French-Iranian author Marjane Satrapi, author of 'Persepolis', dies at 56

https://www.france24.com/en/culture/20260604-french-iranian-author-marjane-satrapi-author-of-persepolis-dies-at-56

by fidotron • 2 months ago

457 104 2 months ago

france24.com

eatonphil• 2 months ago

The movie was really beautifully done and I've wanted to read the book itself. Rest in peace.

the_af• 2 months ago

The book is beautiful too, I recommend it.

fidotron4• 2 months ago

One of the most surprising things about the movie was how precisely it captured the artistic intent of the book. A serious achievement by those animators.

frankieg33• 2 months ago

I didn't realize there was a movie. Thanks for posting so I can check it out.

I will second, the graphic novel is excellent. Up there with Maus in terms of showing you a new perspective.

srean8• 2 months ago

I think the movie came first, at least in the US.

baby3• 2 months ago

I would recommend the book over it

NordStreamYacht3• 2 months ago

What's the connection with France?

Even Khomeini was in exile in France until the shah was deposed.

KomoD• 2 months ago

Born Nov. 22, 1969, in Rasht, Iran, and grew up in Tehran. Sent to live in Austria at 14 during the Iran-Iraq war. Returned to Iran after her high school years and attended art school in Tehran.
Left Iran for Europe again at 24 and continued her art studies in Strasbourg, France.
Now lives in Paris as a French citizen. Since publishing "Persepolis," has not been back to Iran.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/0...

inglor_cz2• 2 months ago

France was historically very interested in the Near and Middle East, though colonially somewhat less successful than the UK; Napoleon sailed to Egypt in 1799, and later the French Republic protected Lebanese and Syrian Christians, up to some point in history. People from the Levant still like to study in France (incl. Nassim Nicholas Taleb). Hence, France is considered a strong and culturally developed country in the region.

And unlike the UK and US, they had no historic bad blood with Iran (Mossadegh et al.)

SSLy• 2 months ago

And French is still language of educated class in some places in Levant, esp. Liban.

rjsw• 2 months ago

A more recent influence came from the Sykes-Picot Agreement [1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes%E2%80%93Picot_Agreement

everdrive5• 2 months ago

There were two large exile groups subsequent to the Iranian revolution: France and Albania. MEK has a large presence in both. I don't know enough of the history to say whether France was chosen because there was _already_ an affinity or not, but interestingly "merci" is one of the common ways to say "thank you" in Persian.

rurban2• 2 months ago

The Vienna group was bigger. That's why she was sent to Vienna. Esp. the ex aristocrats and generals are all living in Vienna. Only the religious nutheads in Paris.

Tangurena2• 2 months ago

There was (might still be) a large Iranian population in Los Angeles. Enough to have a Farsi language UHF station and for the city to get a nickname of Tehrangeles.

qnpnpmqppnp• 2 months ago

That she's French-Iranian?

It says so right in the title so I may have misunderstood your question.

NordStreamYacht3• 2 months ago

Wondering why Iran has so many connections with France which AFAIK never really colonised the place.

mc32• 2 months ago

I guess kind of like Gabriel Garcia and Mexico, though I don't think Columbians would like anyone to describe him as having been Mexican (ex as Mexican-Columbian) in any way though he lived there for the majority of his life and had become very well integrated into the elite circles of Mexico city -that said, he never renounced his Columbian citizenship and I think he also considered himself Columbian and not Mexican --which makes sense, he was not born there and none of his parents were from there.

estebank• 2 months ago

Nitpick: it's Colombia, not Columbia. And the last name is Garcia Marquez. Splitting half of the last name is not generally done. It sounds like calling somebody called McDonald just Mac.

NordStreamYacht3• 2 months ago

Downvoted for asking questions. Nice.

everdrive5• 2 months ago

I always enjoyed the first half of Persepolis. Told from Satrapi's perspective, it was a very relatable story about a young child who was swept up by the world events around her, and tried to rebel in very normal, child-like ways. It was very relatable in that abstract sense, even if most of us have not been through a violent revolution. (and even more violent subsequent war with a neighboring state)

