Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi (; ; 21 September 19693 June 2026) was an Iranian and French comic book author, film director, and children's book author. Her best-known works include the graphic novel Persepolis and its film adaptation; the graphic novel Chicken with Plums; Woman, Life, Freedom; and the Marie Curie biopic Radioactive.

The success of Persepolis established Satrapi as one of the most widely read Iranian authors in the world, and her role in co-directing the film adaptation led to her becoming the first woman to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.

Early life Satrapi was born on 21 September 1969 in Rasht, northwestern Iran, where she spent her first 20 days before the family moved to Tehran, where she grew up in an upper-middle class Iranian family and attended the French-language Razi High School.

Both her parents were politically active and supported leftist causes against the monarchy of the last Shah. According to Satrapi, her maternal great-grandfather was Naser al-Din Shah Qajar, the shah of Iran from 1848 to 1896. After the Iranian Revolution in 1979, her parents lived under the rule of Islamic fundamentalists who had taken power. His body was buried in an unmarked grave at the Evin Prison.

Although Satrapi's parents encouraged her to be strong-willed and defend her rights, they grew concerned for her safety. In her teens, she skirted trouble with police for disregarding modesty codes and buying music banned by the regime. Feeling like an outsider even among friends, Satrapi turned to drugs and struggled academically after a breakup.

When Satrapi was 14, her parents arranged for her to live with a family friend to study abroad, and in 1983 she arrived in Vienna, Austria, to attend the Lycée Français de Vienne. She stayed in Vienna through her secondary school years, often moving from one residence to another and sometimes staying at friends' homes. Eventually, she became homeless and lived on the streets for three months, until she was hospitalized for a near-fatal bout of bronchitis. Despite the hardships, in Austria she began to embrace and take pride in her Iranian heritage.

Upon recovery, she returned to Iran and studied visual communication, obtaining a master's degree from Islamic Azad University in Tehran. During this time, the Guardians of the Revolution took complete control. She met Reza, a veteran of the Iran–Iraq War, and married him in 1993. Initially, their marriage was happy, but over time they grew apart. They divorced in 1994.

When she was 21, Satrapi married a veteran of the Iran–Iraq War, whom she divorced after three years. After the divorce, she moved to Strasbourg, France, to study at the Haute école des arts du Rhin (HEAR). Her parents encouraged her to stay in Europe permanently. Along with her native language, Farsi, she spoke five European languages: French, English, Swedish, German, and Italian.

Career Comics Satrapi became famous worldwide for her autobiographical comic books, originally published in French in four parts from 2000 to 2003 and in English in two parts in 2003 and 2004, respectively, as Persepolis and Persepolis 2. They depict her childhood in Iran and adolescence in Europe following the Iranian revolution.

Satrapi preferred the term "comic book" to "graphic novel". "People are so afraid to say the word 'comic, she told The Guardian in 2011. "It makes you think of a grown man with pimples, a ponytail and a big belly. Change it to 'graphic novel' and that disappears. No: it's all comics."

In 2019, Persepolis ranked 47th on The Guardians list of the 100 best books of the 21st century. In 2024, it ranked 48th on the New York Timess list of the 100 best books of the 21st century.

Persepolis won the Angoulême Coup de Coeur Award at the Angoulême International Comics Festival. In 2013, Chicago schools were ordered by the district to remove Persepolis from classrooms because of its graphic language and violence. The ban incited protests and controversy. Her later publication Embroideries (Broderies) was also nominated for the Angoulême Album of the Year award in 2003, an award her graphic novel Chicken with Plums (Poulet aux prunes) won in 2005. She also contributed to the op-ed section of The New York Times.

ComicsAlliance listed Satrapi as one of 12 women cartoonists deserving of lifetime achievement recognition.

Films

Persepolis was adapted into an animated film of the same name. It debuted at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival in May and shared a Special Jury Prize with Carlos Reygadas's Silent Light (Luz silenciosa). Co-written and co-directed by Satrapi and director Vincent Paronnaud, the French-language picture stars the voices of Chiara Mastroianni, Catherine Deneuve, Danielle Darrieux, and Simon Abkarian. The English version, starring the voices of Gena Rowlands, Sean Penn, and Iggy Pop, was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the 80th Academy Awards in January 2008. Satrapi was the first woman to be nominated for the award. The Iranian government denounced the film and got it dropped from the Bangkok International Film Festival. Persepolis was a successful film commercially (with over a million admissions in France alone) and critically, winning Best First Film at the César Awards 2008. The film reflects many tendencies of first-time filmmaking in France, such as a focus on intimate rites of passage and ambivalent recounting of coming-of-age moments.

In late 2011, Satrapi and Paronnaud continued their success with another film adaptation of one of Satrapi's graphic novels—the live-action comedy drama Chicken with Plums. It follows one of Satrapi's relatives' final days, as he has lost the will to live.

In 2012, Satrapi directed and acted in the comedy crime film La bande des Jotas (Gang of the Jotas), from her own screenplay.

