Towards an Identity and Liberation: A Feminist Reading of Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis and Embroideries
Abstract:
In this paper, I have engaged in a feminist critical analysis of two of the autobiographical graphic novels: Persepolis and Embroideries by the French-Iranian author Marjane Satrapi. What appeals to me the most is Satrapi’s unique style of minimalistic literary text complementing the stark black and white illustrations narrated from a thoroughly feminist perspective. I have analysed one text at a time as they needed to be dealt differently. While in Persepolis the political undercurrent strongly flows throughout the text, it is missing entirely from Embroideries. In Persepolis, I have established how Satrapi has shown her protagonist as a politically conscious woman questioning the oppressive regime and especially its treatment towards women while in the other, I have established how Satrapi has made her unconventional women characters sexually liberated,
turning the societal norms and expectations upside down. Thus, in the former the socio-cultural and political position had been focused upon while in the latter, the
focus is on a woman’s power relations with a man even during the most intimate encounters. My paper not only focuses upon two of Satrapi’s most powerful feminist texts but also highlights the kind of feminist she grew up to be, raw and outspoken in her approach, keeping in mind her ‘privileged’ family background which definitely empowered her to a certain extent and also how that didn’t make
her indifferent to the sufferings of the lower classes in general and marginalised women in particular. I have also explored the aspects of sexual liberation of women
which Satrapi strongly advocated in both of her books in explicitly bold language infused with wit and humour.
Readers can download the Abstract and the Article clicking following buttons:
