Tayo And Marji Identity
As the esteemed writer, Virginia Woolf once wrote, “I am made and remade continually. Different people draw different words from me.” These words continue to prevail truthful as time goes on, proving that different occasions and people can impact a person’s personality no matter their age or past experience. But these words raise the question of what instances produce the most meaningful or impactful character development. Tayo, a half-blooded Native American, in Ceremony and Marji, a teen growing up in the Iranian revolution, in Persepolis both display evidence that traumatic experiences can greatly impact the development of a person’s self-concept and identity by affecting the way the person sees the people around them, the way they see the
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world, and the way they see themselves.
First, religion and the local culture both provide traumatic events to help to shape Marji and Tayo’s personality and self-identity. At the beginning of both of the characters lives, they are immersed in the local culture. For example, at the beginning of the novel Persepolis, Marji narrates, “I was born with religion. At the age of six, I was already sure I was the last prophet,” (Satrapi 10). However, as Marji begins taking notice of her surroundings and the horrors they contain, she slowly starts to lose her trust and faith in God. In the novel Ceremony, Rocky, Tayo’s best friend, and Tayo are brought up following a Native American lifestyle, which includes following certain rituals when different events transpire. When the boys begin going to a ‘white’ school, they are ridiculed for their beliefs, leading them to question the life they had always known. After shooting a deer, Rocky refuses to bury it properly, causing Tayo to step up and take control. The text states, “Tayo knew that what the village people thought didn’t matter to Rocky anymore” (Silko 71). In this case, both Rocky and Tayo are given the choice of whether or not they would continue on with their native American traditions. Growing up, Tayo was always treated as an outsider due to his white blood, so his decision to maintain his native customs is much more impactful than Rocky choosing white customs. Tayo spends his whole life trying to fit in, doing as much as he can to prove to everyone that he is just as much native as everyone else. If he decides to stray from the native ways, he would confirm all of the doubts people had about him, reducing him to even less than he already is. On the other hand, Rocky has never experienced the loneliness of being an outsider because he is accepted by society, his family, and his friends. The native culture does not mean as much to him as it does to Tayo because he never had to fight for it, he is handed everything on a silver platter and expected to follow the path everyone set for him. In the same way that Tayo wants to succeed in Native American culture, Rocky wants to succeed in the white world, both of them having the motivation to prove everyone’s preconceived notions about them wrong. Therefore, Rocky starts to stray from the local culture and beliefs and Marji goes through the same process except hers being her relationship with God. She grew up with God as her right-hand man and with all of her activities, she was conscientious that God was watching her and judging her actions. However, as she evolves and develops her own opinions and ideas, she drifts away from God and religion as a whole. This loss of religion begins Marji’s spiral downward into the rebellious personality she ends the book with. The pressure she feels from her culture to maintain her close relationship with God further makes her feel rebellious as she is going against the widely accepted social norm. The local traditions and culture heavily impact Tayo and Marji’s lives.
Additionally, Tayo and Marji’s paths of finding themselves continue to contrast as their lives go on. Tayo tries to become more immersed in Native American culture while Marji rebels further against the powers at large. For example, while Tayo is visiting the medicine man Betonie, Betonie tells him, “They want us to believe all evil resides with white people. Then we will look no further to see what is really happening. They want us to separate ourselves from white people, to be ignorant and helpless as we watch our own destruction. But white people are only tools that the witchery manipulates” (Silko 122). Tayo applies what he learns from Betonie to his interactions with other everyday people; while at a gas station, he asks a worker for directions. After a brief reply from the worker, the narrator states, “He wanted to laugh at the station man who did not even know his existence and the existence of all white people had been conceived by witchery” (143). Contrastingly, in the graphic novel Persepolis, Marji is forced to obey local laws that neither she nor her mother support. Marji narrates, “And so to protect women from all the potential rapists, they decreed that wearing the veil was obligatory” (Satrapi 78). A newscaster on the television reports, “Women’s hair emanates rays that excite men, that's why women should cover their hair! If in fact, it is really more civilized to go without the veil, then animals are more civilized than we are” (78). The two characters highly contrast in their integration of local rules and ideologies. Despite Tayo knowing that native rituals mean nothing in science, he is at such a low point that he is willing to try anything to feel better about himself and the world. Rather than being like Rocky and ignoring the ceremonies he grew up with, Tayo chooses to look to these to make himself better. He believes everything Betonie tells him about the white people because up until this point, he was just alive, not really living or comprehending anything. This new information opens his eyes and gives him a different perspective from the one he had before, it gives him a reason to be alive and to live life before the witchery gets hold of everything. Tayo reinvents himself for the better based on Betonie’s words, based on the knowledge he has always known. On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, Marji rejects local practices and thoughts, specifically the practice of wearing the veil. While she hates it and views it as oppressive, she does not dare to go out without it because she has seen first hand what the consequences of the action is. Everywhere she goes, everything she hears encouragement towards the wearing of the veil, so her not wearing it would make her and her family look uncivilized and westernized, which was highly discouraged in Iran at this time. Also, Marji’s mother not respecting the veil further encourages Marji to resist the wearing of the veil as well.
