POST #5

Characterization is the way that an author communicates information about certain characters to their readers. This can be done through characters being seen doing things, how they talk to people, and how they react. Characterization can be limited due to how the story is told. Because Persepolis is written from the view of the author, about the author’s life, it is limited as to how much a reader can know about other people in the story. How the characters talk and interact with one another takes place only as it is told to Marji, or as she herself sees it happen, making opinions formed about characters rather biased. To Marji, her uncle Anoosh is very important and a very nice man. As a reader you feel bad for him, and enjoy him because he makes Marjane happy.  Uncle Anoosh is always there for her, they bonded when he got released from prison. "I tell you all of thisbecause it's important that you know, our family memory must not be lost". (pg.60) He tells Marij that "she is the litle girl that I always wantted to have". (pg69) You even grow attached to him a little bit because Marji does in the story. As readers, we see him from one point of view, and that’s Marji’s alone. We don’t know what if her parents think he’s maybe a bit of a hassle, or maybe think he should have done things in his life differently. They don’t mention anything about it to Marji aside from his life story, so we don’t really know too much on their inner thoughts and feelings. We also feel the sort of innocent desire to have the family maid be with the next door neighbour she’s in love with, since that’s what Marji wants. We see it from Marji’s untainted, childish desire to have two people happy and in love. At that point we can’t see it from her parent’s point of view, or the neighbours, where the maid is too lower of a class for him to ever be with her. As a reader, you feel sorry for the maid because of that. But she’s just a minor character who doesn’t get any development after that. Marjane’s parents and grandmother receive a bit of character development through the course of the story, and that’s perhaps because Marjane herself is growing older and understanding them better. As children, we don’t grasp why our parents do and say what they do and that limits our understanding of them as people. This same thing happens within the story, so proper understanding of Marjane’s family can’t really happen until near the end of the book. For the most part, Persepolis and Marjane Satrapi use direct characterization, since she tells you what she thinks of a lot of things, and because it’s from her point of view. There is some use of indirect characterization simply because the readers are still able to form their own opinions through the actions of characters the Marji sees or is told about.