World creation.

I first read Dune a decade and a half ago. I soon followed it with its sequels – Dune Messiah, Children of Dune and God Emperor of Dune. I made a few attempts with Heretics of Dune but never made it past the first 100 pages. Frank Herbert wrote one more Dune novel before he died in 1986 and his son followed it up with a couple of sequels and a prequel series with a lot more books based on his father’s notes.

Though I lost my way a bit with the series, one of the things that fascinated me about the Dune novels was the amount of preparation that went into it, to create the Dune universe, even before Frank Herbert started the series. There are many series that run many books long and lasting centuries in storyline, from Asimov’s Foundation to Tolkien’s Middle Earth books, but many of them start with a limited timeframe initially but then get expanded over a bigger canvas.

Dune begins with the Atreides clan having to deal with a move to Arrakis on orders of the emperor. It is an important position, but also a dangerous one. Arrakis is the only source for melange, which allows space travel to happen and plays a role in a lot of shady things like prophecies, life extensions, cloning and immortality. But extracting it from Arrakis is not an easy task with gigantic sandworms and nomadic Fremen in control of much of the planet. And there is the rivalry with the Harkonnen clan also to deal with.

The initial part of the book introduces us to some of the basic concepts of the universe Frank Herbert had created. We find that humanity had done away with robots and artificial intelligence in a bygone era after a tremendous war. But in place of robots, many human groups like Mentats, Bene Gesserit, Tleilaxu, Spacing Guild and others use the melange to take on robotic characteristics to replace them. This also makes the control of melange very crucial.

As it turns out, the Arrakis assignment was a trap set by the emperor and the Harkonnens to get rid of the Atreides clan once and forever. Though the senior Atreides dies, his son, Paul, manages to escape into the desert with his mother. For the rest of the story, we see the two of them live with the Fremen and the sandworms to recover the planet and plot their revenge, while we delve deeper into the universe Herbert has created for us.

Like Asimov’s Foundation series, Herbert adapts many historic references to suit his world as well. A desert planet, a resource crucial for travel and a rising prophet from among them is a very obvious reference to the rise of Islam, but there is also much more than that. The Bene Gesserit plan to create a perfect individual, though reminiscent of the eugenics of 20th century, isn’t that different from the attitude of European monarchies to lineage. Even the interplay the emperor and his lords like Harkonnen and Atreides is similar to the “elected” monarchies of medieval Europe like the Holy Roman Empire or the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth. In short, Herbert has utilized a wider range of historic inspirations than Asimov, who had largely limited himself to the Roman Empire.

The Dune sequels build on Herbert’s world creation eventually peaking with Book 4 God Emperor of Dune, after which everything gets reset in a way that makes it a total break from the earlier stories, which is probably why I struggled with Book 5. Nevertheless, it has always been a pleasure for me to look at the initial books in the series.

Marvel, Assemble!

It was amusing to read Tom DeFalco, the editor of the book, introduce the book as an initial attempt to capitalize on merchandise sales by having a larger group of heroes and villains battle it out. Though the attempt seems to have failed, Marvel managed to get a best-selling book out of it. The premise was simple – bring most of Marvel’s superheroes together, X Men, Fantastic Four, Avengers and all its offshoots, basically all groups they could think of, along with many of the villains, divide them into two and make them fight each other. Just like the way Romans used to do it in their arenas.

Instead of a Colosseum of Romans jeering them on, the Marvel heroes and villains have the Beyonder, a seemingly supernatural all-powerful entity. Beyonder’s motives are not always clear, but it is very much like the combined gladiatorial arena audience smashed into one, all calling for blood.

It is kinda goofy in parts, except for the cringy part where Doctor Doom creates female super villains. It is not clearly shown why or how he does that. But I guess the world has changed a bit since when it was written in 1984. So, what may have seemed normal back then, may seem a bit weird now.

Unsurprisingly, there is a lot of internal politics within the teams and alliances keep shifting, with Beyonder putting Magneto, who is normally a mutant villain, on the hero side, causing a lot of problems for the Avengers while giving his fellow mutants, X Men, something to think about. Doctor Doom tries to play around with the premise, and almost succeeds as well, but in the end, everyone goes back home and live happily ever after. Well, almost everyone.

