Reading Response # 4- Letter to Marjane Satrapi

Dear Marjane Satrapi,

I am writing you to inform you that I am reading your autobiography "Persepolis" for my english class. I have read it for a month so far and by reading your life story in only a month made me think a lot about how life in Iran must have been in the eighties, compared to the United States were everything was picture perfect back then. The first issue that made me ponder was the whole issue of social class. In your memoirs you state that people in lower social classes were being recruited to join the army just because they do not have money, and have no means of getting a higher education. But also the way that the Iranian army tried to get the young men who were in the lower social class, was promising them a better afterlife with 42 virgins for them to have. This Ms. Satrapi has happen to me as well because I do not come from a family with money. So the army was trying to persuade me, by telling me that they will pay for my education if I want to continue to get a Higher education. Just because I come from a low income family, does not mean I need to join the army. I could always find other way of entering college like acquiring a job to pay my education. I see this as a similarity for both of our countries but the only difference is that in the United States we are able to work up the social ladder if we are not happy with the type of social class we are in and for your country you can not, you have to remain in your social class and marry someone within it or else you might be ridiculed or maybe even be condemned from society.

In addition, the second similarity that I thought about when reading your autobiography was in both in the United States and Iran, people in those countries tend to criticize each other upon social status. Especially people who are in the upper class make fun others because they have better things than others. I feel that we both come from the same worlds because I agree with you with the same issues that I just told you about. Before I close my letter to you I would like to ask you if you would return to your home country? and what would you have done if you had the chance when you were little to change the way Iran was ruled? Also, I think that everyone should read your autobiography to understand the way other countries are ruled outside the United States and it was a unique you showed your memoirs in graphic novel way which makes it an interesting read.

sincerley,

Juan Pulido