The second half of Persepolis was much more difficult for me, and I never know how to feel about it. I think above all else Satrapi deserves a lot of credit for describing herself realistically rather than trying to paint herself as a good person. (not that she was a bad person, but that she didn't shy away from parts of the story that show her in a poor light) I have a lot of respect for her honesty in the second half of the story, however her time in exile in Europe seemed to be one of self-indulgence, meandering, and minor self-destruction. All of which are understandable for someone who has been through such a traumatic turn of events, however it was a bit sad that the young, rebellious child that was so likable did not seem to survive the conflict.

p-e-w5• 2 months ago

I’ve always wondered how much of the second part is truth and how much is fiction. That a teenage girl from Iran, living by herself in Central Europe with essentially no local connections, would become a drug dealer to her classmates, and on top of that somehow be let off the hook for it by the headmaster, stretches credibility a little bit.

chmod775• 2 months ago

I've personally encountered some stories that were pretty much exactly that.

Vulnerable young people becoming low level drug dealers (often for lack of other options) isn't exactly a rare story.

conductr2• 2 months ago

Idk, I didn’t read this book. But I lived a similar version of that reality in a conservative southern US town. My home life was challenging. I sold drugs and generally was a rebellious troublesome teenager. All the officials in my school and local law enforcement gave me kind slaps on the wrist compared to what they could/should have. I had to assume they were trying to get me to a point of adulthood without having life ruining consequences weighing me down. I straightened up by around 17-18 but there were certainly a few times between 14-17 I could have been charged for adult felony crimes and was let off the hook, never even spent a night in a juvenile detention facility but I was made to flush a lot of drugs down some toilets a time or two. I think it used to be more common to let kids figure things out for themselves. I don’t think the similar levels of leniency would occur, it’s all zero tolerance.

dkarl• 2 months ago

A foreign student who is afraid of returning to her home country sounds like an ideal low-level drug dealer. They are legally vulnerable because they are afraid of being expelled from the country, and they have access to lots of potential buyers in their fellow students. And someone who is new and is looking for friends is more easily approached and recruited.

ginko• 2 months ago

I'm from Vienna (admittedly younger) but it seems believable. The place she picks up the drugs in the comic is "Café Camera" which is clearly a reference to "Camera Club" which was well-known for this in the 80s and 90s.

colechristensen3• 2 months ago

Do all stories need to be of virtue and success?

It seems like you're disappointed it wasn't a modern "noble savage" myth, that it was realistic instead of a fairy tale about a person coming from a bad place to a good place and being happy, wholesome, and free.

This kind of mythology is a pretty big problem in the western world right now as is the kneejerk reaction to it.

p-e-w5• 2 months ago

That’s a rather uncharitable take on what the poster you’re responding to wrote.

I read Persepolis a few years ago, and it’s hard not to come away with a similar impression. The first part often does resemble a fairy tale of sorts, while the second part is a pretty dark story of teenage alienation. The contrast is jarring, and it goes well beyond “duh nobody’s perfect”.

Both parts are excellent in their own right, and quite unlike any other book I’ve read, but there is indeed something strange going on in part 2. Most readers will remember this, I think.

fidotron4• 2 months ago

All of which are understandable for someone who has been through such a traumatic turn of events, however it was a bit sad that the young, rebellious child that was so likable did not seem to survive the conflict.

Great literature does not exist to be heartwarming but to speak fundamental truths, however uncomfortable they are. Persepolis cleaned up as you implicitly desire would cease to be the great work that it is.

everdrive5• 2 months ago

I never said I wanted it to be changed. Even if you dislike or disagree with my take, I want to make that really clear; I don't think we should modify art because we find it unpleasant.

lopsotronic2• 2 months ago

There's a parallel in Maus, where the PoV character runs increasingly into his Holocaust survivor's father's racism, even as he explores his father's threading the needle of 20th century Central Europe[1] . He calls his pa out on it, but for his pa the schwarzers aren't people, so there's no "there" there.

If Speigelman had a slightly deeper historical insight he might have drawn the connection between the byzantine precision of American race law and what Hitler had hoped to accomplish in his own "Wild West". Both end products of the secular wave of colonialism, with Hitler's being at least a hundred years too late, held back by the late stage of German nationhood.

Suffering is no guarantor of virtue. Extremes of violence can brutalize not just individuals but entire peoples. Which is why we should not look to victims as prima facie exemplars, but with empathy and deeper understanding.

