110+ Marjane Satrapi Quotes On Education, Friendship And Marriage

Marjane Satrapi is an Iranian-born French graphic novelist, illustrator, and film director. She is best known for her autobiographical graphic novel series, Persepolis, which tells the story of her childhood and coming of age in Iran during and after the Islamic Revolution. Satrapi has also written several other graphic novels and illustrated books, as well as directing two feature films. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Marjane Satrapi on education, love, friendship.

Top 10 Marjane Satrapi Quotes

1. Life is too short to be lived badly.
2. All big changes of the world come from words.
3. When we're afraid, we lose all sense of analysis and reflection. Our fear paralyzes us. Besides, fear has always been the driving force behind all dictators' repression.
4. Culture and education are the lethal weapons against all kinds of fundamentalism.
5. The world is not about Batman and Robin fighting the Joker; things are more complicated than that. And nothing is scarier than the people who try to find easy answers to complicated questions.
6. Evil is international and the fanatic is international and universal. There is no difference between a Muslim fanatic, a Christian fanatic, even a secular fanatic.
7. Image is an international language.
8. I respect humanity. That's my religion. I can't stand these religions that are really businesses. So much money everywhere that's going to buy a really nice house in heaven - or what? I don't get it.
9. People are so afraid to say the word "comic". It makes you think of a grown man with pimples, a ponytail and a big belly. Change it to "graphic novel" and that disappears.
10. Always keep your dignity and be true to yourself.

Marjane Satrapi Short Quotes

• Fear has always been the driving force behind all dictators' repression.
• I had learned that you should always shout louder than your aggressor.
• War always takes you by surprise.
• Start [the movie] in color. Color is always attributed as fun, and black and white is very sad.
• I realized then that I didn't understand anything. I read all the books I could.
• Once again, I arrived at my usual conclusion: one must educate oneself.
• A cat can never be well-trained because they're too independent.
• I'm not a religious person at all.
• I like to be sad once in a while. You need it for your equilibrium.
• I wasn't made to take orders. My grandmother used to tell me: 'Laws are for idiots.' She was right.

Marjane Satrapi Quotes About Love

Well, I would have much preferred to have had a normal childhood. I would have loved it if my greatest dilemma, at 14, was whether to go to Benetton for my pullovers. I would have preferred not to have cried all the tears I have cried. — Marjane Satrapi

I was in love with Darth Vader. He was extremely sexy to me. Once I had almost a sexual dream about Darth Vader. At the moment he was about to pull his helmet off, my husband woke me up and I was so annoyed. I told him, "I was on my way to kiss Darth Vader." — Marjane Satrapi

Not everybody loves their children. If that was a fact, all the children would be happy and they would make happy adults. Instead, we have lots of miserable children that later became miserable adults. This is a fact. We cannot change that. — Marjane Satrapi

Anything that has a relationship with pleasure we reject it. Eating, they talk about cholesterol; making love, they talk about Aids; you talk about smoking, they talk about cancer. It's a very sick society that rejects pleasure. — Marjane Satrapi

I don't watch many comic-book movies. But I loved 'Sin City.' — Marjane Satrapi

I loved Chiara Mastroianni voice, her talent, her generosity. We rehearsed for two months...She's a workaholic and perfectionist, like Vincent [Paronnaud] and myself. — Marjane Satrapi

There are things that I love in Iranian cinema and things that I don't. In Iranian cinema, you have to use metaphor because you are living under a dictatorship. — Marjane Satrapi

I love the French for their sarcasm, their irony. I love them for their bad moods. — Marjane Satrapi

For me, who loves to draw and who loves to write and cannot choose between one or the other, the comic is the best form. — Marjane Satrapi

A real love story has to finish bad. That is what I think. — Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi Quotes About Persepolis

The novels have done so well because the drawings are abstract, black-and-white. This adds to the universality of the story. "Persepolis" also has dreamlike moments, and the drawings help maintain cohesion and consistency. — Marjane Satrapi

The most natural thing for us is drawing. The characters [in Persepolis] are hand drawn. We're not technical people. We don't know how to type. — Marjane Satrapi

