up in pre-revolution and post-revolution Iran, as well as her experiences in Western countries. In this book, Marjane recalls and highlights historical events that affect her life during her upbringing in Iran. These include the oppression of the Shah, along with the rise and effects of the regime. These events are integrated into Persepolis in order to showcase their effects on Marjane and the other citizens of her country. These events’ inclusion are important due to the context and understanding that they grant readers unfamiliar with the text.

Read More
835 Words | 4 Pages

She starts to fuse her views of the revolution to her religious ideology. “ It was funny to see how much Marx and God looked like each other. Though Marx’s hair was a bit curlier”(13). In the quote, Marjane is merging her perspective of her ministerial to her version of a dictative being. She isn’t doing this on purpose, the effect of the war is causing Marji to see people of a bad nature in a good light, she reads books like the Dialectic Materialism which stands in a biased viewpoint.

Read More
1059 Words | 5 Pages

Marjane’s, and most Iranian women at the time, headscarf shows their oppression during the revolution. Marjane’s family is a part of the revolution, and because of this Marjane becomes very educated about the revolution. Marjane’s father is constantly attending protests, and her mother was even photographed at a protest. Her Uncle Anoosh was one of the original revolutionaries for Iran, and flees from Iran to the Soviet Union. He returns to Iran later in the novel, and educates Marjane about the revolutions

Read More
458 Words | 2 Pages

Persepolis is a graphic novel written by Marjane Satrapi about her personal experience during the Iranian Revolution. She writes of her early childhood and how, at the age of ten, she wished to become a religious prophet. Satrapi was born religious and wanted to represent her religion in positive ways. When explaining what she desired to become, she states that she wants to be “justice, love, and the wrath of God all in one”(Satrapi 9). This statement is paired with an accompanying comic panel.

Read More
570 Words | 3 Pages

In this chapter Marjane’s parent had just gotten back from their trip with all their smuggled goodies for Marjane. The fourth panel on page 132 depicts Marjane walking down the street in her denim jacket singing about kids in America. Not only does her jacket and neck scarf oppose the Islamic regime but her singing cheerfully about kids in America does as well. In the background you can see angry adults yelling and pointing at her most likely because of the casual clothes she is wearing. This demonstrates opposition to the regime because it shows her going against laws in her own free will to show what she loves.

Read More
1310 Words | 6 Pages

Have you ever heard two people having a discussion about a topic, but they have different opinions? Acknowledging the fact that people could have different opinions based on their own perspectives is very important. In Persepolis, Marjane writes as her 10 year old self, sharing what she experienced in Iran, while they were in the middle of a revolution. Throughout the book, she gets older and her perspective changes multiple times over several different topics. Marjane Satrapi’s perspective affects her presentation of imperialism, religion and loss of innocence.

Read More
923 Words | 4 Pages

Her loss of innocence is also contributed to by the government, with them killing Uncle Anoosh, which is a cause of nationalism by the Islamic State to kill the communists. Nationalism also negatively affects Marjane because of the Guardians of the Revolution. They relentlessly torment her, in an attempt to remove the Western influence from her. In summary, nationalism completely and utterly destroys Marjane’s childhood innocence, and is one of the major reasons why Marjane is the way she is today. In essence, this picture conveys social class through showing different styles of hats.

Read More
748 Words | 3 Pages

This proves that Marjane’s perspective manipulates her presentation of her social class. As well as imperialism and social class, there is also the theme of gender roles within a society. The photograph at left shows gender roles from the view of a 1st world country where the stay at home mother purely takes care of the kids and cooks/cleans for the family, meanwhile the father works and makes money for the household. Additionally, Marjane’s perspective with gender roles is demonstrated in the dialogue as Marjane says, “I am the last prophet,” and then the men question, “A woman?” (Satrapi 6).

Read More

More about Persepolis Influences

Related Topics

Open Document