[1] the "Bloodlands" of Tim Snyder

vr46• 2 months ago

That's a interesting observation on Spiegelmann, although I don't know how that could have been incorporated into the story, without him actually challenging his father in that way. There is a reference somewhere that the animal metaphors were inspired by the racial caricatures in American vaudeville and theatre, so there was some recognition there, aside from the complications that animal metaphor itself added to things.

andrei_says_• 2 months ago

It was exactly the depression and confusion in the second part that made me feel her humanity and thus deepened mine.

It is an incredible book and I feel grateful for it.

Shorel• 2 months ago

That "bad" part is where her story becomes more valuable. Literature has many idealistic heroes, which are also patronising, in a sense. Satrapi makes us self reflect, which is much better, and much more real. In contrast, I'm really tired of the catholic fiction, it's always the same. Like written by an AI, but from the year 1100.

quijoteuniv• 2 months ago

Article called the book «Persopolis» :(

internet_points2• 2 months ago

The graphic novel was very good, showing what Iran must have felt like to iranians before the revolution, and the sadness at having lost that way of life. I highly recommend reading it.

p-e-w5• 2 months ago

At least to the kind of Iranians who were sending their children to French schools, yes.

But of course the other kind of people very rarely have someone writing international bestsellers on their behalf, so this is all we’ll get.

ndiddy• 2 months ago

I think it's a very well written personal memoir that shows what the revolution felt like to someone growing up in the Iranian urban upper class. It portrays the revolution as there being a hope for change, prior to religious men with beards and guns inexplicably showing up because that's what did happen from her perspective. I don't see anything necessarily wrong with this. The revolution was split between college-educated urban secular leftists and a much larger portion of religious conservatives, and the latter eclipsed the former so quickly that her viewpoint is probably legitimately what it looked like for her and her family. It doesn't try to do any political analysis of what motivated the Islamists or why they gained power because it's her personal story, it's not trying to be some sort of objective history of the Iranian revolution. I think it does what it set out to do very well, and it's an excellent story of the tragedy of just trading one oppressive dictatorship for another.

kranke1553• 2 months ago

And ? the author couldn't have written it from the pov of someone else. youre asking someone to do something that cant be done, and then blaming them for not doing it ?

internet_points2• 2 months ago

Sorry, I was imprecise. What it must have felt like to some iranians. I'd love to hear if you have tips for books that show other experiences from that period!

harperlee• 2 months ago

"Marjane Satrapi died of sadness a little over a year after the death of Mattias Ripa, her husband and the love of her life"

The simple humanity in this candid description brought a small tear to my eyes. I'd say that the classical approach to this is a dry, clinical description of a depression stage, or a description of a how and not a why. Very welcomed in the age of AI slop!

sometimelurker• 2 months ago

Persepolis was really good, read it a few years ago. really recommended

NoSalt• 2 months ago

Died of "sadness" ... that's incredibly sad. I mean, I know it's possible, but it seems so surreal to hear.

wslh• 2 months ago

It's incomplete without the rest of the sentence: "a little over a year after the death of Mattias Ripa, her husband and the love of her life"

Grief is not just metaphorical, severe bereavement can affect health in very real ways.

agumonkey2• 2 months ago

yes, stress hormones may be one cause and can harm a lot of tissues

srean8• 2 months ago

Has there been any study that analyses the frequency of natural death of one shortly after death of his/her partner. How different is that compared to what one would expect assuming statistical independence and based image and health adjusted mortality curves.

klaussilveira• 2 months ago

Yes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widowhood_effect

srean8• 2 months ago

Thanks.

rustyhancock• 2 months ago

Does it say what happened?

Died of sadness did make me wonder about something self inflicted.

gedy• 2 months ago

Yes, I also took it to be a tactful-as-possible way to say that.

MattGrommes• 2 months ago

That's always a possibility but I've seen my Grandpa die of a broken heart after my Grandma died. The night of her funeral he asked his children if they thought someone could die of a broken heart and after that it took him less than a year to go himself. I'd never considered that saying to be true until then but I watched it happen.

pvaldes• 2 months ago

Don't know the details, didn't read the comic, and don't really have a personal interest on the history so what follows is just general speculation. She looked depressed enough to commit suicide. Is a fact also that people that orbit around drugs, tend to die younger, by suicide or by the effects of the drugs.

