A book for everyone
“A diamond is forever”, the memorable tagline for De Beers’ Diamonds may have been the most celebrated advertising slogan during the past few decades. If we describe the literary classics and the philosophical treatises as the lasting glittering diamonds, then the graphic novels like Persepolis might be the popular short-lived metallic ornaments which would gather rust easily. I had to acknowledge that, in most people’s eyes, graphic novels are less serious than those literary and philosophical masterpieces of high literature value, but does it really mean that the college students should always focus on serious literature but not graphic novels like Persepolis? After reading Persepolis, I believe the answer is no.
Choosing a book for the entire class is different from choosing a book for some particular students. “A literary classic or a seminal philosophical treatise such as Plato’s Republic” , suggested by a critic Charlotte Allen, may be suitable for students who have interest in Philosophy, but to other students interested in other areas of the sciences and humanities, this kind of book may seem more or less boring. However, as the only summer reading material for this year’s first-year class, Persepolis, according to a book review on a website called “ya reviews”, “has something for everyone” .
For most non-Arabian students and especially Western students, Persepolis presents them a truer and more colorful image of Iran where exist not only “fundamentalism, fanaticism, and terrorism” but also tremendous suffering Iranians had borne during the Iran-Iraq War, the relentless pursuit of freedom under the centralization mode of governance and the great affection among members in ordinary families.
For international students like me, the writer’s four-year studying experience in Austria arouses echo in their hearts. When Marjane first arrives in Austria, everything is so new and so exciting. She buys lots of things that can’t be found in Iran and begins to create a circle of friends with difficulties. She makes friends with people who have almost nothing in common with her and realizes the dramatic Eastern-Western culture differences when her friend, Julie, shows her disrespectful attitude to her mother and shows off her crazy sexuality to Marjane. Despite the intense culture shock she felt, Marjane does all she can to please her friends, even it is inappropriate to do so. But as she wrote in her novel, “the harder I tried to assimilate, the more I had the feeling that I was distancing myself from my culture, betraying my parents and my origins, that I was playing a game by somebody else’s rules” , she doesn’t know who she really is. The loneliness, degradation, inferiority, culture shock and loss of identity are never unfamiliar to lots of international students. The real and vivid description makes her experience very convincing and touching.
For female students, the depiction of a country with prevailing male chauvinism in Persepolis is undoubtedly frightening and unpleasant. Thankfully, the protagonist Marjane is not a cricket in the box but a brave girl who finally moves to France to enjoy extensive democracy and freedom struggles for individuality. However, we should see that the solution to creating an independent identity for Iranian women is still not satisfying. The book inspires all the women-Iranian or not- to fight for women rights, helping create more choices of life for Iranian women and make conformity not the fate that they are resigned to.
Despite its abundant connotations, Persepolis’s graphical technique of expression makes it a fine work. Graphic novel has more consistency than illustrated book and is more stagnant than animation is. Thus, it has both relatively consecutive tempo and right amount of variation. My emotions alternate wildly between exuberant mood and overwhelming sorrow with the evolution of the story which moves me much in laughter and tears.
Persepolis is more than a graphic novel. Compared with relatively unintelligible literary classic and somewhat dull philosophical treatise, Persepolis digs out some of the most basic things of human nature and therefore makes itself appeal to both refined and popular tastes.
Choosing a book for the entire class is different from choosing a book for some particular students. “A literary classic or a seminal philosophical treatise such as Plato’s Republic” , suggested by a critic Charlotte Allen, may be suitable for students who have interest in Philosophy, but to other students interested in other areas of the sciences and humanities, this kind of book may seem more or less boring. However, as the only summer reading material for this year’s first-year class, Persepolis, according to a book review on a website called “ya reviews”, “has something for everyone” .
For most non-Arabian students and especially Western students, Persepolis presents them a truer and more colorful image of Iran where exist not only “fundamentalism, fanaticism, and terrorism” but also tremendous suffering Iranians had borne during the Iran-Iraq War, the relentless pursuit of freedom under the centralization mode of governance and the great affection among members in ordinary families.
For international students like me, the writer’s four-year studying experience in Austria arouses echo in their hearts. When Marjane first arrives in Austria, everything is so new and so exciting. She buys lots of things that can’t be found in Iran and begins to create a circle of friends with difficulties. She makes friends with people who have almost nothing in common with her and realizes the dramatic Eastern-Western culture differences when her friend, Julie, shows her disrespectful attitude to her mother and shows off her crazy sexuality to Marjane. Despite the intense culture shock she felt, Marjane does all she can to please her friends, even it is inappropriate to do so. But as she wrote in her novel, “the harder I tried to assimilate, the more I had the feeling that I was distancing myself from my culture, betraying my parents and my origins, that I was playing a game by somebody else’s rules” , she doesn’t know who she really is. The loneliness, degradation, inferiority, culture shock and loss of identity are never unfamiliar to lots of international students. The real and vivid description makes her experience very convincing and touching.
For female students, the depiction of a country with prevailing male chauvinism in Persepolis is undoubtedly frightening and unpleasant. Thankfully, the protagonist Marjane is not a cricket in the box but a brave girl who finally moves to France to enjoy extensive democracy and freedom struggles for individuality. However, we should see that the solution to creating an independent identity for Iranian women is still not satisfying. The book inspires all the women-Iranian or not- to fight for women rights, helping create more choices of life for Iranian women and make conformity not the fate that they are resigned to.
Despite its abundant connotations, Persepolis’s graphical technique of expression makes it a fine work. Graphic novel has more consistency than illustrated book and is more stagnant than animation is. Thus, it has both relatively consecutive tempo and right amount of variation. My emotions alternate wildly between exuberant mood and overwhelming sorrow with the evolution of the story which moves me much in laughter and tears.
Persepolis is more than a graphic novel. Compared with relatively unintelligible literary classic and somewhat dull philosophical treatise, Persepolis digs out some of the most basic things of human nature and therefore makes itself appeal to both refined and popular tastes.
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