MarjaneSatrapi’s memoir, Persepolis, is an eye-opener of sorts. The book gets people thinking about how horrible the religious situation in Iran was back then. She also talks about some other issues through the book. Drug abuse for example. She brings out this awareness through her own past experiences, in this book. In this essay, I am writing about Marjane’s character and her talks with god. Through these meetings with god it seems like she is trying to tell us something more. Something about her beliefs in god and how they played an important role in the way she thinks.

The main reason, to me, that people follow a god is for hope of a better day or maybe just anything that is hoped for. People, very often,believe that god will help us solve our problems when people should be solving them themselves instead. Gods give us hope without even saying a word. It is strange the way a god is so blindly followed. MarjaneSatrapi, I believe, has portrayed this characteristic in the character. The author shows us the hope that the character had in god mostly through the conversations they have together, but it feels like there is a different idea behind those scenes.The author could be conveying the idea of god not being the saviour of any situation but rather people themselves.I would feel that once, rather if, someone has realised that there is no hope even after all this prayer and worship they would understand or think about the more probable reality of the situation. But the reality of that situation is not as such. God is looked at as much more superior than any being on the planet, which is a very big problem. It could definitely make people feel like their existence is not that important, which in turn could make them not understand the importance of humans on the planet. It is like they put themselves down.

In the first conversation between the character and god (Pg. 8, Persepolis), I believe, MarjaneSatrapiis bringing out the idea of how people, including herself, see it necessary to give god an explanation, and also how having the idea of god puts a certain kind of unnecessary pressure on the person worshiping. What is more interesting is the line used in the very next frame- “Except for my grandmother I was the only one who believed in myself.”(Pg.8, Persepolis). Considering the fact that god told her that he believed in her in the previous frame, it seems like MarjaneSatrapi is telling us that the character’s belief in god was already not so strong. The character even portrays this when god and her are talking and she keeps telling him to change the conversation even when he does, (Pg. 13, 14, Persepolis). Slightly after, after the character overheard her parents talking (Pg. 16, Persepolis), she tells god that she wants to take part in the demonstration and he is given a look of sudden shock, like what she was saying was horribly wrong. In the next frame he walks out, as if not interested in being a part of the demonstration. The author at this point, I believe, is bringing out the idea of god being the whole reason behind these riots, considering the fact that she is experiencing a religious war. Along with the idea of god and religion there has to exist the idea of a better and worse one, it seems.Often it is the idea of religion and god that give birth to the biggest wars, just like in the book. At the end of her conversation with her parents (Pg. 17, Persepolis), when she asks where god is, I think, is because she realised what the war had to do with, which is god, and her belief disappears. She entered a space of reality, the truth behind the situation. Even when the character talks about how god and Marx look alike (Pg. 13, Persepolis), it feels like she is trying to tell us that Marx was the one who should have been considered a god. Again, showing us how her belief in god was almost dead.

The time MarjaneSatrapi faced these religious issues was when they were at their peak. Though, these issues still exist in Iran and many other parts of the world. Not with the same kind of violence as what we have read in the book, but as conservative as in the book.