In this page we could easily see that the pattern of shapes on Marjane's grandma's dress is Jasmine flowers (look at the second panel). This was the last memory she has with her grandmother before she left for Austria. They spent a night together before Marjane's departure. The reason I think Satropi uses jasmine flower as the pattern of grandma's dress is because her grandma routinely used to put jasmine flowers in her bra: to Marjane, jasmine flower has become a symbol of her grandma. From this, we could see that Satropic really pay attention to details when she draw the panels.
P154
This page is completely blank, representing the separation between childhood and teen-hood of the protagonist, Marjane. We can also interpret as a life switch. Life switch because she is no longer confine in a freedom-less country , Iran, but exposed to the outside world and experienced the taste of freedom. The blankness of this page does not only represents a new beginning for Marjane, but also to reader because I think the arthur wants the readers to take a pause and rethink what had happen so far in the book before they move on. Instead of the gutter between panels, this blank page is like a gutter of the book.
Hi Fion,
ReplyDeleteI really like your interpretation of the blank page on p. 154 as the gutter! Did you know that Persepolis was originally published in two volumes? I think that was where they split, although it seems to have definitely been a concious choice to leave that page blank in this "complete" edition.
Nice one!
I really like your interpertation on page 154. I think that it is surely a gutter for the book. I personally think that it is placed in that spot particularly because of the time passing, as well as the new beginning in Marjane's life in a different part of the world for the first time.
ReplyDelete-Denitza