With live-action I think we'd have lost the universal appeal of the Persepolis story. With live-action, it would have turned into a story of 'the Other' - people living in a distant land who don't look like us. It might have been exotic, but also a "Third-World" story. — Marjane Satrapi

We can only feel sorry for ourselves when our misfortunes are still supportable. Once this limit is crossed, the only way to bear the unbearable is to laugh at it. — Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi Quotes About Iran

The Germans sell chemical weapons to Iran and Iraq. The wounded are then sent to Germany to be treated. Veritable human guinea pigs. — Marjane Satrapi

I was a westerner in Iran, an Iranian in the West. I had no identity. I didn't even know anymore why I was living. — Marjane Satrapi

The information I have about Iran is second hand. — Marjane Satrapi

I wanted to do my artistic work, and in Iran you have censorship. It was difficult for me to do the work I wanted to do. — Marjane Satrapi

It's true that, in Iran, women have half of the rights men do. And yet 66 per cent of students are women. — Marjane Satrapi

I call Iran home because no matter how long I live in France, and despite the fact that I feel also French after all these years, to me the word 'home' has only one meaning: Iran. I suppose it's that way for everyone: Home is the place where one is born and raised. — Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi Quotes About Life

In life you'll meet a lot of jerks. If they hurt you, tell yourself that it's because they're stupid. That will help keep you from reacting to their cruelty. Because there is nothing worse than bitterness and vengeance... Always keep your dignity and be true to yourself. — Marjane Satrapi

Of course, when you remember your life, you never remember anything in a chronological way. You always have pieces of memories, and some of these memories are full of details and very colorful. Some of them you just see the action and it's completely blank. — Marjane Satrapi

I was a child who had a life, who had hopes, and I wished that a bomb would not fall on my head. — Marjane Satrapi

The best thing I ever did in my life was to ask, 'Do I like everybody?' And the answer was, 'No.' So why should everybody like me? If people are against me, so what? I'm against them too. — Marjane Satrapi

Life is complex. You don't have any person who is nice from the beginning until the end. You don't always have the notion of redemption. The bad people don't always pay. — Marjane Satrapi

Life is absolutely unbearable. And we're going to die. — Marjane Satrapi

I try to look at life carefully and reproduce life the way life is. It's a question of looking carefully at how it is. In life, you don't have total happiness. People always say that. But you don't have total sadness either, no matter what situation you are living in. — Marjane Satrapi

But violence is news, to a certain extent, and people don't want complicated news. Because as soon as you realize things are complicated, your life becomes more complicated. — Marjane Satrapi

For me, drawing is a question of death and life. Every day I draw, I write, I do something. — Marjane Satrapi

It's always extremely interesting to speak at colleges. My books are taught in many colleges in America and are part of the educational system, so it's really important to me. I don't believe in so many things in life, but something I believe in is education. — Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi Quotes About Badly

Any medium can only live up to the strengths of the people working in it. If it's been used to tell bad or boring stories, it's not a problem with comics; it's a problem with the writers of those comics. — Marjane Satrapi

I am very bad at computers. I don't really know how to write email. — Marjane Satrapi

I don't like 'graphic novel.' It's a word that publishers created for the bourgeois to read comics without feeling bad. Comics is just a way of narrating - it's just a media type. — Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi Famous Quotes And Sayings

My culture comes from everywhere. I'm sick of this notion of nationality, that if you're brought up in the same city or same country you're the same. Even three kids brought up in the same family with the same genes, they are not the same. Just consider a human a human. — Marjane Satrapi

Human beings have a lot of problems identifying themselves with other human beings who don't resemble them exactly. But there's something about drawing that means that anyone can identify to a drawing. I mean, people can identify themselves with Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse. — Marjane Satrapi

A Muslim fanatic and a Christian fanatic, a Jewish fanatic, a secular fanatic, an atheist fanatic, a communist fanatic - all of them are the same. The thinking that, 'If you don't think like me, that if you are not with me, then you are against me;' this is something to condemn. — Marjane Satrapi

You are putting yourself in serious danger...' I think that I preferred to put myself in serious danger rather than confront my shame. My shame at not having become someone, the shame of not having made my parents proud after all the sacrifices they had made for me. The shame of having become a mediocre nihilist. — Marjane Satrapi

