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  • Published: 1 September 2006
  • ISBN: 9780224080392
  • Imprint: Jonathan Cape
  • Format: Trade Paperback
  • Pages: 352
  • RRP: $49.99
Categories:

Persepolis I & II




Now in one volume, both parts of Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi's brilliant memoir-in-comic-strips about growing up in Iran during and after the Islamic revolution.

Wise, often funny, sometimes heartbreaking, Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood tells the story of Marjane Satrapi's life in Tehran from the ages of six to fourteen, years that saw the overthrow of the Shah's regime, the triumph of the Islamic Revolution and the devastating effects of war with Iraq. The intelligent and outspoken child of radical Marxists, and the great-grandaughter of Iran's last emperor, Satrapi bears witness to a childhood uniquely entwined with the history of her country. Persepolis paints an unforgettable portrait of daily life in Iran and of the bewildering contradictions between home life and public life. Amidst the tragedy, Marjane's child's eye view adds immediacy and humour, and her story of a childhood at once outrageous and ordinary, beset by the unthinkable and yet buffered by an extraordinary and loving family, is immensely moving. It is also very beautiful; Satrapi's drawings have the power of the very best woodcuts.

Persepolis ends on a cliffhanger in 1984, just as fourteen-year-old Marjane is leaving behind her home in Tehran, escaping fundamentalism and the war with Iraq to begin a new life in the West. In Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return we follow our young, intrepid heroine through the next eight years of her life: an eye-opening and sometimes lonely four years of high school in Vienna, followed by a supremely educational and heartwrenching four years back home in Iran. Just as funny and heartbreaking as its predecessor - with perhaps an even greater sense of the ridiculous inspired by life in a fundamentalist state - Persepolis 2 is also as clear-eyed and searing in its condemnation of fundamentalism and its cost to the human spirit. In its depiction of the universal trials of adolescent life and growing into adulthood - here compounded by being an outsider both abroad and at home, and by living in a state where you have no right to show your hair, wear make-up, run in public, date, or question authority - it's raw, honest, and incredibly illuminating.

  • Published: 1 September 2006
  • ISBN: 9780224080392
  • Imprint: Jonathan Cape
  • Format: Trade Paperback
  • Pages: 352
  • RRP: $49.99
Categories:

About the author

Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi was born in 1969 in Rasht, Iran. She now lives in Paris where she is a regular contributor to magazines and newspapers throughout the world, including the New Yorker and the New York Times. She is the author of several children's books, as well as the critically acclaimed and internationally bestselling memoir Persepolis, which has been translated into twelve languages, and was awarded the first Fernando Bueso Blanco Peace Prize in Spain. Her other books include Embroideries and Chicken With Plums.

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Praise for Persepolis I & II

As Iran enters another important period of change...I think this is particularly good time to pick up Persepolis. Satrapi's deceptively simple, almost whimsical drawings belie the seriousness and rich complexity of her story - but its also very funny too

Emma Watson, Our Shared Shelf

A revelation...you will remember it for a very long time

Mark Haddon

Persepolis is a stylish, clever and moving weapon of mass destruction

David Jenkins, Sunday Telegraph

The magic of Marjane Satrapi's work is that it can condense a whole country's tragedy into one poignant, funny scene after another

Natasha Walter, Independent on Sunday

I cannot praise enough Marjane Satrapi's moving account of growing up as a spirited young girl in revolutionary and war-time Iran. Persepolis is disarming and often humorous but ultimately it is shattering

Joe Sacco

A tour de force to rival Maus

The Times

An adult and difficult story but [accompanied by] very simple black and white illustrations, comic book style, and it is exceptionally powerful...show the amazing power and depth that can come from a literary story shown through words and images

Ink Pellet

The magic of Marjane Satrapi's work is that it can condense a whole country's tragedy into one poignant, funny scene after another.

Natasha Walter, Independent on Sunday

Persepolis is a stylish, clever and moving weapon of mass destruction.

David Jenkins, Sunday Telegraph

I cannot praise enough Marjane Satrapi's moving account of growing up as a spirited young girl in revolutionary and war-time Iran. Persepolis is disarming and often humorous but ultimately it is shattering.

Joe Sacco

Marjane Satrapi's books are a revelation. They're funny, they're sad, they're hugely readable. Most importantly, they remind you that the media sometimes tell you the facts but rarely tell you the truth. In one afternoon Persepolis will teach you more about Iran, about being an outsider, about being human, than you could learn from a thousand hours of television documentaries and newspaper articles. And you will remember it for a very long time.

Mark Haddon