Marvel followed up Secret Wars with a few sequels and in the 2010s a different Secret Wars altogether, retaining some of the themes and elements of this book and its sequels. I have to say I prefer the newer one, perhaps because it is a bit darker than the original one. But then again, it is catered to a different audience in a different time, which I can relate to easier. It would be interesting to see which story and by how much the upcoming MCU movie will recruit. Either way, Doctor Doom plays a crucial role in both, along with Reed Richards and Spider-Man (Multiple versions).

The beginning of the end.

In Alaric the Goth, Douglas Boin quite literally takes us into the past – to late 4th century / early 5th century Roman empire. With the help of archaeology and literature, Boin paints us a realistic image of Alaric’s life, from 370 to 411, and the context of his life. It was by no mean an easy life. The Goths managed to live in a country that denied them citizenship and keep them away from the most basic necessities, but they eventually carved out their own nation that lasted three centuries despite many challenges. And it all began with Alaric.

After a brief encounter with the 410 Sack of Rome, Boin takes us to Alaric’s early years. There aren’t any sources for this time period, but Boin enlists the aid of later sources and archaeology to bring out Gothic life in erstwhile Roman Dacia. Born north of the empire’s Danube border, Alaric had to tackle an unpredictable and savage life in his early years, with many of his age and much older getting snatched away by Roman soldiers to be sold as slaves. But the empire also gave them opportunities. Life in the empire was much more stable and secure than outside it. When the Huns approached from the east and north, Alaric and his friends were left with no option other than to seek refuge in the empire.

When historians look for the reasons for the fall of the First Roman Empire in the fifth century, two of the oft-repeated reasons are the 376 Battle of Adrianople and the 410 Sack of Rome. Alaric lived through both and was instrumental in the latter. I will also add a third one – the 394 Battle of the Frigidus, in which Alaric and his fellow Goths helped Eastern Emperor Theodosius defeat his Western counterpart and seize the entire Roman Empire for himself. Boin sees this as a pivotal moment in Alaric’s life, setting the direction for his later actions (I do so as well, but for different reasons).

The excessive loss of Gothic troops at Frigidus appears to have devastated Alaric. Having come to the empire for stability and security, receiving death in return appears to have triggered something in Alaric. Boin sees it as a demand for Roman citizenship, an equal status with all Romans, since they were the ones he was fighting for. While Boin does attempt to make a strong case for it, he isn’t fully convincing. In early third century, Roman Emperor Caracalla had extended Roman citizenship to everyone born within the empire. Alaric most certainly was not. However, it is not clear whether it meant that Alaric’s children would have become Roman citizens if they were born in the empire.

After Theodosius died in 395, Alaric made his play against his teenage sons and successors – Arcadius in the east and Honorius in the west. He was initially successful after Arcadius gave him space in the Balkans, giving his Goths much needed land and security. In the meantime, Stilico, the Vandal general (and later father-in-law) of Honorius also sought Alaric’s support. When Arcadius reneged on his commitments to Alaric, Alaric sought out Stilico.

Over the next decade, Alaric made many attempts in Italy to get a commitment of land for his people to live and farm freely (Boin sees this as a call for citizenship, I don’t) but failed, eventually culminating in the 410 Sack of Rome. But even then, Alaric could not deliver, with Honorius secure in Ravenna. (Rome had stopped being the capital of the Roman empire for over a century). Even an attempt to attack Ravenna failed as a different set of Goths came to the emperor’s rescue, much to Alaric’s anguish. In the end, Alaric died of an unknown illness, unable to complete his mission. His brother-in-law eventually took over his Goths (Later known as Visigoths) and was able to create a kingdom with the empire in Aquitaine.

Douglas Boin has brought forth a remarkable narrative on the life of Alaric. Many, ancient, medieval and current, have chosen to bring down his efforts in creating a homeland for his people, but Boin is able to bring out the best about Alaric, a committed leader who cared for the welfare of his people.

Why do people still believe in gods? Because they need to.

Once upon a time, there were very many gods – the Mesopotamians, the Mesoamericans, the Egyptians, the Anatolians, the Greeks, the Levantines, the Indians, the Chinese, the Japanese and all those other civilizations, settled and unsettled, across Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas, all had them. Then most of the gods disappeared off to Omnipotent City, when humans stopped believing in them. Only for many to return in the 20th century as comic book heroes / villains.

Thor is, by far, the most recognizable of the comic book old gods thanks to his run with Marvel. But when Jason Aaron began writing Thor stories in 2012, he also created Gorr the God Butcher, who went on an epic crusade to kill all gods.

