Persepolis

Um, a webcomic that revisits Greek mythology, it's Rachel Smythe's, uh, Lore Olympus, I think is an excellent example of the new webcomic format and of, uh, how it can lead to reimagination, and started off, uh, as a, uh, newbie author, uh, working in, uh, graphical design, posting her comic book online that now it's grown into a global phenomenon.

And finally, against the accusations that comics are only good for childish fan- fantastic stories, uh, two comics that are relevant for the present day, so Joe Sacco's, uh, Palestine, which is a nonfiction journalistic comic about his, uh, travels in Palestine in the 1990s, and Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis, which is an autobiographical memoir of the, uh, Iranian revolution as experienced by the author.

Uh, that's been really interesting.

Um, thank you so much for talking us through this intriguing topic.

[laughs]

There's still time, but I read Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi.

I loved this book.

So this was a graphic novel that I found on a shelf at-

This week I talk with Lei-Wen Pham, artist on the new graphic novel As I Dream of You.

The book was written by Jennifer Lee, writer and director of Frozen and other films.

As I Dream of You is a book that intentionally misleads you in several ways, and the result is really moving.

At first glance I thought it was going to be a clone of Craig Thompson's Blankets, but it turns out to be something quite different from that.

Leigh Wynn has worked more in children's book illustration than comics, and she talks about the difference between the two, working with Jennifer Lee, the meaning in the book's coloring, and more.

First, I want to thank our patrons for supporting the Deconstructing Comics family of podcasts.

You can pitch in by pledging at least $2 a month at patreon.com slash deconcomics, or you can help us for free by reviewing the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever podcast reviews can be posted.

I did not know who she was.

I mean, you've still got a lot of, you know, early 20th century American men writing.

But the but beyond that, like the set of authors and also the worldview experiences that they're bringing to that, like like Persepolis is on there.

Right.

Which is a graphic novel.

And if it were, Bechdel would probably be among, you know, the first ranked.

Like, Persepolis and these kinds of books that, like-

Yes, I was thinking, yeah

... really matter.

Persepolis is probably one of the early contenders.

Um-

Yeah

So the motivation for me was to try a new genre, and as a personal note, As a child, I loved graphic novels.

And the two of the most influential ones, if you're not familiar with the genre, is Mouse by Art Spiegelman about the Holocaust and Marjan Satrapi's Persepolis about the Iranian Revolution, these two graphic novels.

tens of millions around the world have been translated into multiple languages.

And so there is a tradition in the comics and graphic novel world of recounting authoritarianism.

One that I would suggest, although Dion, I'm sure you've probably already read it.

And this is one of the classics, but I think it's quite timely because of the recent death, sadly, of the author is Persepolis.

Oh, yes.

Right.

Join us for that discussion.

And after that, but with current events in Iran being all over the news, we decided it would be a great time to read Persepolis, the story of a childhood.

by Marjane Satrapi, published in 2004 and considered really a modern masterpiece of graphic nonfiction.

Yeah, I'm excited about that.