Gene Luen Yang
Gene Luen Yang
Gene Luen Yang is an American writer of graphic novels and comics. Until recently, he was the Director of Information Services and taught computer science at Bishop O'Dowd High School in Oakland, California and travels all over the world, speaking about graphic novels and comics at comic book conventions and universities, schools, and libraries. In 2012, Yang joined the faculty at Hamline University, as a part of the Low-Residency Master of Fine Arts in Writing for Children and Young Adultsprogram...
NationalityChinese
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth9 August 1973
CountryChina
I was a superhero fan in the '90s, so I'm definitely familiar with John Romita, Jr. In fact, when I was in high school, I would go to local conventions and line up and get his signature.
I think every time you work with another collaborator, there's an adjustment process where you figure out the other person's strengths, and that has definitely happened for me.
I talk about religion because it's one of the ways human beings find power and belonging. Religion is more than just that - I think faith traditions give us ways to talk about experiences of the numinous, too - but power and belonging are a big part of it.
Religion and culture are two important ways in which we as humans find our identity. That's certainly true for me.
I love the interplay between words and pictures. I love the fact that in comics, your pictures are acting like words, presenting themselves to be read.
In traditional Asian arts, the word and the picture always sit next to each other. I have an aunt, a Chinese brush painter, who told me that when you do a Chinese brush painting, you have to pair the image up with some poetry.
In the early '90s, I was finishing up my adolescence. I visited my local comic-book store on a weekly basis, and one week I found a book on the stands called 'Xombi,' published by Milestone Media.
I noticed that when my daughter was born, my son really, really liked her. But then as she started getting older, and as she started crawling around our house and touching different things that were his, sibling rivalry issues started appearing.
One of the ways [racism] pops up is when they turn a comic into a live-action movie and there's this temptation to make Asian characters white.
In the '40s and '50s, a lot of teachers and librarians saw the graphic novel as the enemy of reading.
I liked interacting with students. I liked having coworkers. For a long time, I was really worried that sitting at home by myself in front of a computer was going to make me crazy.
Building a habit of reading leads to all sorts of reading.
Sometimes, a fight you cannot win is still worth fighting.
Wait." "So what am I supposed to do now?" "You know, Jin, I would have saved myself from five hundred years' imprisonment beneath a mountain of rock had I only realized how good it is to be a monkey." (222-223)