Gorr used to be a normal god-fearing chap until he had to go through a time of miseries during which his family died. When all his prayers were left unanswered, he rejected his gods only to find rejection from his community instead. Alone, abandoned and dejected, he vows to kill all gods and then chances upon a weapon that was truly godsend – one that can kill gods and get him their power. And with that he launches his millennia lasting epic crusade.

And as it turns out, only Thor can stop him. But thankfully, he has the help of two more Thors, displaced in time from the past.

While Gorr and the Thors battle it out over different timelines, we are left to figure out who is on the good side – Is it the believer for rejecting the thankless gods or the gods who seek out and answer prayers. True to form, Thor seeks out prayers and answers them in the best way he can. After all he is the God of Thunder and thunder comes with rain and the precious H2O that all living beings need.

Today, we live in a world where the old gods are largely left to fantasies. Churning of gods was nothing new in the old world. The Egyptians had seen Osiris, Ra, Seth, Aten and others dominate at various times, before all, including the original Egyptians themselves, were lost or forgotten under the might of invading armies. The Greeks stuck on with Zeus for a long time, but one wonders about Kronos, Ouranos and Gaia long forgotten.

Sometimes there were amalgamation of pantheons as societies merged. The Norse saw the Æsir assimilate the surviving Vanir after a long war, while the Vedic people had a pantheon mixed with devas and asuras, only to be split again later. This theme is more evident in the Roman and the Hindu pantheons. But as science began to take away the mysteries of nature and universe, the need for so many gods disappeared, and monotheistic (or similar) gods, some with traces to ancient multi godded pantheons, gained prominence.

As it turns out, humans never needed Gorr to eliminate gods, just science to turn the arcane into mundane. But even here humans still have a lot of things to figure out. As Arthur C Clarke said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”; making gods creatures for science fiction and fantasies, in a world humans can imagine but not create yet.

In the end, Jason Aaron’s Thors overcome their formidable foe. In doing so, we see why people still believe in gods. In times of severe hardship, humans seek out the supernatural in hope. (When does a child not cry out for mother when in need). Even Odin ends up praying to Thor in the end.

“Remember, remember the fifth of November”.

The Great Train Robbery took place in 1855. It was a sensation in Victorian England. The thieves pulled off a miracle and managed to steal a bit over 100 kilograms of gold. They almost got away with it, too, had it not been for random chance that led to one of the schemers getting captured in an unrelated crime. In the end, most of them got shipped off to the island for prisoners – Australia.

A century and a bit later, Michael Crichton wrote a slightly fictional version of the robbery in 1975. It was made into a movie in 1978, directed by Crichton, with Sean Connery and Donald Sutherland in the lead. I read The Great Train Robbery the first time while I was still in school. I recall loving its Victorian setting and super detailed planning. I have reread it a few times over the years and still manage to find the book fascinating.

The story begins with two career criminals, Pierce and Agar, and how they plot to steal the gold while in transit from London to Paris. One of the crucial plot points (and a minor deviation from history) was the acquisition of the keys to the safes carrying the gold. Much of the story revolves around this and the preparation of the actual theft. They even execute a dry run to see if everything falls in place.

But even with the best of plans, execution is a different matter.

Crichton brings in a lot more unpredictability into the execution of the robbery, making it more exciting and adventurous than it actually was. In reality, two of the co-conspirators worked with the railway company and played a vital role in the theft. But Crichton relegated them to the background as minor characters. In the end, the thieves managed to get away without much trouble, and the robbery was only discovered when the safes had reached Paris, despite its changeover over via the Channel.

The theft unravels on Guy Fawkes Day, or at least as per the book, with a chance arrest of an associate of the conspirators. In reality, much of the unravelling had already happened by then, ending with Pierce’s arrest on the 5th of November. But by shifting away from history, Crichton gives more grandeur to the plot. All in all, it makes for an exciting thriller of a book.

On a sidenote, Crichton describes the stolen gold to have meant for the Crimean warfront, when in reality it may have been just part of standard business transactions happening across the Channel. In the trial, Pierce follows it up with an unsavoury, perhaps justified, comment about Lord Cardigan in Crimea, as a way of closing the Crimean thread. It is a bit curious for Crichton to have chosen to do so.

And then there was one.

