Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood Marjane Satrapi

Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood Marjane Satrapi is an autobiography about Marjane younger years in Iraq during the Iraq Revolution.  

            The first chapter [The Veil] starts off with Marjane being ten in 1980, a year after the revolution. She struggles to adjust that she has to wear a veil to cover her hair. She doesn’t understand that they’re being separated by sex and non-religious schools were being banished. Marjane was born into the world where it is modern yet still religious. She adapt to the modern part of the world, and not picking up her religion like her family has. That was one of her struggles of her understandment of the revolution, but the year before this, her school was a French non-religious school where the boys and girls could mingle.

            In the next chapter of the book, The Bicycle, Marjane starts to understand and accept the segregation and concept of the revolution. She describes the revolution as a bicycle in page 13. “The Revolution is like a bicycle. When the wheels don’t turn, it falls.” Her friends agree with her and wants to take part in the protest with her parents.

The difference of the two chapters are like the north and south poles. She doesn’t really understands what is happening in “The Veil”. Her parents were part of the protestors of the revolution and she had a dream with god. Her dream insists of god explaining how she is the prophet, teaching her and tending her. She wants to help the world be a better place by being the prophet. Then the next chapter, “The Bicycle”, she gains her knowledge of the revolution and she wants to stop and abolish the revolution, with the two friends.

When her parents ask her what she wants to be, she answers “I want to be a doctor (12)”

But later on, Marjane feels guilty towards God. When she went to sleep, she had another conversation with God. God felt let down and betrayed, but Marjane “cheered him up” by saying she just didn’t want anyone else to know. But earlier that day, she told her grandma and her classmates she wanted to be a prophet. Her grandma accepted her and didn’t think it was irrational, but her classmates thought differently. Her classmates laughed at her and thought she was crazy.

          In conclusion, Marjane wanting to be the prophet is to help her family and place to be a better place. But people don’t accept her dream and just pushes her away, like her parents when Marjane asked if she could join the protest with her.                                                             

The Name of This Book is Secret

            The Secret books by Pseudonymous Bosh are a series of books in which the author keeps the characters names and the setting mysteriously hidden by giving them pseudonyms. The main characters, “Cass” and “Max-Ernest”, discovered a box called the Sympathy of Smells, from Cass’s grandfathers, and their journey carry from then on. They connect the box with Benjamin Blake, a missing magician, Luciano, Benjamin’s evil twin brother, and Gloria, Luciano’s partner in crime. To keep the book a mystery and on edge, Pseudonymous uses his own techniques.

            Gloria, one of the many villains, was looking for the Sympathy of Smells too, but didn’t get her hands on it fast enough. Once Cass found the box of Sympathy of Smells, she gets a note saying that Benjamin Blake is kidnaped. Being the heroic as she is, she wants to go save him. Cass’s disguise is as one of the Skeleton Sisters, a teen pop sensation, to the Midnight Spa, where Gloria works. Max-Ernest thought it was too dangerous for Cass to go alone, so he join Cass for backup and a messenger. Once they arrived, Gloria isn’t as unobservant as Cass thought, Gloria outed Cass and Max-Ernest by locking them up in a room and interrogating them. The story goes on from there that the author has not allowed me to tell you.

One of the many techniques Bosh uses is stalling. In the first two pages of the story, he asks and informs the reader that reading this book, they’re holding a great responsibility to keep the secret to themselves. Instead of jumping right into the story, Bosh gives the readers a warning, “But, remember, I warned you” (2), predicts the future, “You beg. You plead. You threaten. You cajole.”(2), and being indifferent, “Read on, if you must.”(2). For the chapter one, he didn’t write anything on the pages, except for x’s. He later on explains it “I’m sorry you couldn’t read Chapter One.”(6).

            One of his main technique he does is interjecting. He adds asterisks in the texts to distract the readers. For instance, when Max-Ernest was getting kidnapped, Bosh put many asterisks to make you look at the bottom of the page to disturb their zone into the action. He also puts an interjection chapter between suspenseful chapters. For example, when Gloria was going to reveal the secret on her youth, Pseudonymous ends the chapter when Gloria was starting to take off her gloves, as it is a part of her secret. Instead of continuing the big reveal, he writes a story dedicated to chocolate and his favorite kind.

            In conclusion, Bosh does a great job at keeping the suspense going throughout the book.

