What Does the Title Tell Us?

I’ll be fully honest in saying that I had to read the first half of this book twice to understand what I was reading as I kind of flew past it the first time because I was only focused on the words rather than the words and the pictures in the panels. Once I re-read it and focused more on the panels as a whole, I felt like I had a better idea of what the story was about. With that said, for this week’s edition of the Jazzy Journal, I thought I would talk about the title of the book, Persepolis, means and how it foreshadows the events of the story.

Initially, I was unsure what the word “Persepolis” meant. I googled it and found that is directly translates to “the Persian city” or “the region of Persia.” This tells us where the book will be set and allows us room to assume, based on prior knowledge, what the events of the story will be. I think, based on the title alone that the title does tell the truth about the story because it is where the story takes place. I’m not fully sure, within the first eighty pages, if we have found out all that we are supposed to know about the title yet, but I am sure that there is more to come.

In the chapter called “Persepolis” is where I find the title to be the most on-target with the story. In this chapter Marji and her grandmother talk about her grandfather and his life in Persia and also the Shah and how he ruled Persia before Marji’s life. The title is relevant throughout the story because it is about the Iranian revolution and Iran is where the land known as Persia was.