Persepolis Essays (Examples)

Persepolis, a memoir, written in French as a graphic novel is a semi-humorous take on the author's experiences of growing up in revolutionary Iran.

Persepolis begins with the depiction of Marjane in 1980. She is 10 years old and part of a group of girls who are all wearing the veil. Almost hidden on the left hand side of the page, she is dour as are all the others who do not understand why they have to wear this veil. All complain that it is hot and some take off the veil and continue jumping rope without it.

In pre-Revolutionary Iran, Marjane had studied in a school that was sexually mixed. The "Cultural Revolution" closed all bilingual schools that were alleged to be manifestations of capitalism and so the schools became gender segregated. In 1980, Marjane had to transfer to an all-girls school.

Demonstrations occurred both for and against the…

Persepolis

Love of Country in Persepolis

The graphic novel Persepolis: The Story of Childhood offers a glimpse into the life of an expatriate of Iran, Marjane Satrapi. The work is detailed in its representation of the turmoil that was experienced by many people during the Islamic Revolution that took place from 1978-1979 and effected women disproportionately. Iran before the Islamic Revolution was notably progressive, with women and men able to mix in professional and educational settings and women had a conservative choice about dress and professional and personal development, after the Islamic revolution the nation was in turmoil and though as many if not more women supported the Islamic Revolution many challenges were faced. Some of these challenges are supported in Persepolis, such as the closing of Marjie's mixed gender secular school and the demand to wear the veil and for her to attend an all girls' school.

It is…

Persepolis is Marjane Satrapi's graphic novel depicting the impact of the Islamic Revolution on daily life in Iran. In particular, Satrapi comments on the effects of the Revolution on education and specifically the education of women. The opening scenes of the book depict the school mandating the veil for all females and banning bilingual education because it represents "capitalism" and European imperialism. Although Satrapi satirizes the occasion with good humor, the scene is filled with foreboding. Marjane's mother protested against the veil, her picture displayed in local newspapers. As a result, she dyed her hair and wore glasses so that she would not be recognized. Satrapi depicts the veil serves as an apt symbol of the government's putting blinders on its citizens. Cut off from valid sources of information, the Persian people receive a veiled version of reality. One of the themes in Persepolis is how the government spins the…

Marjane looks over at the iron on the ironing board and is forced to recognize the horror of war through a simple everyday object. (Satrapi, 54). She begins to imagine the many ways to torture people (Satrapi, 53) and eventually allows her religion to help her feel safe. Marjane's experience with traumatic events alters her identity with her society and with her God. Religion is what is familiar to Marjane, as she states that she was born with her religion (Satrapi, 6) and children desire that which is familiar to them. In the face of trauma, children seek out that which is familiar to them. In this case, the trauma strengthened Marjane's bond with her God. Through Persepolis, one can recognize that in many situations the religious bond with God is directly related to a loss of innocence.

Satrapi's story of a child caught in the middle of the Iranian…

Krik Krat & Persepolis

The Conflict of Culture

There are a plethora of similarities that exist between Marjane Satrapi's The Complete Perseopolis and Edwidge Danticat's "A all of Fire Rising," one of the short stories in her collection of tales known as Krik? Krak!. Each of these respective works revolves around cultural conflicts between the main characters and their surroundings. Also, the setting for both of these pieces of literature takes place in the background of a revolution. There are constant references in Danticat's story to the Haitian Revolution, while the essential premise of Perseopolis is the dramatic cultural changes that take place in Iran as a result of the Iranian Revolution. Conflicts that stem from the forced merging of cultures and values are at the forefront of each of these stories, and allows for much of the dramatic action that takes place within them. However, a detailed examination of…

Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

Persepolis is a book that tells the story of Marjane Satrapi and is entitled as the story of a childhood. The author of the book was born on the edge of the Caspian Sea in Iran and grew up in Tehran. During her stay in Tehran, Satrapi studied at the Lycee Francais and left for Vienna and later Strasbourg for studies in decorative arts. The book tells the story of her youth in Iran in the 1970s and 80s, especially with regards to life through the Islamic evolution and the Iraqi war. In telling the story about Satrapi's childhood, the book explains the author's once outrageous and ordinary childhood, which is also characterized with extraordinary, unimaginable, and loving family. Notably, the story of Marjane Satrapi in Persepolis contains two major revolutions with different reactions. The first revolution is regarding the overthrows of the Shah while the…

Gillian Sarofim

Prof. instead The Veil

In Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi uses the veil to represent the changes that occurred as a result of the Islamic Revolution in Iran. In Satrapi's young mind, the veil acts as the only material and symbolic reality aspect of the revolution. The story unfolds with condensing, yet loaded images. Satrapi uses the playful images of young girls as a way of foreshadowing her later thoughts of the changing times in Iran. Satrapi's feelings towards the veil are similarly contrasting. Her upbringing allows her to think freely, yet her surroundings force her to think a certain way about religion. The new Iranian government attempts to use the veil as a representation of modesty, however, Satrapi indicates that the veil truly represents a government's oppression on her people. Looking through a veil, for instance, means that one sees only a limited picture of reality, and one is…

The Miracle Worker. New York: Bantam, 1960.

ISBN: 0553247786 9780553247787, 122 pages, play. Appropriate for all audiences, intended primarily for adults but of interest to early adolescents and up. High critical appraise and winner of the Tony Award for Best Play in 1960, the year following the script's debut on Broadway.

This play is based on the autobiography of Helen Keller, focusing on the character of Helen's teacher Anne Sullivan and the struggle and ultimate triumph of this woman's struggle to teach Helen how to communicate and understand the world around her. Dramatic action must serve as a substitute for more direct textual exposition, making a reading of the play somewhat lackluster in comparison with viewing a full performance of the script. The characters are fully realized and highly compelling, however, and though the plot is generally well-known amongst most readers of a certain age level, the details and lifelike…

Injustice anywhere," King went on, "is a threat to justice everywhere."

As to the social and racial injustices King is speaking of, a bit of background into conditions in the South - and specifically, in Alabama - is worthy of some space in this paper. In fact, just a few years prior to the civil rights activism in Birmingham (that saw King arrested and placed in a jail), the lynching of African-Americans in Alabama was not uncommon. The New York Times (August 30, 1933) reported that two "Negroes" were found lynched near Birmingham on a Sunday morning, but the good news was "mob murders have declined"; indeed, the paper reported, "...in the last ten years there have only been four lynchings" in Alabama. And on July 26, 1947, The New York Times quoted the Tuskegee Institute's data that "six out of every seven potential lynchings have been prevented" over the…

But the girls can read the text from Lolita's point-of-view. They can appreciate her powerlessness, as they are powerless in the context of a state, held in the force of an oppressive regime even if the book is not explicitly about Iran.

Nafisi defends her choice of European classics because they uphold the integrity of the individual, and the individual was given scant appreciation in Tehran at the time. A pro-Revolutionary Iranian might have suggested an uplifting, dull theological text as appropriate reading for the girls. An anti-Iranian activist might have suggested a political tract against the regime should have been the focus of the group's secret reading.

By stressing that an individual is important outside of politics, and his or her inner life is worthy of creative and varied interpretation, Nafisi states that she was committing the most radical choice of texts of all. This is Nafisi would defend…

However, according to some views, "Mahmoody's story of being held hostage in Iran was considered to have great commercial potential and the movie rights were sold before the book was even begun." (McAlister, 162-163) Therefore both the content and the way it was written enabled a rather easy access of the reader to the message the book tried to convey.

On the other hand, Satrapi, a regular graphic artist for The New Yorker, chose to tell her story using the technique of the graphic novel, a type of novel which combines both writing and pictures. This technique is used in general in order to express ideas about issues that would otherwise lack attention from the wider public. Therefore, multicultural graphic novels "can create a bridge to ideas and stories that some young readers might never be interested in or otherwise encounter." (ilson, 32) From the writer's point-of-view, "Graphic novels are…

Men are the focal point in the sculpture, Darius and Xerxes Receiving Tribute. Darius is raised on a higher level than his subjects are. He appears taller than the others, even while sitting. There is a direct order in the status of the men who are coming to pay tribute to him. His most important guests are in front of the line. The least important guests are at the rear. He is holding his staff in his right hand, the sign of a ruler. Darius felt that he was all power and "...king of the earth" (Ancient Mesopotamia).