            

Blog ----> Literary Essay

The Glass Castle II (My Blog)

The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls is an amazingly written memoir. It talks about her childhood memories and how her family is flawed in many ways, like her father is an alcoholic father, a father who is always in a constant run, and a mother who didn’t take the responsibilities of a mother. Despite all the flaws, Jeannette is able to forgive. It is an important criteria in life to forgive, as it is one of the cardinal virtues.

Jeannette doesn’t look at the world with hatred, but rather with a loving heart. She forgives both her parents every time they make a mistake. For example, when she was three years old, Jeannette was cooking hot dogs and she got burned because her mother, Rose, was being careless. She was then rushed to the hospital, and six days after hospitalization, she gets back to cooking her hot dogs. This shows how Jeannette isn’t even worried about getting hurt again when cooking. She just gets right back into what she does regularly.

There was also another time when her father, Rex, was teaching Jeannette to swim, but instead of teaching her how to swim, like how every parent is with caution, Rex throws her in to the sulfur spring repeatedly. It either sink or swim, her father would only save her when she sinks, and he would keep on doing this. From this, Jeannette learns how to paddle and swim. Jeannette doesn’t blame her father or get mad, instead she forgives her father and thinks that from this experience is to inspire her to learn.

Rex being a careless father, used to steal money from the bar, and then he would use that stolen money to buy beer. Due to Rex’s carelessness, he became an alcoholic throughout Jeannette’s childhood. When Rex is not sober, he throws chairs and threatens people who gets in his way, he even threatens his own wife. Even with all the chaos her father has caused, she forgave him. She forgive her father because she is blinded with love and trust she has gained from over the years with him, even with all the horrible things he did to her, because they’re family .

Over all, Jeannette Walls repeatedly forgives her parents mistake and looks on the bright side. In the end, she says “I could not imagine what my life would be like- without him in it. As awful as he could be, I always knew he loved me in a way no one else ever had.”(279). She creates an image for the reader to follow, and it is to forgive easily and the good things in life happen.

The Glass Castle

The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls is an amazingly written memoir. It talks about her childhood memories and how her family is flawed in many ways, like her father is an alcoholic father, a father who is always in a constant run, and a mother who didn’t take the responsibilities of a mother. Despite all the flaws, Jeannette is able to forgive.

Jeannette doesn’t look at the world with hatred, but rather with a loving heart. She forgives both her parents every time they make a mistake. For example, when she was three years old, Jeannette was cooking hot dogs and she got burned because her mother, Rose, was being careless. She is then rushed to the hospital, and six days after hospitalization, she gets back to cooking her hot dogs.

There was also another time when her father, Rex, was teaching Jeannette to swim, but instead of teaching her how to swim, Rex throws her in to the sulfur spring repeatedly. It either sink or swim, her father would only save her when she sinks, and he would keep on doing this. From this, Jeannette learns how to paddle and swim. Jeannette doesn’t blame her father or get mad, instead she forgives her father and thinks that from this experience is to inspire her to learn.

Rex used to steal money from the bar, and then he would use that stolen money to buy beer. Due to Rex’s carelessness, he became an alcoholic throughout Jeannette’s childhood. When Rex is not sober, he throws chairs and threatens people who gets in his way, he even threatens his own wife. Even with all the chaos her father has caused, she forgave him. She forgive her father because she is blinded with love and trust she has gained from over the years with him.

Over all, Jeannette Walls repeatedly forgives her parents mistake and looks on the bright side. In the end, she says “I could not imagine what my life would be like- without him in it. As awful as he could be, I always knew he loved me in a way no one else ever had.”(279). She creates an image for the reader to follow, and it is to forgive easily and the good things in life happen. 

Blog Review

Shameea's Blog Post

The blog post I think was very well written was about “Sold” by Shameea Mahbub. She retells the story from the books main character, Lakshmi, precisely and answers the social action questions. I have also read “Sold” by Patricia McCormick and I agree with the response she answered to the social action questions.

