Guest Column: Yearning for an Uprising (Graphic Novel Review)
by Thomas E. Simmons
I picked out an interesting book from the “just released” shelf in my local public library this week titled Woman Life Freedom (Seven Stories Press 2024).
Its marketing is a little misleading. To claim the book was “created by Marjane Satrapi” as its cover proclaims suggests that it is a new graphic novel by the creator of Persepolis, a memoir which tells of the author’s upbringing in Tehran during the Iranian Revolution and Iran-Iraq War. It’s widely acclaimed. It’s been translated into over 100 languages.
But Satrapi offers only a brief preface and six-page introduction to Woman Life Freedom. It’s not even clear whether she contributed as an editor (in a notation buried at the end of the book is the assertion that Satrapi helped organize the editorial committee). But be that as it may. This is an excellent book.
“Woman – Life – Freedom!” is probably a catchier slogan in the original Kurdish: “Jin – Jiyan – Azadî!” The slogan was used by Kurdish activists even before the murder of Masha “Jina” Amini by Iranian morality police in September of 2022. Jina was detained for the infraction of wearing her headscarf somewhat askew, then beaten so severely that she died of blunt force head trauma in police custody three days later. Her murder set off a wave of protests. Those protests are the subject of this book.
It is a collection of twenty-three comics and illustrated pages by artists and writers like Paco Roca, Hippolyte, and Pascal Rabaté. Each reads like a real-life 1984. It’s chilling but also inspiring. Freedom is always worth fighting for.
Muslim women showed enormous courage in the protests which followed Jina’s murder. They marched, they chanted, and they removed their headscarves in public displays against the Iranian oligarchy. Many were arrested. If and when they reappear, they appear docile, as if they’ve had a change of heart. In a comic strip by Mana Neyestani and Farid Vahid, the captions explain:
Regularly, one of the protesters or revolutionaries arrested will appear on television, confessing and repenting before the camera.
Although by now, everyone knows under what conditions such confessions are made.
The panel accompanying the narration shows a woman chained to a stool facing a man pointing a combination long-barreled gun and movie camera in her face. To the side stands an older woman holding a microphone boom over the detainee’s bowed head.
The next panel shows the older woman again, this time in a close-up. The captions introduce her as “Fati” who “helps to extract confessions.”
Next, the comic strip shows a grinning Fati tapping away at a dozen different cell phones, spreading false information through social media as “part of the regime’s cyber army.” She types:
- mn235iran: All lies. IsFahan is quiet, no one in the streets.
- lli87victory: All lies. Chiraz is quiet, no one in the streets.
- kurdl249: All lies. Mashhad is quiet, no one in the streets.
By actively spreading falsehoods, the oligarchy fosters distrust, encourages paranoia, and de-unifies the opposition. It’s the playbook of every tyranny.
Woman Life Freedom is an excellent book. Predictably, some of the chapters resonate more than others, but the varied voices organized around a common theme demonstrate the kind of unity necessary to overthrow a repressive despotism.
The legal restraints the Islamic Republic of Iran imposes on women are especially repressive. Their speech, their dress, and their movements are constrained. The feminist movement that is taking to the streets and risking their lives has inspired liberty-lovers across the globe. It’s a movement that deserves our support. After all, freedom is always worth fighting for.
Thomas E. Simmons
University of South Dakota Knudson School of Law
Vermilion, SD