Once upon a time there were four anthropomorphic turtles and their dad / master / sensei. Now, all of them are gone, killed by the Oroku clan with whom they had a blood feud lasting generations. All gone except one, the last Ronin. The Oroku scion is now ruling over a New York city with his synthetic ninjas built by a mad scientist. The dystopian version of New York reminded me of the New York in Escape from New York. (In fact, there is a reference to Kurt Russell’s character as well). The Oroku clan controls everything in the city. And so, the last ronin embarks on one last mission to bring down his family’s nemesis.

And he fails.

As an honourable ronin, the turtle commits seppuku, only to be saved by the daughter of an old acquaintance. (Otherwise, the story would have been relatively short). The rest of the story unfolds as the ronin recovers, trains new recruits and sets himself up on taking on the Oroku scion and his foot soldiers once again, but now bolstered by his new clan.

As a TMNT fan, it was sad to see the ronin haunted by his three dead brothers as ghosts in his mind. But it was also a comfort – to know that family is around when you need them the most. As the ronin contemplates on his journey ahead, we see the turtle waiting for an ending, an escape from misery, and a chance to finally rejoin his family once again. With his seppuku spoilt, he finds a new family and a couple of old friends return to guide him towards closure and salvation.

The action is brutal, and there is a lot of it, staying close to the dark theme of the original comic. Lots of destruction, but not much blood, because the bad guys are mostly robots. The book carries a lot of flashbacks, neatly placed in the storyline, as the authors fill the gaps in the story’s past; the death of the other turtles and their sensei, and the ronin’s journey through all of it. Once the flashbacks get over, we see a split storyline, as the protagonists plan their efforts step by step and see what actually happens in those steps in the next sequence. Of course, nothing goes as per plan, but then that’s the fun part, anyway.

The book ends well in a sombre note, but then it sets up a sequel. I wish they hadn’t, but then the show must go on.

The end of an empire, and the beginning of everything else.

I first read about the 843 Treaty of Verdun when I was 12 years old. It was fun thinking about a bygone era when a mighty empire was divided amongst three brothers, simply because they couldn’t get along. It was sad as well, since a great dynasty that once ruled half of Europe disappeared in just 150 years after that. In fact, they barely lasted the 9th century.

Fraternal civil wars were a common occurrence in this bygone era. The Merovingians, the Spaniards during Reconquista, the Rurikids, the Mongols and many other Muslims dynasties used to make the mistake of dividing kingdoms in every generation, often leading to fraternal civil wars. So, when the three brothers, Lothaire, Pepin and Charles began to fight after their father’s death in 840, it was not at all surprising.

Or perhaps it was.

When Charlemagne died in 814, he had managed to outlive all his legitimate sons except one. This meant that the surviving son, Louis, named perhaps after the Merovingian Frankish king Clovis, succeeded to all his father’s domains and his imperial title without any competition. (He did, however, have a nephew to dispossess).

But this type of succession was a rarity among the Franks. In every generation, the Franks, be it the Carolingians or the Merovingians before them, divided the realm amongst the legitimate sons.

But the early Carolingians were an exception. Charlemagne’s father, Pepin, was the first in his family to be crowned king and though Charlemagne, Pepin and Charles Martel (Pepin’s father) all had brothers to compete for power, all of them lived substantially long years after that (43, 21, 23 respectively). This meant from the death of Charlemagne’s brother, Carloman, in 771 to the death of Louis in 840, the Franks had not seen brothers fight brothers for almost three generations. So, for a brief period of time fraternal civil war may have seemed to be a rarity for those generations.

It was also in this time of relative peace that the Franks had carved out their empire out of western Europe. So, war and violence still went hand in hand for the Frankish society.

Oathbreakers begins with the initial sequence of the war of the brothers, the Battle of Fontenoy of 841, and then goes back in time to the origins of the Carolingian kings. It is fascinating to read about the many internal struggles of an empire in-formation, especially by reading the unwritten words. Each generation attempts to sell their own narrative for the future by glossing over “problems”, and Garbiele and Perry attempts to bring these out in a detailed way.

The first half of the book covers the rise of the Carolingians from 732 to 840, while the second half covers the civil war of the brothers that led to the Treaty of Verdun in 843. In between we see a growing empire peppered with many rebellions that pitted sons against their fathers and complicated familial relations. Many of the notable nobles of the day were related to each other either by blood or by marriage and attempted to make the best use of an unstable polity to their own advantage. One of the repeated questions asked by the authors was the “what if”, but even when the Franks avoided battles at home, they were likely to have found it on foreign soil.

