Is Satrapi a Storyteller or a Documentarist?

"Storytelling is the conveying of events in words, images, and sounds often by improvisation or embellishment. Stories or narratives have been shared in every culture and in every land as a means of entertainment, education, preservation of culture, and in order to instill moral values. Crucial elements of stories and storytelling include plot and characters, as well as the narrative point of view." (Wikipedia)

“Documentary: Presenting facts objectively without editorializing or inserting fictional matter, as in a book or film… presenting political, social, or historical subject matter in a factual and informative manner and often consisting of actual news films or interviews accompanied by narration.”
(Dictionary.com)

Is Marjane Satrapi a Storyteller or a Documentarist? Before you say anything consider this; In Documentary: Is every fact in Persepolis presented objectively and informatively? In Storytelling: does Persepolis’s plot follow the generic plot diagram?

Plot Diagram:
(http://waxebb.com/writings/plot.jpg)

Satrapi, as the author, places herself in a grey area open to speculation and scrutiny. How can Persepolis consider itself a story without thorough structure, or a true documentary with biased insight?

Satrapi as a Storyteller is plainly evident by the fact that she has written a novel about a main character (herself) and the events in that character’s life. She has laid down and expressed a series of narratives in chronological order explaining the character’s life and setting for entertainment, educational, and moralistic value. But is that all Persepolis is? A story?

Satrapi as a Documentarist is shown by the narration she presents given certain situations. Although a reader may immediately think she is biased when it comes to the Iranian Revolution and other historical contexts and reactions, one must take a step back and shift the documentarian view onto the characters themselves. For Marji, how can one dispute a documentary about her private young life? How can a reader produce evidence to support that Marji was not sad when her Uncle Anoosh was executed? Or how her mother did not faint after saying goodbye to her at the airport? For Persepolis, the major documentary may in fact not be about the Iranian Revolution, but of Marji’s life.

So how are we to make a decision? As readers, we must be flexible and open-minded, ready to trade lenses in order to understand a piece of literature. One argument is that Persepolis is actually a work of Art (since it is a graphic novel), and how can any decision be objective in the light of that understanding? Well, considering I have asked a rather subjective question in the first place, perhaps this is the lens we the readers must look through in order to define our decision. Art, however, is something nearly impossible to define; there are infinitely many components which all, in the end, depend on the person in question’s approach. Art, as the form, is evident in the cartoons and graphics Satrapi uses to tell her story. Art, used symbolically, is shown by how the pictures are characterized by strictly black and white coloration, proving any number of points... but what about Art as expression?

Artists often create art just so they can express themselves; have an output for their inner turmoil, their memories, dreams, desires, life etc. It is something that they impulsively must do. In some ways Artists are considered Storytellers, explaining a moment in time in a piece they create. Schirato and Web’s article ‘Visual Narratives’ supports this idea in that “…Pictures—visual culture—can communicate or present not just forms, but stories too… Images and visual objects… contain a story, or a body of information...” (80) However, we also see that Art can infuse with Documentary, for example the famous painting “Washington Crossing the Delaware” by Emmanuel Leutze. This painting depicts the real historical moment December 25th, 1776, when George Washington crossed the Delaware River in a surprise attack on the Hessian-held town of Trenton during some horrendous winter weather.

“Washington Crossing the Delaware”: (http://dic.academic.ru/pictures/enwiki/87/Washington_Crossing_the_Delaware.png)

In this light and lens, we begin to see that Art can be both expression and narration; a story and a documentary. Returning to Persepolis, it is suddenly easier to see that Satrapi’s memoir combines both these forms. Satrapi is a Storyteller because she conveys the events of her life through artistic and literary means, expressing herself, her history, moral values, and culture. Satrapi is a Documentarist because she sets before us “The Life and Times of Marjane Satrapi—Between the Ages of 6 and 14” with historical contexts narrated through her eyes and her experiences, and information about the events of the era and its’ impacts on her directly.

So if Art is the lens and we see Storytelling as an equivalent to expression and Documentary equivalent to narration, then Persepolis has the potential to be both; Satrapi can be both a Storyteller and a Documentarist, despite the clash in definitions. Schirato and Web again explain that “Visual works may not easily tell stories, but they have huge narrative potential and great expressive power: the ability to convey emotions, ideas and attitudes, and to direct readers to particular narratives.” (104)

So, given this, what do you think? Is Satrapi a Storyteller or a Documentarist?





Bibliography


Documentary. Dictionary.com. Web. 21 Sept. 2009.
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Storytelling. Wikipedia. Web. 21 Sept. 2009.
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"Washington Crosses the Delaware, 1776," Eye Witness to History,
www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (2004). 21 Sept. 2009.
.

Web. 21 Sept. 2009. .