The Persians ordered men from conquered cities to bring gifts to the Persian ruler, the theme of the sculpture. This sculpture was found in the Apadana, one of the most impressive buildings in the area. The building is decorated with several depictions of nobles and others carrying gifts to the king. The…

This occurred in 330 BC, and Zoroaster's date would then be 588 BC, and this date we may take to refer to the initial success of his prophetic mission which consisted in the conversion of King Visht-spa when Zoroaster was forty years old. Since he is traditionally said to have lived seventy-seven years, we will not be far wrong in dating him at 628-551 BC. It seems also to be generally agreed that the Prophet's sphere of operation in which his message was proclaimed was ancient Chorasmia -- an area comprising, perhaps, what is now Persian Khorasan, estern Afghanistan, and the Turkmen Republic of the U.S.S.R. (Zaehner, R.C., 1961, 33)."

Ayala's science takes the mitochondrial Eve back even before what we know about Zoroastrianism, but we really have no accurate date of the monotheistic tradition as it arises out of Zoroastrianism, because there are no written artifacts that support its…

Consequences of these choices only compound his deep-seated insecurities. (Zushi)

Both Ben and Miko are Japanese-Americans, and their shared ethnic background impacts on their lives in significantly different ways. Miko is proactive and politicised -- she is the assistant organiser of a film festival showcasing Asian-American talent. Ben, meanwhile, is a depressive manager of a local cinema, seemingly content in his life of slow-burning frustration and -- not surprisingly -- covert masturbation.

Sexual stereotyping is at the heart of the story. The title itself is a reference to Ben's feeling of inadequacy in the trousers department (underneath the dust jacket, the book cover bears a life-size image of a ruler). At one point, Ben recalls a "stupid joke": "hat's the difference between Asian men and Caucasian men?" The punchline -- "the cauc" -- is both funny and deeply uncomfortable. "I actually heard a girl tell that joke in college! I…

They also counted with cavalry and carts.

However on thin passages or gorges, the Persian cavalry could not display its full power and their number superiority was blocked, since their spears were shorter than the Greek weapons. The narrow battlefield of the gorge forced them to fight almost in equal number with the Greek army, forcing them to retreat after two days of battle.

The Persian army achieved important victories: the Greek fleet was rejected on the Artemisium cape and, after the victory over Leonidas of Sparta and his 300 men on the gorge of Thermopylae, the news of the first Persian victories spread over the country and discouraged the Greek army that retreated from battle, bringing new victories for Xerxes's army. The Persians devastated Boeotia and the Attica, reaching Athens.

After the Thermopylae defeat, on August of 480 B.C., in Athens there was consternation. However, instead of surrendering, the…

Hamilton notes the biographies of Alexander often reflected the backgrounds of authors who wrote about him. For example, Sir William Tarn, a Scottish gentleman of the ritish imperial era, characterized Alexander as a chivalrous Greek gentleman with a missionary zeal to spread Greek civilization. In contrast, Fritz Schachermeyr, a German historian who had experienced the rise and fall of the Nazi Germany, described Alexander as a ruthless and cruel ruler, indulged "in deceit and treachery to gain his ends, as a 'Titanic' figure aiming at the conquest of the world."

oth Tarn and Schachermeyr are among the great modern historians of Alexander but even they could not escape personal biases.

The irony of Hamilton's book is that, although he is at pains in his discussion of the difficulty of writing about Alexander and is critical of biased historians, the book starts with a straightforward admission of a bias. Rejecting the…

Alexander saw himself as that philosopher-king who would install a new kind of cooperation and brotherhood with one or unified Greek culture, Hellenism, and speaking a common language, Greek (Smitha 1998). He intended that his subjects in the East would be reared and trained to become like the Greeks and Macedonians.