Another major element that affects both Marji and Tayo’s identity development is the looming war that they faced.
As a consequence of the war, both Marji and Tayo become desensitized to it, which results in a major personality change in both characters. For example, Marji develops a negative outlook on the world due to what she continues to see around her. For example, she abruptly blurts out “We have to bomb Baghdad” after her and her family were bombed by the Iraqi pilots (Satrapi 82). Tayo’s experience with war results in a similar effect to that of Marji. He tries to numb himself from the horrors of his past which results in a lack of guilt and empathy, which is evident after he stabs Emo. The narrator states, “He got stronger with every jerk that Emo made, and he felt that he would get well if he killed him...His hands didn’t hurt either; the blood felt like warm water trickling down his fingers. He didn’t feel anything (Silko 58). After going to war Tayo faces PTSD which enhances his feeling like an outcast in his own community even more. The war desensitizes Tayo from violence due to the vivid and gruesome images he saw and heard about. After Rocky’s death in the war, Tayo loses his compassion because he no longer has anyone to care about, and he remains compassionless for months after he comes home. This enables him to assault Emo with a clean conscious, unaware of what he is truly doing because he no longer feels any sort of empathy towards Emo. Similarly, Marji also loses her compassion for others. She no longer views the world with a film of innocence over her eyes, she sees and understands that the world carries many bad people who do many bad things. She begins to generalize everyone in Baghdad as an associate of the Shah, and due to her disdain for the Shah and his regime, believes they are the enemy. She no longer cares that there are innocent families living in the capital, and would be willing to risk their lives to achieve what she wants. She is
hurt and confused by what she has experienced in her own city and wants to hurt Baghdad, no matter how many lives that costs or what it means for the future of her country.
The war forces Marji and Tayo to reevaluate what is truly important in their lives. For example, at the beginning of Persepolis, the reader learns that Marji wishes to become the next prophet and that her relationship with God is extremely strong and important to her. Almost immediately, her devotion to God is questioned when she states, “My faith was unshakeable.” But in the next picture, she says, “The year of the revolution had to take action. So I put my prophetic destiny aside for a while” (Satrapi 14). Prior to going to war, Tayo had promised his uncle Josiah that he would help tend to the cattle; however, Tayo is forced to break that promise due to his loyalty to Rocky. When Josiah died during the war, Tayo is faced with an enormous amount of guilt that contributed to his PTSD hallucinations. While talking with Betonie, Tayo comes to the realization that “He wanted to leave that night to find the cattle; there would be no peace until he did” (Silko 134). While war drives Marji farther from her original path, it shows Tayo what and who is really important to him. If it were not for the war, Marji would have continued believing in God and her prophetic duties. Marji beginning to lose her religion also serves as a metaphor for her losing her innocence. The war made her grow up much sooner than she should have, and she was not able to grow up with a childhood like normal kids. It was full of demonstrations and discrimination, and from a young age, she was protesting with her parents against the Shah. The war took Marji’s childhood, and as a result of growing up in such a harsh environment, Marji begins to take on a pessimistic personality. She acts out in school because she no longer cares, she gave up God altogether because she does not see a point in it anymore, all of this is a snowball effect of growing up during a wartime. The war affects Tayo in a big way also, however, Marji’s giving up on people contrasts Tayo’s development. When he gets back from the war, he is very similar to Marji, very bitter and angry about the time and joy the war stole from him. He also feels immense guilt about leaving Josiah and the cows, which is reflected in his episodes that he experiences both during and after the war. But, rather than focusing on his guilt and sorrow like Emo and Harley, he actively tries to improve his life for the better, one way being finding the cows. He figures that finding and tending to the cows will make up for his betrayal to Josiah, lessening his guilt and providing no fuel for his PTSD visions. Nonetheless, had it not been for the war, Tayo would have never deserted Josiah, resulting in no guilt or PTSD. Had it not been for the war, Marji would have never strayed away from God or been sent down her path. Tayo would have never had to determine that Josiah meant more to him than his friends or drinking. It was the war that sets their lives in the direction they were meant to go in.
world, and the way they see themselves.