My mother was the favorite child of her parents. My father was the favorite child of his parents. The result of these two favorite children was me. And I am an only child. So I was convinced that I was the center of the universe. — Marjane Satrapi

You hear people saying, 'Oh I'm so tired, I've had enough of Cannes.' How can you have enough of Cannes? It's just the best place to be, like a fairytale. — Marjane Satrapi

It is dangerous when you start calling people from one part of the world terrorists or fanatic, and you reduce them to some abstract notion. If evil has a geographical place, and if the evil has a name, that is the beginning of fascism. Real life is not this way. You have fanatics and narrow-minded people everywhere. — Marjane Satrapi

Maybe the biggest problem is that there's no empathy. Nobody puts themselves in the place of others. Everyone thinks they are the only one to suffer. Or that they're the only ones who like ice cream or take their kids on vacation. — Marjane Satrapi

People, they think that animation is a style. Animation is just a technique. It's like, people, they think that comics is a style, like comics is a superhero story. Comic is just a narration, and is a medium, you can say any kind of story in comics and you can say of any kind of story in animation. — Marjane Satrapi

If you have a little sensibility or a heart, you have all the reason to be depressed once in a while. But the depression is like a motor for creation. I need a little bit of depression, a bit of acid in my stomach, to be able to create. When I'm happy, I just want to dance. — Marjane Satrapi

You draw the character from all angles - side, profile, back, etc. so the animator has this character in all the ways it looks like. — Marjane Satrapi

Here's the problem: the description of the world is always reduced to yes or no, black or white. Superficial stories. Superhero stories. One side is the good one. The other one is evil. — Marjane Satrapi

Anyway, that's how it is! Either they obey the law, or they're expelled!! And make sure they wear their veils correctly..." - "If hair is as stimulating as you say, then you need to shave your moustache!" My father actually said that. — Marjane Satrapi

I don't believe in the clash of cultures. The culture is one. The culture is a ring off the same chain. Picasso was very much influenced by the African arts, and he influenced a whole other generation of artists. So everything influences everything. — Marjane Satrapi

I realized that I was more of a sprinter than a marathon man. With a long, long project, I get bored easily. — Marjane Satrapi

Writing is not for me. I completely lose my sense of humor when I write. I become extremely pathetic, very sensational. Images give me possibilities that I don't have with words. — Marjane Satrapi

I think animation is like running a marathon, and making a movie is like a 100 meter sprint. The question is: are you a marathon man or are you a sprinter? I realized that I was more of a sprinter than a marathon man. With a long, long project, I get bored easily. — Marjane Satrapi

The most exciting time is when I think of an idea and how I imagine I can make it. It would be wonderful if there was a projector inside my eye that and it could just put the idea on the screen for people to see. — Marjane Satrapi

Racism is not nearly as important as poverty. That's the same around the world. What look like ethnic problems are really economic issues. If you look closely at all these conflicts around the world, they come down to poverty and economics and resources. The more poverty, the worse the war. — Marjane Satrapi

George W.Bush can go and kill thousands of Iraqis every day. By making people believe they are the enemy, and not human beings any more. If evil has an address, a nationality, you can exterminate all of them. This is fascism. — Marjane Satrapi

My real background was in art studies. At the beginning I was a painter, then I was this graphic designer, then I became an illustrator, then I was a comic artist. But for me it's a different way of expression, a different field of art. They're not separated; everything for me is related. — Marjane Satrapi

Comics are just another medium to express yourself. It's not cinema; it's not literature; it's just something else. It has a specific requirement, which is that images are used to tell the story. There are lots of crappy movies, with guns and action and Arnold Schwarzenegger or whatever. — Marjane Satrapi

Imagine if I cannot stand someone and every day he is here in my face, then I cannot work. Then, the whole time, I am thinking "I hate him, I hate him." But if I love him or I love her, then I can do anything, then I am comfortable. That's why it's so important to be surrounded by people that you really like. — Marjane Satrapi

When you say 'revolution' when you have only men outside, you know that something is going wrong. I'm not like a hardcore feminist, but I think that one of the things that makes the society advanced is equality between men and women. If half of the society is oppressed by the other half, it's not fine. — Marjane Satrapi

