Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Growing Up and Growing Old
Identity, Culture, and Self-Expression
Gender and Oppression
Suffering and Trauma
Summary
Analysis
Marjane’s body begins to change. Between the age of 15 and 16, Marjane grows seven inches and develops a beauty mark on her nose. She thinks her new body is hideous. To make things worse, she experiments with cutting her own hair. Eventually, Marjane cuts it short, spikes it up with gel, and starts wearing eyeliner and a scarf. Julie thinks Marjane looks beautiful; Momo, Olivier, and Thierry say nothing. Even the young hall monitors at school love Marjane’s new look. They pay Marjane to cut their hair, which provides her with spending money. Momo, however, takes issue with this. He accuses Marjane of sucking up to the power-hungry “peons.”
If Momo wants to keep Marjane around, he has to make it clear that no one else at school is worth her time. Momo is obsessed with death, and Marjane represents his clearest connection to death and trauma—and he seems to think that if he lets her go, he won’t be as cool and edgy. So by accusing Marjane of sucking up to worthless people, Momo puts Marjane on the defense and forces her to explain why he should let her stick around. This kind of manipulation keeps Marjane off balance and makes her feel less at home in Vienna.
Themes
Momo insists the hall monitors just want to control everyone. One afternoon, he expounds on his theory that life is nothingness. He declares that when people realize this, they can’t “live like an earthworm” anymore. Marjane snaps that this is stupid; existence isn’t absurd and people die for their values. When Momo says that even that is a “distraction from boredom,” Marjane asks if her uncle “died to distract himself.” Momo can’t argue with this, since Marjane knows more about death than he does.
Momo’s insistence that life is nothingness reflects his privilege. Marjane’s narration implies that Momo leads a cushy, privileged life—he’s never had to fight or work for anything. For Marjane, who’s come from a war-torn country and whose parents fought for their rights, Momo looks like a spoiled child. Even if Momo doesn’t argue with Marjane, it’s still implied that he doesn’t necessarily believe her.
Themes
Thierry rolls joints while everyone else keeps watch. Marjane doesn’t like smoking, but she participates to feel like part of the group. To her mind, marijuana is no different from heroin. She remembers her parents talking about her cousin, who became addicted to heroin and started to “look like a vegetable.” Not wanting to become a vegetable, Marjane only pretends to smoke and sneakily rubs her eyes to make them look bloodshot. As Marjane does this, she feels more and more like she’s moving away from her culture and betraying her parents. She feels like a coward every time they call, since they still think she’s a such a perfect child. If they knew she was dressed like a punk and smoked joints to fit in, she suspects they wouldn’t think so highly of her anymore.
At this point, Marjane has resolved to assimilate into her friend group and into Western culture more broadly. But she has to compromise who she is inside (an independent, proud Iranian woman) in order to externally fit in. Given that Marjane only pretends to smoke and feels like she’s betraying her parents, it seems that she finds her efforts to fit in emotionally taxing. She feels trapped between two cultures, two identities, and two realities.
Themes
Marjane feels so guilty that she changes the channel whenever news of Iran comes on TV. Whenever friends or classmates ask if Marjane has seen the latest from Iran, she lies and says her parents are fine. Despite her efforts to distance herself from her past, Marjane still dreams about her family at night. Once at a party, Marjane tells a boy she’s French—at this point, Europeans see Iran as evil and she doesn’t want that burden. However, Marjane remembers how her grandmother always told her to keep her dignity and stay true to herself.
It’s understandable why Marjane would avoid news of Iran, as she wants to avoid any extra trauma. In addition to enlightening her as to what her parents are suffering on a daily basis, news of Iran also reminds Marjane more generally that she has ties in Iran. Since she’s concerned with assimilating and has to deal with others’ xenophobia and bigotry, it’s easier to pretend she’s not Iranian and knows nothing about Iran.
Themes
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Unfortunately, though, the truth comes out a few days later. From a cafe booth, Marjane listens to classmates giggle that she’s ugly and that she lies about having seen war to make herself seem interesting. They also say they’d commit suicide if their brother dated Marjane. Finally, Marjane loses her temper and shouts that she’s proud to be Iranian. At first, she wants to die of shame. Then, she realizes she redeemed herself. She understands what her grandmother meant: that if Marjane isn’t comfortable with herself, she’ll never be comfortable.
Marjane’s classmates’ xenophobia is on full display in this passage as they condemn romantic relationships between Marjane and any Viennese boys. In this moment, Marjane comes to an important conclusion: that she is genuinely proud to be Iranian. If she ignores her identity, she’ll never find peace or happiness. In essence, it’s more important that Marjane figure out who she is and take pride in her authentic identity than it is to try to assimilate.
Themes