One of the main topic she takes about is how sexism plays a big part in the entire book. I agree with her point, because in India all of the married women have to stay at home to tend to her chores, child and husband. They have to wear hijabs at a very young as to show modesty. It is not a choice they have to make, it is required. Shameea also brings up really strong quotes and connections from the book to back up her response. For example, “A boy who had been born into the sex-trafficking industry, Harish, had such a different life than the other girls at the "Happiness House" Lakshmi had been increasingly jealous of him, calling him the David Beckham boy because he had played soccer. Harish had simple privileges that Lakshmi was deprived of. He was able to go to school, able to roam around freely, able to have the privileges of a boy.” She brings up a male character that wasn’t a big part of the story, and connects it with her point.

The question, “Who's perspective is missing?” Shameea answered in her blog was perfectly responded with her opinion. She thought no one’s perspective was missing. She explained how Lakshmi’s point of view was very critical for the book. It help make the story really dark and accurate.

In conclusion, the blog post was written very beautifully with thought. The blog post was also separated with paragraphs that were planned out to different questions and topics. The blog post was also supported with very well picked examples throughout.

Non-Fiction Critical Analysis

In the non-fiction book Same-Sex Marriage, by Tricia Andryszewski, tells you about gay rights history. The bias novel, for gays, tells you information for both the views of same sex marriage (For or against). It also displays some pictures of same sex couples that can make you feel either disgusted or content.

The author wants to show the reader what same sex marriage is, the rumors about it, and how the big commotion about it started. Tricia knows that most of her audience would be at a younger age, so she gives the readers information mainly from the nineteen hundreds to 2012, rather than telling a story or a story of her own experience. One of the rumors she discusses about is, in 1982 was AIDS was called the “gay disease” because the highest percentage of the people who got it were either lesbians or gays. Because many gays and lesbians has this disease, most hospitals wouldn’t take them in since a great amount of people were anti-gay. The reason she mentioned this is to scary or shock the audience. She goes on to list the gay or lesbian politicians and mayors, to show that even other homosexual people get involved with the government, that most likely there are who people are anti-gay.

This book showed me various information that I didn’t know from my many articles that I read about online. She shows that readers that it is normal to be a homosexual, and many other people are with them. Instead of avoiding the fact that they’re gay or lesbian, she showed how there were many people who came out of the closet in the nineteen hundreds, and then had to go through the hatred the heterosexual and anti-gay gave them. 

Sold

In the novel, Sold by Patricia McCormick, it talks about Lakshmi, a thirteen year old girl, who is being sold to a prostitution house, because the rain washed all their rice away, and their house roof collapsed. Since they’re very poor because their lazy father gamble all their money away. Because of this, her father decided that Lakshmi will work for a stranger named Aunty Bimla. From there, Bimla and Lakshmi travels to the city to get to the prostitution house, but Lakshmi doesn’t know where she is going, she thinks she is going to be a maid for the rich. She later finds out that the place is called Happiness House, and there she meets other teenage girls that are sold there as well, and she is not working as a maid, but a prostitute.

There are many difficult or complex things in the text. Such as writing out what is happening to her body, like her period. Many younger or male readers might not understand the concept of what is happening. They try to make it obvious but very hidden at the same time. Another is how most of the time in the text, the show sexism. Her mother stays home and tends for her husband, she does all the chores in the house, and her husband just gambles. When Lakshmi questions her mother why women is treated so poorly, she replies with "Simply to endure, is to triumph” this creates an image that women do this to gain themselves back. Near the beginning of the book, it shows how Bimla is a very sexist character as well. When she is putting makeup on Lakshmi before her first customer, she said how you must please men, and they’re always the right one. This shows that Bimla also thinks that women are worthless because we are just objects to pleasure men and live life to the men’s perspective of perfect. Another example is how Harish, a male teen, is free to do whatever he wants, and not get judged by it. Harish gets to go to school, gets more rights than a girl, and the best is he isn’t stuck in one place, he gets to go anywhere he wishes.

In the book there is a missing perspective, which is Lakshmi’s. Without her perspective, we can’t figure out how she is feeling throughout the story. We don’t know what is going through her head when she was trying escape the horrid place that they call it Happiness House. With her perspective in the story, it wouldn’t be as interesting of a story, because it would be easier to infer what would happen next in her journey of child prostitution. But without Lakshmi’s point of view, it portrays an image of her journey, not a memoir.

            For the third question, is justice served? I think that their justice was not served, and they lost it to the men they were forced to be with. In the end, they do get freed for the prostitute house, but there is one thing that is lost forever, their innocence. The men that paid to be with the young teens were not brought to jail and to be punished for what they did, but instead, they get away with it.