I took three years of karate because of Bruce Lee, you know. I was a green belt. — Marjane Satrapi

Politicians think they have answers for everything. We artists, we only have questions. — Marjane Satrapi

Graphic novels are not traditional literature, but that does not mean they are second-rate. Images are a way of writing. When you have the talent to be able to write and to draw, it seems a shame to choose one. I think it's better to do both. — Marjane Satrapi

That's the story of life - when you start enjoying people, it's always too late. — Marjane Satrapi

I don't consider myself as a feminist but more a humanist. — Marjane Satrapi

Revolutions just spread blood. Evolution - this is something that changes in the long term. Because history is long term. But today, we don't talk about history. The past is two weeks ago, and the future is two weeks after. — Marjane Satrapi

To speak behind others' backs is the ventilator of the heart. — Marjane Satrapi

Business is very personal. For me, everything is extremely personal. With actors, the fact that I write helps, because when you say to an actor "Oh I want you to do it a little bit more ...," without saying what you want more of, then the actor doesn't know what to do. But if you can put into words exactly what you want, then the experience of writing is helpful with that. — Marjane Satrapi

Teacher: What do you want to be when you grow up? Marji: I'll be a prophet. — Marjane Satrapi

I don't make a career plan. I take things the way they come. — Marjane Satrapi

'The Jungle Book.' It's one of the best animated films ever. I saw it when I was small at a cinema in Tehran. — Marjane Satrapi

I think that all stories - if you make movies about zombies and aliens - it has always to do with your personal story. If not directly, it is about your fears, your obsessions, things like that. — Marjane Satrapi

The things that I do today are the things I did as a child. When I was a child, either I was drawing or I was taking all the kids off my street and I wanted to make shows - I was all the time making! The only thing is, now I know how to do it better, and now they give me money for it. — Marjane Satrapi

If today I have to make a political statement, it is, 'I love beauty.' I think beauty makes people better. — Marjane Satrapi

I'd heard so many stupidities about my country since I left Iran. People had watched this stupid movie Not Without My Daughter [in which Sally Field plays an American who rescues her daughter from her estranged in-laws in Iran]; I heard so many things like that. I did not make Persepolis for Iranians. It was my answer to the rest of the world, to say, "Let me give you another point of view." — Marjane Satrapi

I'm very open and never write what I'm going to say. Speeches bore everybody else. I have to freestyle. Every time, from one program to another, everything changes and I improvise. — Marjane Satrapi

Hunger eats civilization. The West is not hungry; that's why they can say they're so civilized. Civilization is the biggest bluff! — Marjane Satrapi

If you know a little bit the psychology of human beings, you have to understand that if you say something you should not do, then everybody wants to do it. — Marjane Satrapi

There's this scene in "The Night of the Hunter" when the kids are downstairs, and you have the feeling that they're both in a room and at the same time it looks remote. And you wonder, How can you give the effect of both "inside" and "outside" at the same time. And you realize, by watching it many times, that around the scene there's this black edging. — Marjane Satrapi

We found ourselves veiled and separated from our friends. — Marjane Satrapi

The regime had understood that one person leaving her house while asking herself: Are my trousers long enough?' Is my veil in place?' Can my make-up be seen?' Are they going to whip me?' No longer asks herself: Where is my freedom of thought?' Where is my freedom of speech?' My life, is it livable?' What's going on in the political prisons? — Marjane Satrapi

I chose the actors that I was in love with. I cannot work with people that I don't personally like a lot. They can be the best actor in the world, but if the first contact is not good, if I don't fall in love with them, then I don't want to work with them. It's impossible. — Marjane Satrapi

I almost don't know how to write an email. — Marjane Satrapi

One can forgive but one should never forget. — Marjane Satrapi

I never wanted to make a graphic novel. As soon as you become a 'writer,' you have to be intelligent all the time... I like the fact that I have the right once in a while to say silly things. — Marjane Satrapi

I'm someone who lived in a war for five years. I received bombs on my head every day of my childhood. Did that stop me from living? Did that stop me from laughing? — Marjane Satrapi

