Eye of the Tyger — Auto-bio-graphic Explorations

I had been looking forward to seeing Persepolis for several months. Saw it a few weeks back and loved it. While it’s totally worth seeing, it ends a little abruptly for my liking. Around the same time I saw Persepolis I was reading Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. This was my first real graphic novel and I really enjoyed it. Bechdel’s plot and the way she deals with identity politics seems significantly more sophisticated than Marjane Satrapi’s novel. (I haven’t read Satrapi’s novel though; I’ve only seen the film, which could make a big difference in my reactions). Both of these graphic novels, however, seem worth anyone’s time. I wonder if Fun Home would be good as a film; the book is pretty awesome by itself.

Some images from Fun Home and Persepolis: the picture on the left resembles me now, whereas the image on the right depicts what I think I must have been like as a kid. Though, I didn’t grow up in Iran. And, my family certainly wasn’t as passive about my rants and revolts as Satrapi’s appear to have been.