Literature

When the title says it all

4 reading minutes

written by Diana-Alice Ramsauer · 03 August 2021 · 0 comment

Diary of a young Iranian haunted by a sanctimonious old fool is the prototype of a book by an author who didn't really know what she wanted to say. There's nothing wrong with this graphic novel. But nothing is really good either. Maybe that's because there isn't much at all. Doesn't this introduction make you want to read the rest of the article? That's a pity: there's still something to take in this first work by Shaghayegh Moazzami.

Once you've read the title, you already know the story. It's the diary of a young Iranian woman haunted by a sanctimonious old woman. Add some flesh to that description: we meet an Iranian immigrant cartoonist who arrives in Canada to escape her country's restrictions. Her name is Shagha (the author's name is Shaghayegh Moazzami) and she's not quite sure what she's going to do with her life.

Suddenly, an «old sanctimonious woman» appears in her story. This little demon on her shoulder calls her a Westernized whore, a deflowered girl, but above all a bitch, bitch, bitch and more bitch. From night to morning. It's easy to understand that this old woman represents the voice of the Iranian codes that pursue her in her life in Canada.

Pushing open doors

And that's where the story misses the mark. Trying to understand the heartbreak of a young Iranian woman arriving in Canada through this sanctimonious old woman? Not at all uninteresting. Learning that in Iran, the constitutional rights of men and women are not the same... Representing the weight of religion on daily life by showing the ban on eating pork... Illustrating censorship in the Islamic Republic by the impossibility of getting your hands on a Tintin album? Thanks, we already knew that. A simplistic and boring scenario.

Well worth an hour's reading

A simple piece of advice: don't buy this book. If, on the other hand, it should happen to be offered to you, don't throw it away until you've read it. Why not? Firstly, because the drawing is not unpleasant. There's a very subtle alternation between the «sketch/charcoal» strokes of Shagha's daily life and the lighter lines of the historical flashbacks she recounts.

Also because the author has a way of drawing the two men in her life with a certain finesse: the first, depicted at first without a head, simply as a present body; the second, sketched like a soft cotton cloud. Finally, because despite the simplistic, caricatured nature of the entire book, the depiction of Shagha's relationship with her husband is a little out of the ordinary. And it's good to read about healthy break-ups. For that alone, the book was well worth a review.

Write to the author: diana-alice.ramsauer@leregardlibre.com