Since the beginning of the year in my Arts Studies course we have examined three pieces of literature: Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Joe Sacco’s Safe Area Gorazde and Joy Kagawa’s Obasan. While at a glance these three works may appear entirely unrelated, we have examined as a class how they are sometimes actually very similar and how the themes of memory, trauma and remembering are woven through all of them. All three of the stories are very personal and seemingly endemic to their specific place and time in history, yet at the same they tackle very similar human experiences.

In Persepolis we have the story of a young girl, fraught with large political movements and moments of trauma. In Safe Area Sacco tells his personal story of visiting Gorazde, as well as the stories of those he meets there. Their stories are recount the racial discrimination which ultimately led to genocide over eight thousand innocents. Finally there is Obasan, narrative which stands in the middle of Safe Area and Persepolis. Like the story of Marji, Obasan is from the perspective of a little girl being swept up in large, often traumatic political events. From Safe Area it touches the themes of racial discrimination and the violent splintering of heterogeneous communities. While all three works are heavily related, I see Obasan as a sort of thematic bridge between the two other pieces. While Naomi’s personality is considerably more withdrawn than Marji’s and the manifestation of prejudice against the Japanese was different than that of the Bosnians, Obasan is thematically extremely reminiscent of both works. Considering that all three pieces were written about entirely separate events and for entirely separate purposes, I find it amazing that they are in ways so similar.

Ignoring the cliché that has arisen around the phrase, “history repeats itself” seems very fitting to describe this phenomenon. Rather, humans all encounter similar circumstances, issues and conflicts that arise from our very nature; no matter where you are located in the world you must face humanity with all its flaws and vices. This is what enables our three authors to write vastly different yet intensely similar stories, what allows to relate to people no matter their creed and ultimately allows to understand ourselves.