In any case if two relatively young people die in a short interval of time would be wise to look for environmental effects. Oil pigments have chemicals, and some colors were removed for being notoriously unsafe. Going further, slow poisoning to eliminate opponents with the benefits of plausible deniability is trendy among some criminals unfortunately. If somebody "dies of grief", research for discarding a hidden toxic should be started, just to be safe.

croisillon• 2 months ago

you don't even have to be partners https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Cocteau#Death

ksajadi• 2 months ago

In a previous life I used to model insurance payouts for residential mortgages. The average we used was within 7 years.

TomMasz• 2 months ago

I am currently in that situation, and I can tell you it's a battle to keep the darkness away when you suddenly find yourself alone. I'm managing, with help, but not everyone can.

srean8• 2 months ago

Indeed. It is probably the most significant thing that ever happens to a person. My sincere condolences.

I have not dealt with such a change but have dealt with grief. Try to catch the sun rise. It is incredibly beautiful.

It will probably hurt because the instinct is to want to share the beauty to enjoy it. The good thing is that you can, with the version of your significant one you hold in your mind. I am serious, do catch the sun.

Grief hits in overpowering waves. Over time there is space between the waves. They will always be there but they become survivable.

All the best.

combray• 2 months ago

My wife suddenly died 4 years ago, we had 3 little kids at the time. You need to focus on a) being kind to yourself, whatever that means to you and b) the good things about the change. All change has good parts and bad parts, and it's easy to focus on negative things. Especially with a death since in magnitude they are probably greater than the good things. But if you focus on what you lost you will simply lose the rest of yourself.

I also think that women have a harder time with this than men, possibly because maternal death in childbirth used to be so much more common. But this is just a guess. Certainly until it happens to you its not the sorts of things that you think about too much, and once it does happen you tend to speak to people who are going through the more acute phase of it since they are still actively processing it.

rurban2• 2 months ago

Besides her groundbeaking Persepolis, I was at the world premiere of The Voices, a wonderful black comedy, and got angry that the stupid distributor buried the film. We all loved it. Fuckers. She had a lot of problems to get her next films financed then.

tetrisgm• 2 months ago

Poor woman. Somehow despite growing through hardships, it’s the loss of her husband that broke her.

May she be at peace now, and her work cherished.

customguy• 2 months ago

We are focusing on the small details and hiding the misery in the world. Look at the smoker and we miss global warming, war, and the crap we eat--not the bad guys but smoking. I smoke and they talk about cancer, I eat and they talk about cholesterol, I make love, it's AIDS. Before AIDS and cholesterol and cancer there's the pleasure of making love and eating and smoking. I have to die someday, so if the thing that gave me pleasure all of my life kills me instead of me going under a truck, that's fine. Besides, why should I live so that when I die I give fresh meat to the worms? I hope that I am rotted and they don't want to eat me. F@#$ck the worms.

-- Marjane Satrapi

Maybe a love so great you cannot go on without it is better than no such love. I wish her nothing but peace, but this such a tragic loss for the world. 56 :(

Also, fuck sadness. It's a healthy human thing, sure, but so is giving it the middle finger. Take care, all of you, and maybe smile at a person who needs it today, just because fuck sadness.

olelele• 2 months ago

Thank you for this comment. Especially on a forum as focused on optimization of health, peptide therapy etc. You made my day a bit better.

antod• 2 months ago

My attitude is Fuck Optimisation, it's just so exhausting and boring.

letsdelta• 2 months ago

I will always be grateful to her for so touchingly letting me in to her life, in a special part of the world, at a unique time of it’s existence

J_Shelby_J• 2 months ago

I rewatched it recently and it’s still such a good movie.

I’ll always remember the outrage I felt when they go to the hospital when her father needs heart surgery and they have to pretend not to know the hospital director because he was previously their janitor and they were afraid to embarrass him by acknowledging that and not getting treatment. Absurdity.

baby3• 2 months ago

Would recommend reading the comic instead

baby3• 2 months ago

I read all the persepolis comics a long time ago and to my memory it was the first time I cried reading a comic. A beautiful work of art. I would recommend to anyone reading this comment to order the first book.

vandahm• 2 months ago

I read Persepolis in French, and I don't speak French as a native language, so I worry that I missed some of the art and the nuance of it. But, even so, I thought it was beautiful. She was an extremely talented storyteller, and I'm sad that she left us so soon.

French-Iranian author Marjane Satrapi, author of 'Persepolis', dies at 56

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