Author Archives: robocancan

A Rainbow of Black and White

I’m not sure whether to attribute it to my growing ability to comprehend comics or something profound in Persepolis, but I am  eerily in love with this novel so far. I say eerily because while I’ve never experienced any of the realities of regime changes and revolution, the search for ones beliefs and the ever fluid reactions of a child impressed by so many extreme notions stirs a response in me to where I feel myself conflicted by the people and atrocities presented. I like the way Iran’s bleak and seemingly black and white world is contrasted with a young girl coming of age into the well rounded and colorful person she seems meant to be.

We are allowed to grow intellectually and emotionally with Persepolis, starting with the most simple foundations of love and spirituality. While some may have this impressed upon them more than others, I think it’s important to see Marja as personally devoted, without much encouragement from her elders. As she absorbs more and more ideas from her turbulent world, she changes her dreams; just as a youngster today changes future occupations weekly, Marja’s day dreaming carries the weight of ethincity, nationality, religion, and general humanity. However rather than become overwhelming, Satrapi’s black and white images give a simple yet effective tug at the emotions behinds such intellectual searching.

My favorite page by far is twenty five. It runs the gambit of emotions from the almost comical naivety of childhood to the sadness of parental loss to the feeling of impotence in a world so great. For the first time we see Marja in a balance of black and white, and with it the weight of the world truly impressing itself upon the young girl. Both the contrast of her grandfather with her wrinkly hands as well as her mothers face to her own, the page is a beautiful composition that illicits so much of what this book is about.

I’d also like to bring up the issue of an unreliable narrator. With this much history involved, there is certainly room for false memories, or if carefully researched, the issue of fitting personal history to more famous events. Do you think Satrapi give any hints to this difficulty and if so, why?

Response to “Setting the Scene in Watchmen”

I think it’s interesting that this post both praises the Watchmen for it’s realistic New York setting and the statement that Mr. Manhattan is eortiz’s favorite character for his very unreal super powers. A great example of the power of masking, as McCloud discusses it on in the second chapter of Understanding Comics. I would argue that rather than masking being exclusively an illustrative technique, its utilized in the Watchmen through narrative. While Dave Gibbons’ style seems to gravitate towards the more realistic side of the McCloud triangle, this is still, to varying degrees, an impossible story. Rather than identify with the iconic aspects of the characters, the unique and detailed faces of all characters (primary, secondary, superficial) along with similarly realistic backgrounds allows the reader a more objective view of the story based on the text. The focus on reading allows for a greater “perception” rather than “reception” of the story, perhaps lending the story its sophistication and acceptance in the literary world (McCloud, 49).

As to eortiz’s second point about the lack of cultural diversity, I certainly agree, and would also point to this as one of the few aspects that may one day come to view the Watchmen as dated. This cultural criticism certainly applies to virtually every American form of entertainment, and forms the basis for so much of the responsive literature being produced today. Yet its not so much the lack of representation that stuck out to me as much as what we do see: specifically, the lesbian on page 21 of chapter five. I applaud the creative team for attempting to include someone who (especially at the time) was such a poorly understood minority in the American public. Yet I cannot help but feel the eighth panel is both unnecessary and perhaps even misleading. I say unnecessary because, at least for me, it is obvious Joey is a woman. By pointing this out with her poster and intimidation, it seems to place a more flagrant and negative stereotype on her. This is probably way too sensitive, but for the sake of discussion…

My other problem is that the acronym from Gay Woman Against Rape has nothing to do with Gwar, which is only lame because those two things should totally be related!