Third Post - Community

Just ignore this....

Fourth Post - Conflict/Control

An average city life in downtown Tehran,

Who could ever guess,

Things would turn into such a huge mess,

Marina Nemat could certainly not, otherwise she would have surely ran.

Tehran was a great place to grow up and live in,

Until the Islamic Revolution

People’s rights were lost and Marina found herself in Evin Prison

A huge conflict in her life with little hope for resolution

She was taken as a prisoner for basically no more then suspicion of treason,

Although everyone was against the Revolution at hand,

Marina then met Ali, by whom she was questioned and tortured for little reason,

All basic rights and freedoms were lost and living conditions where worse than bland.

Plenty of conflict had begun to arise,

Marina hated Ali but he was basically the only way for her to survive.

Ali clearly had secure control over Marina’s life,

He was the reason she was not getting a death sentence of course,

But he had tortured and even raped her without much remorse,

And then Ali took it even farther, as he forced her to become his wife.

At times he treated her well but she would never be able to forgive him,

Marina’s life was completely out of her control, as at Evin no freedom was given.

Just as she and the rest of the girls in with her were starting to lose hope,

Ali began taking Marina on visits to his family, helping her to cope,

Yet reality she would never be able to fully elope,

She was worth nothing, absolutely no personal power; it was all a cruel joke

From Marina’s hardships you gain insight to her strong-willed personality,

She endured things that for many its hard to believe could be reality,

Control plays out strongly as the story goes on,

Ali is in complete power but for freedom Marina gives a subtle and hopeless plea,

Yet prison has already changed her and the innocent teenage Marina is long gone,

Life is brutal, how could she live it all as a prisoner to the government of Iran

 But suddenly things change greatly, Ali is murdered,

What does this mean? She despised him yet he kept her alive,

But instead of death, she is released as Ali’s parents fought greatly for her,

Suddenly from imprisonment to freedom, Evin Prison was now left behind.

But her problems lived on as what she experienced was too much to let go,

Her life in the past two years had basically been taken away,

The loss of control has affected Marina’s life to this day,

She will always remember even know she was a prisoner so long ago.

Third Post - Community

Throughout the novel Prisoner of Tehran, Marina has many relationships with different people that, without which it would have been exceptionally hard and in some cases impossible for her to survive her time in prison.  The main reason for this is that she went through very tough times and definitely was very close to giving up with herself at many times but it was the presence of others and friends in the prison that was able to bring up her spirit and raise her hopes.  But in some cases her relationships in prison legitimately saved her from extreme pain or in a couple cases even saved her life.  This blog is meant to address Marina’s relationships with these other key characters in the novel. 

            Once Marina was moved to be with the other girls in prison her prison life became much more bearable as she had at least of a little bit of companionship as well as people that she could talk to and relate to.  Marina is generally a friendly person, although being held in prison obviously hardened her significantly as it would to anyone.  But the girls in prison were generally friendly to each other and Marina was accepted well.  She especially bonded with a girl named Taraneh who she met in prison.  She would always read the Koran in the corner of their room and this interested Marina.  They became quite good friends.  Taraneh told Marina about how she was on the execution list and she was aware of how Ali had saved Marina from being executed.  Unfortunately, Marina was not able to get anything done for Taraneh and one day her time ran out and she was sent off to be executed.  Marina never saw her again.  They had connected well and this helped both of them to push through their days in prison.  Due to this, when Taraneh was executed it was awfully tough for Marina but she had to learn to deal with hardships such as this in prison.  They morphed her into a much stronger willed girl. 

            Another very essential relationship that Marina developed in prison was with Sister Maryam.  Sister Maryam was a revolutionary guard yet was much more friendly and caring then other guards.  Marina came to her very often to talk to her and discuss Ali and what her experiences with him were like and what his intentions might be.  It was very important for Marina to have someone to talk to about this topic because it was very confusing to her and, in some cases, she was not sure what she would do or even what she could do.  Sister Maryam was also able to protect Marina in several occasions.  The main situation was when one of the rougher revolutionary guards was set on brutally torturing Marina and Sister Maryam called up one of Ali’s good friends to come and save her.  Without her Marina would have had much more trouble physically and emotionally in prison as Sister Maryam acted as almost a big sister to Marina. 

