Customer Reviews
As good as they say - By: Paul Kirby, 12 Aug 2008 
Currently very hyped but deservedly so. Wonderfully personal, oftenin touching & tragic ways. A comic without caricatures, Persepolis is, without hyperbole, a modern classic. Politically astute & subtle, noone emerges clean from the various machinations that have besieged Iranin the last decades, which is not to say that Satrapi refuses allegiances. On the contrary, the themes of political discovery & commitment that form a major subtheme only reinforce the Marxist-flavoured analyses of her father, & her implicit seconding of them. The eventual political tone is robustly anti-authoritarian - more like the Bakunin recommended to a young Sartrapi by a poser punk that she may like to think. Technically, the economies of line & shade are accomplished, as is the use of dialogue & gesture. Very much recommended. It may even be better than Maus.
Wonderful story and instructive over recent history of Iran seen through a child's eyes - By: B. Yeoh, 29 Jul 2008 This is a wonderful story through pictures of Marjane's childhood. It shows Iran during the revolution & after through Marjane's eyes. I expect if you are Iranian then a lot of this recent history is known to you & perhaps Marjane's individual story may not accord with yours as one reviewer suggests), however for many of us outside of Iranian society it gives a glimpsein to the life, dreams, hopes & struggles of the people of Iran, over the last 50 years.
There is a great deal of hopein the book & Marjane doesn't shy away from the difficulties, she & her family had - but she expresses the ideas of hope & the feelings of loss & disappointment from a singularly fascinating point of view. It also makes me think, I could have done with such a formidable & gentle grandmother around, when I was growing up!
The drawings are characterful & expressive. I believe the book translates to film well & if you've only seen the film, I would recommend going back to the book as a way of absorbing the story at a slower pace.
Highly recommended.
A Joy A Total Joy - By: Laura Daly, 15 Jul 2008 The Complete PersepolisThis is the first graphic novel I have ever read & I have to say I totally loved it. It is a wonderful account of an acient civilization & an itelligent people who had to life though pointless wars, religous nuts who I would consider to be hypocritices. The comic strip adds so much & is very humourous at times. You can not help but like the author, her parents or her grandmother. You also can not help feeling the intelligence of these people & the sadness sorounding their country. The author's journey into Europe is both sad & enlightening. This book is not one you can afford to miss.
wait its bilingual -english and french versions -both great - By: Dr. U. L. Khawaja, 01 May 2008 marjane ,music ,men & marijuana
the privileged child of a pro communist teheran family tells her somewhat hedonistic & always veracious adventuresin the backdrop of a war & revolution,the travesty becomes reality as she proceeds to her personal predicament ,a girl's transition to a womanin the context of preserving her bosom with jasmine flowers is both poetic & filled with pathos as she is destroyed almost by, a perfunctory western culture of drug & hard metal,her contempt of religious authority is only equalled by the patronising condescension of her western peers with their pseudo intellectual gibberish & selfishness,
yet she gives a horrific account of the terrible war wrought upon a newly freed iran by the american ally saddam ,the bilateral arming of the 2 oil rich nations by west,resultingin an unforgivable massacre is described appropriately .
the political comment even goes to claim the revolution could have donned another mantle if a weak iran had not been targeted by iraq at america's behest.
the coming of agein a french viennese school is a satire on the artifice & hypocrisy of the western claims to civilization ,the racial patronising as an iranian & her sexual coming of age with european men who use her as a portal to discover their homosexuality & later to buy cannabis is dark humour but pathetically predatory .
she wins ultimately as she discovers her intuitive strength as a woman who needs a man not for security but intellectual consumption ,her sojourn to paris after her obligatory marriagein iran is a liberation not from a regime ,which are all the samein their hierarchy & machiavellian political antics,but self-discovery.
she finds liberty with her wise granny who teaches that the only uglinessin the world is a lie & it is refreshing to see her critique of the hypocrisy of the attires assigned to male & women studentsin tehran university.
the movie is a poetic blend of verisimilitude & monochrome images juxtaposed with colour occassionally & always spellbinding to watch .
it spares no one -the bearded iranian revolutionaries ,the hypocrisy of catholic nuns -the predatory sex drug culture of the west or the political games of the superpowers which treat people as fodder for missiles .
but its inherent strength for me liesin a honest account of a disillusioned,spirited woman who becomes content when she is true to herself, not listening to bootlegged iron maiden & guzzling home-made wine.
her pridein being iranian is the key to understanding a personal account which is neither a mockery of mullahs nor a celebration of female emancipation ,but rather a search for your own truth .
marjane means a precious gemin farsi & persepolis was the ancient persian capital torched to ashes by alexander -the metaphor for the bombing of modern iran by western bombs is complete -time comes full circle.
the movie might be black & white but the content is so rich & diverse it needs no color ,an ingenious invention for a tired medium.
i will recommend multiple viewings for this dvdin french & english both as catherine deneuve & chiara have dubbed the brilliant black & white visuals .
love to see the making of as well -and marjanes tehran home will be a great storyin a special edition.
usman khawaja
it is an amazing autobiography.... - By: Mr. M. MOFIDI-NEYESTANAK, 20 Mar 2008 
the book depict many aspects of social history of Iran since 30-40 years ago, however, many issues explainedin the book, despite they are right, can not be generalised for whole people...and I think the readers might understand that the book is actually an autobiography...a very impressive one of course...I found it amazing ....