First, religion and the local culture both provide traumatic events to help to shape Marji and Tayo’s personality and self-identity. At the beginning of both of the characters lives, they are immersed in the local culture. For example, at the beginning of the novel Persepolis, Marji narrates, “I was born with religion. At the age of six, I was already sure I was the last prophet,” (Satrapi 10). However, as Marji begins taking notice of her surroundings and the horrors they contain, she slowly starts to lose her trust and faith in God. In the novel Ceremony, Rocky, Tayo’s best friend, and Tayo are brought up following a Native American lifestyle, which includes following certain rituals when different events transpire. When the boys begin going to a ‘white’ school, they are ridiculed for their beliefs, leading them to question the life they had always known. After shooting a deer, Rocky refuses to bury it properly, causing Tayo to step up and take control. The text states, “Tayo knew that what the village people thought didn’t matter to Rocky anymore” (Silko 71). In this case, both Rocky and Tayo are given the choice of whether or not they would continue on with their native American traditions. Growing up, Tayo was always treated as an outsider due to his white blood, so his decision to maintain his native customs is much more impactful than Rocky choosing white customs. Tayo spends his whole life trying to fit in, doing as much as he can to prove to everyone that he is just as much native as everyone else. If he decides to stray from the native ways, he would confirm all of the doubts people had about him, reducing him to even less than he already is. On the other hand, Rocky has never experienced the loneliness of being an outsider because he is accepted by society, his family, and his friends. The native culture does not mean as much to him as it does to Tayo because he never had to fight for it, he is handed everything on a silver platter and expected to follow the path everyone set for him. In the same way that Tayo wants to succeed in Native American culture, Rocky wants to succeed in the white world, both of them having the motivation to prove everyone’s preconceived notions about them wrong. Therefore, Rocky starts to stray from the local culture and beliefs and Marji goes through the same process except hers being her relationship with God. She grew up with God as her right-hand man and with all of her activities, she was conscientious that God was watching her and judging her actions. However, as she evolves and develops her own opinions and ideas, she drifts away from God and religion as a whole. This loss of religion begins Marji’s spiral downward into the rebellious personality she ends the book with. The pressure she feels from her culture to maintain her close relationship with God further makes her feel rebellious as she is going against the widely accepted social norm. The local traditions and culture heavily impact Tayo and Marji’s lives.
Additionally, Tayo and Marji’s paths of finding themselves continue to contrast as their lives go on. Tayo tries to become more immersed in Native American culture while Marji rebels further against the powers at large. For example, while Tayo is visiting the medicine man Betonie, Betonie tells him, “They want us to believe all evil resides with white people. Then we will look no further to see what is really happening. They want us to separate ourselves from white people, to be ignorant and helpless as we watch our own destruction. But white people are only tools that the witchery manipulates” (Silko 122). Tayo applies what he learns from Betonie to his interactions with other everyday people; while at a gas station, he asks a worker for directions. After a brief reply from the worker, the narrator states, “He wanted to laugh at the station man who did not even know his existence and the existence of all white people had been conceived by witchery” (143). Contrastingly, in the graphic novel Persepolis, Marji is forced to obey local laws that neither she nor her mother support. Marji narrates, “And so to protect women from all the potential rapists, they decreed that wearing the veil was obligatory” (Satrapi 78). A newscaster on the television reports, “Women’s hair emanates rays that excite men, that's why women should cover their hair! If in fact, it is really more civilized to go without the veil, then animals are more civilized than we are” (78). The two characters highly contrast in their integration of local rules and ideologies. Despite Tayo knowing that native rituals mean nothing in science, he is at such a low point that he is willing to try anything to feel better about himself and the world. Rather than being like Rocky and ignoring the ceremonies he grew up with, Tayo chooses to look to these to make himself better. He believes everything Betonie tells him about the white people because up until this point, he was just alive, not really living or comprehending anything. This new information opens his eyes and gives him a different perspective from the one he had before, it gives him a reason to be alive and to live life before the witchery gets hold of everything. Tayo reinvents himself for the better based on Betonie’s words, based on the knowledge he has always known. On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, Marji rejects local practices and thoughts, specifically the practice of wearing the veil. While she hates it and views it as oppressive, she does not dare to go out without it because she has seen first hand what the consequences of the action is. Everywhere she goes, everything she hears encouragement towards the wearing of the veil, so her not wearing it would make her and her family look uncivilized and westernized, which was highly discouraged in Iran at this time. Also, Marji’s mother not respecting the veil further encourages Marji to resist the wearing of the veil as well.