In consolidating his huge territory, Alexander founded cities, mostly named Alexandria, in suitable and well-paved locations with sufficient supply of water. His army veterans, young men, merchants, traders and scholars settled there, infused Greek culture and, through them, the Greek language widely flourished. Through his mighty victories and territorial control, Alexander thus spread Greek civilization and paved the way for the incoming Hellenistic kingdoms and the conquest of the Roman Empire (Microsoft 2004).

He also felt that trade would unite his empire more strongly and so he forced new commercial possibilities and made abylon the center of brisk world…

Ancient Kingdoms- Expansion and Empire Building

Ancient kingdoms and their expansion strategies were uniform throughout the ancient world. Persia, Rome, Athens and Sparta had expanded their kingdoms by means of conquests, wars and consolidation. The enlargement of kingdoms had but one purpose i.e. security as Thomas Hobbes notes: "If there is no power erected, or not great enough for our security, every man will and may lawfully rely on his own strength for caution against all other men" (99). Greece, Russia and all other major empires of the ancient world had their focus on just one thing, security which they sought through either conquests or consolidation with weaker nations.

It is strange but true that all major empires especially Sparta, Athens and Persia have histories that were interconnected. It was always believed both by the rulers and the ruled that mightier forces had the right to rule and for this…

Instead, while under false arrest and retreating from the Macedonians, Darius was killed by one of his subjects.

ecause the battle at Gaugamela marked the turning point in the battle between the Macedonians and the Achaemenids, it is clear that if Darius was to have been able to defeat Alexander and his troops, he would have needed to do so before the battle at Gaugamela. Therefore, it is important to look at the opportunities that Darius had to attack Alexander and his troops prior to that battle. Looking at those opportunities, it becomes clear that Darius' best chance to defeat Alexander's army would have been to attack Alexander before he had the chance to gain the support of the Greek city-states. To do that in the most successful manner, Darius would have needed to attack the armies of Parmenion and Attalus. This would have permitted Darius to defeat Alexander before…

.. Alexander would conquer the Persian Empire, including Anatolia, Syria, Phoenicia, Judea,

Gaza, Egypt, Bactria and Mesopotamia and extend the boundaries of his own empire as far as the Punjab.

In today's terms, Alexander would likely also be considered a practitioner and strong supporter of multiculturalism and diversity, since he allowed non-Greeks into his army, including its administration. This was/is considered Alexander's "policy of fusion" ("Alexander the Great"), and arguably a very early precursor of today's emphases on inclusion, in areas like the military and higher education.

But while Alexander's numerous military feats have all been recorded with the precision of the time, the reasons for Alexander's early death at Babylon remain unclear, even today. For example, according to the article "hat Killed Alexander the Great: Maybe Typhoid Fever (June 11, 1998): "Alexander died in 323 B.C. In Babylon at age 32 after conquering much of the civilized world that…

military place Zhou dynasty China? What social impact ? eference Book: A History World Societies,

Alexander

Essentially, Alexander the Great incurred the displeasure of his Macedon army during the battle of Gaugamela. This battle took place in the part of Iraq that is today known as Irbil. The reason that Alexander's soldiers were displeased with their leader is because after traversing through various parts of Asia and conquering it, Alexander's contingent eventually came upon Darius' forces in the midst of the night. Alexander's army was able to tell that it was the army of the mighty Persian king, whom Alexander had a profound respect for, due to the campfires that they were able to see faintly glowing in the distance within the darkness.