In one section, the authors comment about the Frankish armies going back to their farms after the “season” for military campaign was over. Interestingly, this practice is not that different from the Vikings who were marauding their coastlines and shorelines around the same time. In a way, it signifies the common culture shared by the Franks and the Norse.

Though largely limited to the footnote of history, the rebellion of Pepin the Hunchback against his father Charlemagne is given sufficient detail in the book. History has many instances of sons rebelling against their father mainly because of lack of clarity in inheritance. Parents avoiding making proper arrangements for their children continues to be a recurring issue even in the present day, king or not.

We also get a better idea of the imperial career of Lothaire. I always thought Lothaire to be the odd one out in the family, particularly because of his name. Made Co Emperor in 817 by his father at the age of 22, he comes out as a melancholic figure, as a foil when his brothers rebelled against their father only to depose him later for a brief while, fighting like “ten men” in a losing effort at Fonteney, partly in defence of his nephew whose claim to Aquitaine was being quashed by his other uncles. Though he managed to remain emperor after 843, despite losing the western and eastern thirds of his empire to his brothers, his line of Carolingians was the earliest to die out, in 875. Over the centuries since then, Middle Francia was slowly eaten up by West Francia (Present day France) and East Francia (Present day Germany), while new countries emerged from it as well – Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland and Monaco.

I had initially understood the book to be purely about the civil war between the three brothers, 843 and later, since the Treaty of Verdun did not really solve things fully. So, the detailed story about the early Carolingians was a welcome surprise. However, stopping the story at 843 leaves it a bit incomplete. The Carolingians continued on, very much in power until 911 when the East Frankish line died out (The West Frankish line lasted in power until 987). It was a time when the nobles, many of them descended from Charlemagne or Charles Martel in the female line or the illegitimate Vermandois line, had begun to emerge as powers behind the throne and as eventual rulers of the three divisions of the now lost Frankish Empire.

“The first rule of any government was to safeguard the people. We have failed at that” – Ramonda.

What makes a state?

The UN has 193 member states and two non-member states as observers. Many of these states have regions with varying levels of autonomy which may make them qualify as a state within a state. Then, there are a few states which are not part of UN but have different levels of recognitions in the international forum and have different levels of independence over their affairs.

But at its core, all states have ONE job – Safeguarding its people.

Sure, they may be doing a lot of other things, but everything comes secondary to protecting the lives of its people. And this safeguard isn’t just about military might, but also about the economy, the health and everything else that may impact the lives of its citizens. All states, irrespective of their format, have their own ways of implementing it and offset their costs through taxes and exploitation of available resources.

It also does not mean all the states out there are doing this ONE job. In an ideal scenario, a state that failed to safeguard its people will be overthrown by its people, but the people may not have the willingness or the resources to do so. And that allows failed states to continue.

This is the conundrum the Black Panther, King T’challa, is facing in his state of Wakanda.

Written around the time the Black Panther movie was also being made, many of the themes in “A Nation Under Out Feet” can be seen in both the movie and its sequel. The opening context is a bit different though, since T’Challa’s sister, Shuri, had already been queen earlier and had to face invasions by various Marvel characters earlier in the storyline. These invasions ended in loss, with Shuri in a state of “neither dead nor alive”, and T’Challa returning to the throne. It is to this failure that Ramonda is alluding in the beginning. T’Challa may have saved the universe many times, but the Wakandan royalty had failed in its job.

The story by Ta-Nehisi Coates is a journey for T’Challa as he deals with his failure in protecting both his sister and his people. He is faced with a revolution by various factions within his kingdom, unhappy with the regime. But he recognizes some of the demands by the rebels as just, leading to an ethical dilemma for the king as he feels the burden of the throne. In a parallel storyline, Shuri also has a journey, through the astral plane, as she learns more about the story of Wakanda.

Thankfully, there is an enabling villain in the book scheming and thriving behind the scenes, which allows the king to make a practical exit. In this sense, the movie goes one step better by finding a stronger centre. But both ends with a strong message despite the messages being different.

Wild, wild east.

Between 1973 and 1989, Shōtarō Ikenami wrote sixteen stories set in late 18th century Japan featuring the samurai, elite Japanese warriors, navigating a time of “eternal peace”. A part of this series, Kenkaku Shōbai, was translated by Yui Kajita in 2025 to give us the first volume of “The Samurai Detectives” (The second volume is already out and a third is scheduled for later in the year). It follows the adventures of the Akiyama – Kohei, the father, and Daijiro, the son.