It's cinematographic to smoke. Imagine Lauren Bacall without a cigarette. — Marjane Satrapi

I have been brought up open-minded. If I didn't know any people from other countries, I'd think everyone was evil based on news stories. But I know a lot of people, and know that there is no such thing as stark good and evil. Isn't it possible there is the same amount of evil everywhere? — Marjane Satrapi

Adaptation of books is never a success. When the author wants to make it, it's even worse. — Marjane Satrapi

I wanted to make a real love story with a bad ending, because a love story that ends good is the life of everyone - you and I, for example. I always say to people, You know, if Romeo and Juliet got married, nobody would care about them. Imagine Romeo and Juliet, six kids yelling, mama, mama, papa, papa. — Marjane Satrapi

I don't like the word 'autobiography.' I rather like the term 'autofiction.' The second you make a script out of the story of your life, it becomes fictional. Of course, the truth is never far. But the story is created out of it. — Marjane Satrapi

You know, the cynicism that is in the politics, it is not for my soul. It makes me - out of me, an extremely bitter, cynical person that I hate to see in the mirror, really. — Marjane Satrapi

You never have these moments that, you know, are always perfect. Always something happens. — Marjane Satrapi

The real war is not between the West and the East. The real war is between intelligent and stupid people. — Marjane Satrapi

Words also are filters. They have to be translated. Even in the original language, there is interpretation and some ambiguity. If there's a cultural difference between the writer and the reader, that might come out in words. But with pictures, there's more efficiency. — Marjane Satrapi

I had two major activities as a child. I was trying to put on shows with kids in my street, or I was drawing. Actually, what I'm doing now is exactly what I was doing then. Either I'm drawing, or I'm gathering people for a common project. The only difference is that now they are paying me for that. — Marjane Satrapi

Death, torture and prison are part of daily life for the youth of Iran. They are not like us, my friends and I at their age; they are not scared. They are not what we were. They hold hands and scream: “Don’t be afraid! Don’t be afraid! We are together!” They understand that no one will give them their rights; they must go get them. — Marjane Satrapi

Nothing's worse than saying goodbye. It's a little like dying. — Marjane Satrapi

I had this fantasy that in a democracy the government was the population. So I came to America and got a big slap in my face... Americans were not what I thought. I thought I was going to see bastards and I saw nice people, very friendly to me. — Marjane Satrapi

Cinema is a world of imagination. — Marjane Satrapi

Today, we don't talk about history. The past is two weeks ago, and the future is two weeks after. — Marjane Satrapi

I wrote the plot [for the Persepolis ]and Vincent [Paronnaud] and I wrote and discussed the shooting of the script. Vincent then took care of the production design, the actual shooting, and what was going on within each scene. It's very difficult, though, to draw a line between who did what. Because Vincent would say something, and I would add something, and at the end you have this film, yet no clear idea of who did what. — Marjane Satrapi

You see a picture and you understand perfectly, immediately, the basic thing that's happening. It's probably more accessible because we are in a culture of images. People are used to seeing stories that way. They understand looking at pictures. — Marjane Satrapi

As a director, you have to understand what is happening - if I don't understand it, you can't make changes. — Marjane Satrapi

To tell you the truth, I never wanted to become a moviemaker. It was like I was a cinepihile, and I go, like, three or four times per week to the cinema, and I like to watch films. — Marjane Satrapi

This clash of the culture, East and the West, us and them, Muslim and Christian, does not exist. — Marjane Satrapi

I'm extremely unbearable. You know, I'm narcissistic and at the same time I'm very charming - I think. — Marjane Satrapi

I'm not somebody that keeps the thing in her heart. I can get very angry for five minutes, but then it's finished. Once I've yelled, it's over. — Marjane Satrapi

America is a very special place. In this country, you have the best and the worst at the same time. Whatever you can imagine. — Marjane Satrapi

Life Lessons by Marjane Satrapi

1. Marjane Satrapi's work emphasizes the importance of resilience and courage in the face of adversity.
2. Her stories demonstrate the power of storytelling to bring people together and to foster understanding across cultural and political divides.
3. Satrapi's work reminds us that the personal is political, and that our individual experiences can have a profound impact on the world around us.