A minor dispute arose between Alexander and his troops because the former were inclined to attack the Persian king in the depths of the night, hoping that…

Persia became Iran

Iran, which is the name nowadays for its country, was formerly known as Persia. The two identities of present day Iran is associated both to the peak of power of pre-Islamic, Achaemenid Persia, as also to its Islamic origin situated both in the 7th century start of Islam in Iran via Arab invasion, and to its 16th century when Shiite Islam formally turned out the state religion of Iran. The country has always been acknowledged among its own people as Iran (land of the Aryans); even though for centuries it was pinpointed to as Persia (Pars or Fars, a provincial state in southern Iran) by the Europeans, mainly because of the writings of Greek historians. In 1935 the government mentioned that it should be called Iran, although in 1949 allowances were made for both names to be implemented. Persia turned out a powerful empire under the Cyrus…

Children's Literature

Picture Books

Allard, Harry and James Marshall. Miss Nelson Is Missing. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1977. Print.

Miss Nelson is a non-threatening instructor whose students take advantage of her gentle personality by misbehaving. One day Miss Nelson disappears and is replaced by an ill-tempered substitute, Miss Viola Swamp, who makes the children appreciate their good-natured teacher. The book is designed for primary and early elementary readers.

Beaumont, Karen. I Ain't Gonna Paint No More! Florida: Harcourt, Inc. 2005. Print.

A little boy has been caught and chastised for decorating his home with a box of paints. His mother takes the paint set away from him and tells him, "Ya ain't gonna paint no more!" He soon reacquires the box of paints and becomes busily engaged in painting himself from head to toe. Preschool children will enjoy this book.

Carle, Eric. The Very Hungry Caterpillar. New York: Collins Publishers.…

According to Bachhuber, the Myceaen Agean presence on the Uluburun ship pointed out an important connection between the Semetic and Aegean civilizations (Bachhuber). In addition to the Agean-Semetic connection, materials on the ship also came from Africa, including African woods like Ebony, Elephant tusks, and hippopotamus teeth, which were counted among the rarer items in the findings. Finally, tests of the raw copper found on the ship suggested that some of the material came from as far as Europe, especially Spain (University of Texas). This confirms that the trade routes in the Levant were not only as extensive as previously assumed, but a considerable degree further.

The implications about trade that can be drawn from the artifacts found on the Ulburun are not restricted to simple economics. Instead, the artifacts also allow for important social implications. According to the University of Texas, the wreck's anchors allowed scholars to assume that…

At the same time, the presentation of his work, the lives of the community in which he lived and the way in which he succeeded in forming a family must be relevant for the actual depiction of the historical background, the environment, and the customs of the time. For instance, the fact that he was given to marry the elder daughter of the ruler of the land he had chosen as his next home, Amunenshi, represented indeed an appreciation of his qualities and virtues as an Egyptian. Therefore, it can be said that the piece of writing is also an important source of history of the Near East.

Another important perspective of the story is the historical one which offers a view on the current situation of the time in Egypt. Therefore, the story focuses on the way in which king Sesostris was involved in political actions and maneuvers that…

The statement "Maybe that room was his home, his room and everything what left from it is a wall and a fly" made me think about how an intelligent young child must feel when something senseless like bombing changes their life. After reading your essay, I searched for more of Simic's poetry to read because you found a way to make his words make sense.

The same is true for Tadijanovic's poetry, because your essay pointed out so many interesting connections between his work and Simic's. By choosing to highlight Tadijanovic's beautiful poem "Evening Over the City," you showed how one man's memories of warfare and conflict in their childhood can differ from another. When you discussed the concept of nostalgia, I thought this observation was extremely accurate because only powerful emotions like this can inspire great poetry. Both Simic and Tadijanovic were affected deeply by nostalgia for their homelands,…

Speaking of the United States, for example, since 9/11, there has been an increased in intolerance regarding Muslims. This prejudice toward Muslims has also sparked increased intolerance for Christian people, as Christianity is the dominant religion in America and is the religion most often associated with American culture. 1492 is also the fabled year with the Spanish armada arrived on the shores of what we know now as the United States of America. Therefore this film is a strong choice as it is an intersection of the history of the country and the history of my family.

How we remember our world, national, and personal history is often closely related to the geography and nature of the spaces wherein we lived and migrated to. These are the connections that I see among the texts by Nabokov, Bishop, and "The Passion of Joshua the Jew." These issues from history continue to…