Another major element that affects both Marji and Tayo’s identity development is the looming war that they faced.
As a consequence of the war, both Marji and Tayo become desensitized to it, which results in a major personality change in both characters. For example, Marji develops a negative outlook on the world due to what she continues to see around her. For example, she abruptly blurts out “We have to bomb Baghdad” after her and her family were bombed by the Iraqi pilots (Satrapi 82). Tayo’s experience with war results in a similar effect to that of Marji. He tries to numb himself from the horrors of his past which results in a lack of guilt and empathy, which is evident after he stabs Emo. The narrator states, “He got stronger with every jerk that Emo made, and he felt that he would get well if he killed him...His hands didn’t hurt either; the blood felt like warm water trickling down his fingers. He didn’t feel anything (Silko 58). After going to war Tayo faces PTSD which enhances his feeling like an outcast in his own community even more. The war desensitizes Tayo from violence due to the vivid and gruesome images he saw and heard about. After Rocky’s death in the war, Tayo loses his compassion because he no longer has anyone to care about, and he remains compassionless for months after he comes home. This enables him to assault Emo with a clean conscious, unaware of what he is truly doing because he no longer feels any sort of empathy towards Emo. Similarly, Marji also loses her compassion for others. She no longer views the world with a film of innocence over her eyes, she sees and understands that the world carries many bad people who do many bad things. She begins to generalize everyone in Baghdad as an associate of the Shah, and due to her disdain for the Shah and his regime, believes they are the enemy. She no longer cares that there are innocent families living in the capital, and would be willing to risk their lives to achieve what she wants. She is
hurt and confused by what she has experienced in her own city and wants to hurt Baghdad, no matter how many lives that costs or what it means for the future of her country.
The war forces Marji and Tayo to reevaluate what is truly important in their lives. For example, at the beginning of Persepolis, the reader learns that Marji wishes to become the next prophet and that her relationship with God is extremely strong and important to her. Almost immediately, her devotion to God is questioned when she states, “My faith was unshakeable.” But in the next picture, she says, “The year of the revolution had to take action. So I put my prophetic destiny aside for a while” (Satrapi 14). Prior to going to war, Tayo had promised his uncle Josiah that he would help tend to the cattle; however, Tayo is forced to break that promise due to his loyalty to Rocky. When Josiah died during the war, Tayo is faced with an enormous amount of guilt that contributed to his PTSD hallucinations. While talking with Betonie, Tayo comes to the realization that “He wanted to leave that night to find the cattle; there would be no peace until he did” (Silko 134). While war drives Marji farther from her original path, it shows Tayo what and who is really important to him. If it were not for the war, Marji would have continued believing in God and her prophetic duties. Marji beginning to lose her religion also serves as a metaphor for her losing her innocence. The war made her grow up much sooner than she should have, and she was not able to grow up with a childhood like normal kids. It was full of demonstrations and discrimination, and from a young age, she was protesting with her parents against the Shah. The war took Marji’s childhood, and as a result of growing up in such a harsh environment, Marji begins to take on a pessimistic personality. She acts out in school because she no longer cares, she gave up God altogether because she does not see a point in it anymore, all of this is a snowball effect of growing up during a wartime. The war affects Tayo in a big way also, however, Marji’s giving up on people contrasts Tayo’s development. When he gets back from the war, he is very similar to Marji, very bitter and angry about the time and joy the war stole from him. He also feels immense guilt about leaving Josiah and the cows, which is reflected in his episodes that he experiences both during and after the war. But, rather than focusing on his guilt and sorrow like Emo and Harley, he actively tries to improve his life for the better, one way being finding the cows. He figures that finding and tending to the cows will make up for his betrayal to Josiah, lessening his guilt and providing no fuel for his PTSD visions. Nonetheless, had it not been for the war, Tayo would have never deserted Josiah, resulting in no guilt or PTSD. Had it not been for the war, Marji would have never strayed away from God or been sent down her path. Tayo would have never had to determine that Josiah meant more to him than his friends or drinking. It was the war that sets their lives in the direction they were meant to go in.