Visualizing with Zahra's Paradise

My experience with graphic novels is very limited. Last quarter was the first time I had a chance to really dig into their depth and variety as a genre. I had only really recognized graphic novels as manga, and the newness of them made me intimidated. However, James is a great resource in this area, and I now recognize how versatile they are. I also truly appreciate how artistic and unique each text is.

Zahra's Paradise is a text that follows a mother as she searches for her missing son,  Sohrab, during the Iranian election of 2009. Sohrab goes missing after a protest. The mother and her oldest son try to find him in prisons, at the morgue, and in the cemetery, but they come up empty handed. Eventually, the brother is able to hack into Iranian databases and solve the mystery of his missing brother who has been killed and buried in a grave marked only by a number. The text points out modern issues of the Iranian government and emphasizes both corrupt and positive uses of technology.

This text probably challenged me more than any other I read for this class. I am definitely not a master of reading graphic novels, and this one was especially challenging because I wasn't completely educated on the subject matter and parts of it were quite abstract. For example, it may seem impossible to portray a metaphor in graphic novel format, but this text does just that. I certainly appreciate the thought and talent that went into writing and illustrating this book, but it is not for beginners. As for the subject matter, I found it interesting, and I loved the implementation of technology to make this a truly modern story. Below is my immediate response to the text:

I found it interesting that there was such a wide variety in the global graphic novels that we had to choose from, and that each story connects in some way to themes we have already discussed in the class. The novel I chose to read was Zahra’s Paradise. I am not sure if it was just this graphic novel specifically, but I find myself incredibly challenged by this type of reading. I think that I am so accustomed to reading plain text that trying to follow the unpredictable format of the graphic novel was a struggle for me. I had to really pay attention to the subtleties embedded in the images in order to understand the full story. Furthermore, my text was written about the war between Iran and Iraq and the corruption of the governments mixed with some technology and mystery. I could have benefitted with doing some research on these topics before I read. There were a lot of references to people and historical events that went a little over my head even though this text is pretty modern.

Despite my trouble with the text, I could really appreciate the time and thought that went into the images of the book. The images I chose to share with my group were just a few examples, but I could have easily shared more. Each image was thoroughly thought out and no detail was spared. I shared one in particular that represented the interworkings of the Iranian government as a factory with civilians on a conveyor belt being tortured and fed into the mouths of two giant, corrupt leaders. Every time I look at this image, I notice something new. These analogies are also something I found challenging about the graphic novel because the reader has to truly understand when something is metaphorical and literal. It’s not explicit in the text, and you have to be able to decipher that for yourself, but once I was able to do that, I felt that I could appreciate the text even more. It is these metaphors that make the text most impactful. They truly resonate.