Fresh Mind

Hillary Chute’s The Texture of Retracing in Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis dissects the genre of graphic narrative used by Satrapi. She analyzes the elements, the style, and the juxtaposition of comic books that made Persepolis effective. Violence is depicted as ordinary from a child’s imagination through the minimalist style. Although the illustration was simple, Chute explains how it shows the ‘power of the radically inadequate’. It then questions the realistic representation of violence and how it has been normalized. Satrapi’s depiction of violence is different from mainstream media. She argues that…read more

I just finished reading Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi for my literature class. This is a graphic narrative of the author’s childhood experience in Iran during and after the Islamic revolution. What drew me to the book is the protagonist’s perspective of the horrific events and the way it was told. What struck me the most, however, is the quote: “To Die A Martyr Is To Inject Blood Into The Veins Of Society.” I read this quote a number of times to try to decipher what it means. When I did make…read more