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While writing this blog, I won't even pretend like I have any authority on Iran, its past, present, or future (nor is anyone expecting me to), and don't want to seem ignorant. My Baltimore City public school education barely even taught us our own history. But I also don't want to sugarcoat my thoughts or feelings while reading the text, so go easy on me.

I must say that I've known about Persepolis for quite some time, but was never moved to actually read it. Why? Who even knows. I think part of the reason is my insanely limited knowledge on life and culture in Iran, and the entire Middle East, for that matter, and thought it would expect me to already have an advanced understanding of the complex history of each country.

I was wrong.

Still, I was left with more questions than answers in my initial read, and it took me an hour to get through the first 20 pages of the book because I kept looking up her references, even if I didn't need to. Case in point, the first sentence in her intro was loaded with terms of civilizations and nations I'd taken for granted. Indo-European, namely. I also kept referring back to the introduction to make sure I had the nation's leaders right. What I appreciated about Satrapi is her essentially laying out the history through the panels, using her family as a platform to tell the story of the revolution, their war with Iraq, and how it affected the people of Iran. Never before had I witnessed such a (hopefully) honest tale and revealing, pretty much in my life.

Living in the US has tainted my understanding of the Middle East even before I could shape an opinion of what I thought. Needless to say, it was refreshing to see an anti-capitalist perspective beam from the pages, from the adults down to the children. It pretty much turned on my head whatever I thought I knew, which came out of Bush's mouth (uggghhhhhh). Pages 12-13 exhibit this...she lays out Fidel, the children of Palestine, the Vietnamese victims in the war against the US, Marx and Descartes, all on one page. I'm slightly surprised this book is as widespread in the US as it is, given how quickly some select dumbass conservatives can take its intention completely out of context.

Satrapi starts the story from the Islamic Revolution, and how the government essentially came in and coerced, with violence, its entire population to switch up their culture. She displays this through the veiling of women, the most notable immediate difference. Her family is down with the overthrowing of The Shah, but against the imposition of repression. I was confused at first, because the political prisoners were released after the Shah was exiled, but later targeted themselves? Then I realized it was because these former prisoners were Communist, and thusly, not in line with the customs of the revolution.

Some of my initial questions still include:
--What is Iran's relationship to France, and why was there a nonsecular school there prior to the Islamic Revolution?
--Was the Islamic Revolution Britain's response to Reza Shah (pg. 21), when the prime minister mentioned, "A vast country like yours needs a holy symbol"? Granted, this took place several decades before, but I wondered if their hunger for oil meant they established a 30 year plan or something?
--Who is the "God" figure that Marji talks to as a child, if her family was kindasorta religious? Was it the god of Islam, or just...the symbol of a god?
--Why exactly was the area of Kansas untouched by the Islamic regime? Why was it allowed to fluorish, in its "decadence"? 

BIG QUESTIONS:
--What do folks think of the prevalence of (?) <<--- (it was part why I titled my blog that). Throughout the book, there are times when folks go into political debates, or simply, a recap of the day. There is information coming in from everywhere, and as usual, every figure thinks they are right. Usually, it's hovering over the heads of children. They're inundated with so much information, they don't know what to believe. Parents dealt with it by always saying, "she/he's a child who repeats what she/he hear[s]", which is interesting, because they learn from these multiple perspectives, but are still under the wings of their parents' philosophies. This question mark appears not just for children, but in multiple situations, and spoke to the non-absoluteness of opinion and thought, how everything is subjective. This is awesome. In the US, our news appears to be objective and absolute, but is always flawed. People unfortunately are trained to believe what they hear at face value, when there should be HUGE question marks flying everywhere like in Persepolis.

--What do folks think of Satrapi's decision to switch interchangeably from a black to a white background throughout the text? It appears that the background is black when tragedy strikes, but not always. Except for that one panel on 142, which is entirely black, after Baba-Levy's house is bombed. Clearly, Marji is a fighter, and comes from a family of such, and the tragedy of war is immense, so immense that folks have learned internal and external survival skills, which are summed up in this mentality: "of course they mean something to me. But we're still living." (pg. 94)

It's also interesting how she used her truly traumatic experiences to relate with the anarchist punk white kids when she moved to Vienna. I damn near collapsed when this happened on page 167:

Julie: This is Marjane. She's Iranian. She's known war.
Momo: WAR?
Marji: Delighted!
Momo: You've already seen lots of dead people?
Marji: Um...a few.
Momo: COOL!

(Sorry, I had to do all caps, bc that's exactly how I heard him say it...)

AIN'T NOTHIN COOL ABOUT WAR. I get that he "was fascinated by death", as many anarchopunks seem to be so ready to fight the revolution but don't know the half. Anyways. Off the rant. 

So much happens throughout these pages that it's difficult to maintain a grasp on it all. But, that was just the initial education I needed. Still, so many more questions remain, so many more connections to make, so much more to learn. This book ROCKS, and I can't wait to hear what class is like tomorrow!

-Uni