The Samurai Detectives takes us back to the Edo period of Japan, when the islands were under the effective rule of the Tokugawa Shogunate based in Edo (which later became Tokyo). The emperor was the nominal ruler and was based in Kyoto at the time. It was a period when Japan chose to remain isolated from the rest of the world, a policy which they were forced to reverse after they had to reckon with US military might.

On its own during the period of isolation, Japan had grown well in peace, but peace also meant that military power waned, and the samurai, once central to Japanese military power, gradually lost their value to the society. The book is set somewhat rite in the middle of this Edo period which lasted from early 17th century to late 19th century, at a time when the samurai still held some value but were on the decline. The senior Akiyama was a master swordsman, now retired, while his son is an aspiring teacher, struggling to find a student perhaps because of his strict work ethic. Due to their affairs, both the past and the present, they find themselves entangled in many complicated scenarios which brings to the fore their skills of investigation and that of the samurai.

The book has seven chapters, each a story on its own, in a chronological continuity. It reflects the code of the samurai. We even have a case of seppuku happening because of a dishonourable act. But set in a period where law enforcement was very much different from the present times, it is interesting to note how matters like honour and loyalty play a central role in Japanese society. It is somewhat amusing to see feudal lords being mentioned along with their income. But it appears to be a reflection of the clearly hierarchical and structured Japanese society.

On a side note, maybe it has to do with the translation; despite having a historical setting, it was difficult at times to get that image. Some of the conversations have a relatively current English structure and words like “restaurant” give it a more modern setting.

Resilience.

What is it about ancient civilizations that helps them endure periods of foreign domination? By the time Herodotus began writing his histories, one of the oldest civilizations of the world, Egypt, had already survived domination by Levantines, Libyans, Nubians and Assyrians. Even though the people of Egypt have changed a lot in the intervening millennia, the ancient culture of their land have persevered in some form to the present day.

At the time of Herodotus though, it was the Iranians / Persians who controlled Egypt (though they would be driven out soon). And the Iranians have also had to endure centuries of foreign domination; from Greeks to Arabs to Turks to Mongols to most recently to UK and US. But through it all, Iranians have managed to retain their history and culture albeit alongside the emergence of Islam and introduction of more communities from Central Asia.

Persepolis, founded around 518 BC, was the capital of the first Persian empire, the one that ruled Egypt during the time of Herodotus. Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, though, is an autobiographical account of her life in Iran and elsewhere. She had a volatile childhood since she grew up during the protests against the Pahlavi Shahs, the autocratic rulers of Iran who had come to power with the help of UK / US and depended on them to retain power. But just when the unseeming victory of kicking out the Shah was getting achieved, it took a turn for the worst as their replacements turned out to be theological autocrats. (Satrapi’s parents had liberal and communist leanings).

And then it got far worse.

Iraq invaded Iran (The second Arab invasion in 1400 years, as Satrapi puts it) just as it was trying to get a semblance of stability going. With US supporting Iraq, the war turned out costly for both nations, as Iran stood their ground, defended and pushed back. It lasted eight years in between which Satrapi was sent to Austria at the age of 14, for better education and a better life which is where the first book ends. The second book continues on with her life in Austria and Europe and her return to Iran four years later, after the war.

It is in the first part, before Satrapi leaves for Europe, that the book really revels. We see the Iranian society hanging on to constant upheavals and the stresses it has to face. Though coming from a privileged background (Her maternal grandfather seems to have been a Qajar prince, from the dynasty Pahlavi had displaced), we can see many aspects of the civil society coping with the adverse times.

Satrapi’s childhood experience makes it easier for us to understand the present-day Iranian society. Those who were born in this time would be in their 40s and 50s now and forming a large part of running Iran. Having to face survive continuous aggression throughout their formative years, it is a society trying to find meaning in its identity and existence. The loss of life from the Iran-Iraq War, attached to the “golden key” to heaven, is a constant reminder of what made Iran Iran.

There are moments of clarity in some of the conversations that reveal more about Iran today – When Satrapi and her father celebrate Iran bombing Iraq after long periods of being at the receiving end, and the sad realization of its cost, when Satrapi’s mother talks about the continuous warfare in the Middle East and sighing at its inevitable continuity, and when Satrapi’s father realizes the major outcome of the Iran-Iraq War would have put even Pyrrhus to shame.