Line Illuminator- Habibeh Marron

Habibeh Marron 

Line Illuminator 

Persepolis 

By Marjane Satrapi 

Rotation #4 

Introduction & pages 3-62 

So far I find Persepolis a really interesting book. I think very few of us have heard about the Islamic Revolution that was as hard as any other revolution. The graphic novel is full of amazing golden lines. Even though the book is written from a child point of view it uses strong words and critical thinking questions (since it is a ten-year-old girl and is always questioning everything). I´m so into the book by now that I can wait to learn more about the Islamic Revolution. But first I want to tell you some lines I found interesting in the book, hoping that you can tell what do you think about them or add some more. 

“At one of the demonstrations, a german journalist took a photo of my mother.... her photo was published in all European newspapers and even in one magazine in Iran. My mother was really scared... She dyed her hair, and wore glasses for a long time“ (Satrapi 5)  This tells me how hard those times were. I can make a little connection here with Maus the Jews had to be hidden every time. In this case Marjane´s mom was “embarrassed“ of what she has done. The author doesn´t live clear if demonstrating against the government was good or bad, it was just created a bad image to the individual that committed it. Being in every newspaper was a reason to be hidden, since you are being spotted. It seems like the people in this country had to be hidden and repressed if they wanted to be alive. So was like this since the end of the revolution, but still some other thing (I´m not sure what) is going to happen. Let´s keep reading to find out. 

(Women demonstrating against the veil in 1979)

(Source)    

“At the beginning of the revolution, in 1978, my maid fell in love with the guy next door...After a few visits he fell in love with her too. The story got to my father who decided to clarify the situation. “Okay let´s get this straight to the point: I know that Mehri pretends she is my daughter. In reality she is my maid“. “Really?“. “Do you want to continue seeing her?“. “Ehh...“ (Satrapi 36-37) This one tells me that during the Revolution or even before in Iran the social class was define by birth. This reminds me of the Middle Ages where you could´t change your social class. It was so extremist that a maid wasn´t able to be with the guy that lived next door to the family she work for, even though they liked each other. It is also really quirky that the guy was a little bit disgusted about finding out the girl he was dating was a maid. This is also called racism. In the end of page 37 Marjane says something really clever: “We weren´t in the same social class but a least we were in the same bed“ (Satrapi). This for me is a metaphor meaning that the girl found rare and unfair that they couldn´t be together because of her social class. Some pages ahead this image appear. 

This is Marjane mom slapping Mehri (the maid) and Marjane in the face. For me is unfair and rude the way she could slap her maid but she couldn´t let her see the guy next door. In these times the people weren´t just afraid and angry they were unreasonable too.