            One of the most significant and the most affecting affiliations that Marina had with a character in the novel was her relationship with Ali, the revolutionary guard.  Ali was able to protect and guide Marina through prison and, even though at some times she did not want it, without him she would have not survived.  He introduced her to his family and would bring her for visits which, although she had a genuine dislike for Ali, helped her greatly to get by her pointless days in Evin Prison.  Also, in the end, if it was not for Ali Marina might of never got out of Evin Prison and got a chance to get her life back on track. “Father, take her to her family," said Ali (M. Nemat page 227)  This is was Ali's dying wish and with it his parents fought for Marina and got her out of Evin.  Ali played a huge role in Marina's community at Evin Prison and without him her entire story would probably be a lot worse.   

Second Post - Comparison

1st post - Character Analysis

           Throughout the introduction of Prisoner of Tehran you learn very much about Marina Nemat through the story of her early life before she was sent to prison and the experiences she went through to get to where she is now.  Marina was living in Tehran, Iran well it was under Ayatollah Komenini’s dictatorship, immediately after the Shad period.  Her world went from the Shad period where women could wear whatever they wanted to the Islamic Revolution in which women where women were now horribly discriminated against.  Marina was arrested on January 15^th, 1982 for simply wanting to be taught math in her math class and thrown into jail by the revolutionary guards at age sixteen.  Luckily, she survived these horrible times and lived to tell her story.  Through her story you can see various personality traits that Marina Nemat possesses.

It is evident right from the beginning that Marina is very well informed as she knows a lot about what is going on politically in her country and a lot of her friends are involved in protests against the dictatorship.  It is clear that she is also quite outspoken due to the fact that she refuses to sit back in school and let the teachers teach what Ayatollah Komenini wants.  She stands up for herself and surely a lot of the children in her class when she speaks up against them.  This shows how outspoken she can be, that she is very strong willed and the she will always stand up for herself.  These qualities can also be easily displayed by her experiences in jail and how she stays strong even though she is going through the toughest times possible and dealing with situations that children in our society could not even dream of.  She is clearly quite opinionated as well since she was fairly active in revolting against her government before she went to prison and she always had ideas on what was happening and what should be done to make things change.  Due to this it is obvious Marina is also quite smart.  She knows a lot about her country’s situation and she has a lot of thoughts and feelings towards that.  She also really cares about actually learning in school and shows this by standing up against her teacher and wanting to be taught the proper curriculum. 

            Through Marina’s experiences so far in jail it is also quite clear that she is a very brave girl and that she is quite capable and able to handle herself.  She is forced to go through very tough times as she is forced away from her friends and family and pushed into a cruel world in which no one cares for her.  She was brutally tortured and discriminated against in jail yet she was able to pull herself together and has been able to survive so far; especially being able to continue on after almost being executed.  This shows that she is exceptionally strong willed.  Marina was pulled away from her friends and family at such a young age and it is impossible for us to imagine what this could have been like and how she was able to pull herself together enough to simply get through her days.  But of course, she would not have been able to survive in prison without Ali, the guard who had taken a liking to Marina and was helping her along the way in prison.

            Ali was a revolutionary guard at Evin prison where Marina was being held and, rather than making Marina’s life harder he actually took quite a liking to her and was helping her survive in the prison.  In fact, if it were not for him, she would have been executed.  He was even able to get her moved to ward 246 of the prison so she could be with her friend Sarah, who she knew before the prison.  He took a likely to Marina right from the start when he interrogated her when she first came to the prison.  As she says in the novel he is almost like her “dark guardian angel,” although she does not even want to continue living on in prison and says that she would of almost preferred death.  It is hard to tell at this point why Ali is doing all of this and what his intentions are in the future.  So far he seems to be like a fairly nice guy, although Marina does not want him to be, in fact she almost despises him.  As she gets to know him later on, he attempts to persuade her to like him much more.  “Assadollah and I have been friends for years.” He said. “He was also a prisoner in Evin during the time of the Shah. But he’s gone too far. I’ve tried to change things in Evin, and I haven’t been able to. He wouldn’t listen.”  (M. Nemat Page 225)  This quote is an example of a nicer converstaion Ali would have to Marina trying to convince her that he was nice.  No matter what she saw a dark side due to the fact that she had been torchured by him. 

            Throughout the introductory chapters of Prisoner of Tehran, you learn a lot about Marina Nemat.  She is very brave, smart, open minded, strong willed, opinionated and much more.  Her experiences have shaped the way that she is and have impacted her life in huge ways.  Of course she had to already have a lot of these qualities going into prison to be able to come out of it alive and intact.