In 2014, Satrapi directed the black comedy film The Voices, from a screenplay by Michael R. Perry. The film stars Ryan Reynolds, Anna Kendrick, and Gemma Arterton, and follows a factory worker with schizophrenia whose hallucinations drive him to commit murder while conversing with his talking pets and the severed heads of his victims.

In 2019, Satrapi directed Radioactive, a biopic of two-time Nobel Prize winner Marie Curie. It is an adaptation of a book of the same name. Initially intended to premiere in 2020, it was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic and later released online.

In 2021, Satrapi starred in the French animated short film The Soloists, voicing Ava, one of the three eponymous sisters fighting to express their musical talents in a country with blatantly sexist laws.

In 2024, Satrapi directed another black comedy, Dear Paris (Paradis Paris), which was featured at the Torino Film Festival. It explores several interconnected stories of people's lives affected by death.

Political activism After the Iranian elections in June 2009, Satrapi and Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf appeared before Green Party members in the European Parliament to present a document allegedly received from a member of the Iranian electoral commission claiming that the reform candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi, had actually won the election, and that the conservative incumbent, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, had received only 12% of the vote.

In 2022, Satrapi voiced her support for the Mahsa Amini protests. She continued on this path by directing and coordinating a graphic anthology documenting the uprising and its cultural context for Western audiences in solidarity with these women. She believed in the Woman, Life, Freedom movement as a cultural revolution. She also supported protests for freedom and rights against the regime in Iran.

In January 2025, Satrapi refused the Legion of Honour, France's highest and most prestigious award, citing French hypocrisy toward Iranian people. In an open letter addressed to the Minister of Culture, she explained her discontent regarding the , writing, "I can't continue seeing the children of Iranian oligarchs come to spend their holidays in France, even become naturalised, while at the same time young dissidents have difficulty in obtaining a tourist visa to come to see what the country of the Enlightenment and human rights looks like." She wrote, "supporting the women's revolution in Iran cannot be reduced to photos with victims or celebrities during commemorations of the death of Mahsa Amini... Iranians don't need communication, we need concrete actions." Satrapi emphasised that her rejection of the decoration "is in no way an action or a thought against France. On the contrary, I deeply love this country, which is my country." She was married to Ripa until his death from cancer on 8 April 2025, at the age of 53. After Ripa's death, Satrapi set up the Mattias and Marjane Ripa-Satrapi Cinema Foundation as a way to provide support for foreign students who want to study filmmaking in Paris. Satrapi died on 3 June 2026, and her family said she had "died of sadness" over her husband's death. Numerous public figures paid tribute to Satrapi, including writer Margaret Atwood, President of France Emmanuel Macron, Iranian human rights activist Narges Mohammadi, and actress Rosamund Pike, who starred in Satrapi's film Radioactive.

Satrapi's funeral was held on 19 June 2026 at the Père Lachaise Cemetery, where she was buried. With the funeral open to the public, attendees included actresses Catherine Deneuve and Golshifteh Farahani.

Works French

Sagesses et malices de la Perse (2001, with Lila Ibrahim-Ouali and Bahman Namwar-Motalg, Albin Michel, ) Les monstres n'aiment pas la lune (2001, Nathan Jeunesse, ) Ulysse au pays des fous (2001, with Jean-Pierre Duffour, Nathan Jeunesse, ) Ajdar (2002, Nathan Jeunesse, ) Broderies (2003, L'Association, )

Le Soupir (2004, Bréal Jeunesse, ) Femme, vie, liberté (2023, L'Iconoclaste, )

English

Embroideries (2005, Pantheon )

Monsters Are Afraid of the Moon (2006, Bloomsbury, ) The Sigh. Bloom Entertainment. 2011.

Filmography Year Title Director Writer Notes Ref. 2007 Persepolis Co-directed with Vincent Paronnaud 2011 Chicken with Plums 2012 2014 The Voices 2019 Radioactive 2024 Dear Paris

Acting roles Year Title Role Notes Ref. 2007 Persepolis Actress/Gossip/Schloss (narration) Voice roles 2009 The French Kissers Saleswoman from the music store 2012 Gang of the Jotas The woman 2017 The Simpsons Herself (narration) Episode: "Springfield Splendor" 2021 The Soloists Ava Voice role 2024 Dear Paris Director of the action film

Awards and nominations Year Award Category Title Result Ref.2007 Cinema for Peace Foundation Most Valuable Film of the YearPersepolis Academy Awards Best Animated Feature BAFTA Awards Best Film Not in the English Language Best Animated Film Golden Globe Awards Best Foreign Language Film

Other awards 2001: Angoulême Coup de Coeur Award for Persepolis 2002: Angoulême Prize for Scenario for Persepolis: Tome 2 2005: Angoulême Best Comic Book Award for Poulet aux prunes 2008: Lulu of the Year Award (Friends of Lulu) 2009: Doctor honoris causa both at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and the Université catholique de Louvain from Belgium 2013: Noor Iranian Film Festival award for Best Feature Film Director (shared with Vincent Paronnaud), for Chicken with Plums 2024: Princess of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities. 2025: (Declined) Legion of Honour.