Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis runs the gamut of humor from whimsical and childish to dark and ironic. This humor can be represented by slapstick jokes, found in captions accompanied by humorous images, or it can be more subtle, such as a double entendre in text or situational irony in an image. The humor Satrapi uses has a variety of effects, such as emphasizing someone's grim state in the way she frequently uses gallows humor. Different types of humor help create sharp contrasts between different moments in the novel, which allows for character development and the creation of lasting themes and plots. Satrapi uses literary and visual humor to portray people's descent from innocence to the depths of despair and hatred, which comments on the human condition: how human beings are at once so strong and so fragile that even in the most In the end, the dark ones resort to the healing power of humor. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original EssaySatrapi uses sophomoric humor throughout the novel, but primarily at the beginning of the first part to characterize Marji, the protagonist, as innocent and childlike. On the very first page, Satrapi combines literary and visual humor on the bottom splash. The caption reads: “We didn't really like wearing the veil, especially because we didn't understand why we had to do it.” The humor comes from the way in which, in the image below the caption, children are shown running and playing with their veils instead of treating them as sacred objects as religious authorities require. One little girl scares the other by putting her veil on backwards and chasing the other, shouting that they are the "monster of the darkness." However, even in this example of sophomoric humor, there is a hint of darkness, as one child solemnly declares that he is executing another "in the name of freedom." While it is clear that they are too young to understand what they are talking about, this suggests that they have heard of or witnessed executions. However, despite the sadness present in their daily lives, the girls in this splash continue to play innocently. Satrapi thus establishes from the opening page that Marji retains her innocent happiness despite having heard and perhaps seen terrible things happen. Satrapi creates another moment of Marji's joyful innocence when her uncle Anoosh tells her about his ex-wife in a series of panels. Anoosh's pain is shown in the last panel, where she sheds a single tear as she tells her granddaughter that Russians "don't know how to love." However, in stark contrast to the grim visual context, the literary humor here is evident in the way Marji is completely unaware of the implications of what Anoosh is saying and is callously curious. People less innocent than Marji or at least somewhat aware of the social cues when it comes to divorce would have immediately recognized that it was a depressing topic for Anoosh and would have comforted him. Marji, however, is still too young to understand, and so asks childish questions like "Don't they have heads?" when she asks him why Anoosh's ex-wife's head is scratched in his family photo. Through the amusing lack of social cues, as seen in these pages, Satrapi demonstrates that despite the social unrest surrounding Marji, she has not yet lost her innocence. However, as the novel progresses and the humor changes, his innocence begins to fade. Satrapi begins to mix and replace the more childish humor found in the opening pages with more sophisticated humor to show the progression ofMarji character. As Marji learns advanced concepts such as rationalism and communism, she incorporates them into slapstick and burlesque humor. In a series of two panels, Karl Marx throws a stone at Descartes, breaking his skull, to mock Descartes' philosophy of cogito ergosomma. This demonstrates the mixing of intellectual humor with slapstick humor, an indication of Marji's beginning to mature through her ability to find humor in more complex topics. Halfway down the page, his parents are arguing with another family about what types of weapons Iraq will use against Iran: “From the Iraqi border to Tehran are thousands of kilometers. Missiles that can reach that far cost a fortune!” "Well, that's what the rumors say!" At this point Marji ironically observes that “we Iranians are Olympic champions when it comes to gossip”. The humor here comes from how, instead of gossiping about typical rumor topics, they "gossip" about how they might die violently. This demonstrates how Marji, despite the grim circumstances she has found herself in, is still able to make jokes that relate the generally light-hearted pastime of gossip to the horrors of war: a blend of guileless innocence with the taint of war. Satrapi reveals to the reader that her character has yet to be fully corrupted by desperation. It highlights how children Marji's age, though unable to fully understand the horrors of life, can still turn to humor to make sense of the world they discover is darker than they once believed. As the novel progresses and Marji matures into a young adult, now known as Marjane, the type of humor Satrapi uses completes her transformation, with dry, morbid, and self-deprecating qualities. An example of such dry humor is when Satrapi describes how she attempted to embrace feminism by urinating while standing up. In a series of panels, he shows how his attempt fails as urine "dribbled slightly down [his] leg" (176). This is clearly self-deprecating humor, in the way he describes her valiant attempt at feminism as “disgusting.” The humor here is in how an act that should be formal and noble, considering how it supports a school of thought that gave rights to an oppressed minority, is instead ridiculed. Since Marjane performs the act, believing it would be a noble experiment, he is self-deprecating because his principles are taken lightly. Another example of this is when Satrapi details Marjane's suicide attempt by cutting her wrist. Although suicide is an extremely morbid topic that is generally considered unacceptable to joke about, Satrapi makes a dry joke about how "It has to be said that it's a little difficult to kill yourself with a fruit knife" after she fails to bleed out by cutting her skin. wrists with the aforementioned fruit knife. This is in stark contrast to young Marji, who would never be able to understand the hopelessness and depression that contribute to suicidal ideation and suicide attempts. Once again, Satrapi demonstrates how Marjane has lost her innocence over the years with the transformation of humor: she now finally understands how horrible life can be and copes, in part, with humor. Despite the innocence that Marjane has lost, Satrapi makes it clear to the reading audience that despite the darkness and morbidity of Marjane's adult life, humor is still to be found. This implies that although Marjane is suffering greatly, having to witness the ravages of war and feeling immense survivor's guilt, she still has hope. This is reinforced by how an entire chapter is titled “The Joke”. Instead of titling.