>> From the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. >> Carla Hayden: I'm Carla Hayden, Librarian of Congress. ^M00:00:11 [ Applause ] ^M00:00:17 And this has been my first national book festival as the Librarian of Congress and what a day it has been. I have learned so much about the outstanding writers who participated in this event and I will never forget all of the book lovers I have seen from all ages, all backgrounds, and I just came back from the poetry slam and I have to tell you if you want to see raw talent and emotion, next year you have to be there. It was wonderful. And I'm especially pleased to be able to present to you one of the greatest authors that I've met because he is the Library of Congress' National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, Gene Luen Yang. ^M00:01:18 [ Applause ] ^M00:01:25 And I'm going to congratulate him once again for being named a MacArthur Genius. ^M00:01:34 [ Applause ] ^M00:01:40 Gene is the fifth National Ambassador for Young People's Literature and the first graphic artist to hold this position. And before we get to his program, I just want to make a special announcement. Mark your calendars for September 2, 2017. That will be the date of the next book festival, right here at the Washington Convention Center. So, I hope you can attend. Back to Gene and enjoy and thank you all for being here. ^M00:02:12 [ Applause ] ^F00:02:15 ^M00:02:18 >> Michael Cavna: All right. Hi. How do you follow that? How do you follow a historic new leader of this institution between her and a brand new genius? It's just, you know, we'll do what we can. But, my name is Michael Cavna, a columnist cartoonist with the Washington Post. I do the Comic Riffs blog and I also did the syndicated strip Warp you can find at gocomics.com. I've spent a lifetime in comics and a lifetime as an art senator and believe that graphic novels are one of the most important and crucial forms of communication for young readers, for reluctant readers. I come from a tribe of educators. We have an educator here. Educators are my people. So, three years ago, when my daughter was in a nearby school and she had read Maus. And she comes home, she's sad, she's almost crying. I said what's wrong. She said my teacher said graphic novels aren't books. Can imagine my response to that, so I went and marched to the principal and the principal said, oh, yeah, graphic novels aren't books. So, I spent the next year proving, in the Post, that graphic novels are books. And one of the first people I went to, I thought who is an educator, who understands librarians, and who is a great graphic novelist himself? And who just happened to be coming through town but Mr. Gene Luen Yang and we walked around the Post and we shot a little video and at the end of the year we had an award-winning serious that proved-- the judges said once and for all graphic novels are books. So, that educator isn't very far north of here, so do you mind just as a favor to me one time saying, for me, graphic novels are books. On three. One, two, three. Graphic novels are books. Thank you. I needed that. I needed that. And we have an institution here wise enough to know that. It is my true pleasure to have Gene Luen Yang as our headliner, finishing off this night. It was January when we were not far from here in the Library of Congress and Gene was being inaugurated as the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature and they couldn't have chosen better. He began drawing comic books in the fifth grade. In '97, he received a Xeric Grant for his first comic, Gordon Yamamoto and the King of the Geeks. Here is a man who proudly calls himself a geek. He has written things like Duncan's Kingdom, the Rosemary Comic Book, Animal Crackers. It was a decade ago, American Born Chinese, a brilliant cross-culture book. Yes. Brilliant. So many beautiful metaphors all threading through. Became the first graphic novel to be a National Book Award finalist. He followed that up with such projects as Boxers and Saints, which also was a National Book Award finalist. So, I think you're due pretty soon for a third one in about a year. He is just-- he did a brilliant book about the Shadow Hero. You should definitely check that out. He won an Eisner for the Eternal Smile and now he's doing this wonderful-- he's, again, sneaking-- now he's sneaking education into the graphic novels with this series Secret Coders. It's part comic, but you read it and realize he's getting kids to do problems, to solve, to think, and that's part of his genius. He taught high school for nearly two decades in Oakland. He's working on a long project, Dragon Hoops about that teams-- that basketball team, a diverse team. He just does it all. He even-- on top of Avatar: The Last Airbender, on the side, writing Superman-- just to kind of through that in. A think that's a lifelong dream for many people, he's just throwing that in there. So, he's doing it all. He just-- he's-- I've had the pleasure of moderating him numerous times. He's just a fantastic talent, a fantastic voice, and a fantastic ambassador, I believe globally, for comics. Please welcome Gene Luen Yang. >> Gene Luen Yang: Thank you. ^M00:06:38 [ Applause ] ^M00:06:44 >> Michael Cavna: So-- and-- all right. Well, thank you for coming here. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, thank you for having me. Thank you all for being here, especially at the very end. Thank you so much. And thank you to Michael. I don't know if you all know this, but Michael is kind of like a ninja. You know? He's at the post, he dresses up as newspaper man, but really he's a comics guy. >> Michael Cavna: I am a geek who likes to play with sharp things. That's why I'm a ninja. And thank you. I mean, you know, I was texting Gene-- I-- a little bird told me that Gene would be getting-- just heard a little bit in advance, a Genius Grant. And so I'm like when can I text him, when can I text him. And here's someone you can text, like, you know, in the middle of the night and for-- in the name of comics, he will respond. He will be there. He's a voice. You know? So, it's fantastic. Is the word-- I want to start, is the word genius-- are you tired of it yet? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, I want to hear it out of the mouth of my wife. That's my goal. >> Michael Cavna: I met your wife. It's not going to happen. She-- because she's too smart to fall for that, right? But-- and your kids right? >> Gene Luen Yang: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Anybody you see on a daily basis is hard to impress. >> Michael Cavna: And, well, and I don't know about you praising your family because that came with a $625,000 no strings attached grant. The one string is just to support people who support comics. You know? But, you know, I wanted to ask you-- so, in January, you were inaugurated as the ambassador. You're used to-- you spent your career in schools. Now you get to go to schools. You get to spread the Gospel while you're still creating. How are you finding it? You know, it's a little bit like winning an intellectual Miss Universe where you have to show up at so many functions, wear the sash, but in the name of graphic novels, in the names of young people's literature in many forms, but now that you've been doing it for almost 10 months, how's it been? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, first, that's my second goal. I want my wife to call me Mr. Universe. That would be awesome. But it's been great. >> Michael Cavna: For 625,000 you might be able to-- yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: It's been great. It's been a little bit hectic. I think this is one of the most hectic years I have ever lived, but it's also been awesome. I love going to schools and talking to kids about-- not just comics, but books and reading. And about how sometimes we put up these artificial walls, right-- >> Michael Cavna: I was going to say, can you talk about you theme? Your message? >> Gene Luen Yang: So, every ambassador picks a platform, the platform I chose is reading without walls and by that I just mean I want kids to explore the world through books and I want them to do it in three specific ways. Number one is I want them to choose books about people who don't look like them or live like them. Two is I want them to choose books about topics that they might find intimidating. And, three, I want them to choose books in formats that they might not normally read for fun. So, if you're a kid that normally only reads chapter books, I want you to try a graphic novel or a book in verse. And if you only read graphic novels, I want you to try a chapter book, any sort of other thing. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. So, did you practice what you preach as a kid? You were doing comics, but, you know, you, you know, you're brilliant. You know, your knowledge in computer programming is brilliant, but were you reading everything? Were you sort of open? Did comics help you break down other walls? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, one of the reasons I wanted to do reading without walls is because it's something that I would tell myself to do when I was a kid. I do remember-- I went to the library a lot, mostly because my mom took us. Took me and my brother. It was sort of a free babysitter, I think. >> Michael Cavna: Was this in the Bay Area? >> Gene Luen Yang: It was in the Bay Area. >> Michael Cavna: I-- literally, my mom at the same time taking us to the library. We might have been at the same library in the same comic aisle. OK. Yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, that's the thing is that with-- I remember at my local library we didn't really have that great of a YA section. It kind of went from J to adult and there was nothing in-between. I remember getting to like fourth, fifth, sixth grade and starting to feel a little bit lost at the library and that's when I discovered comics. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. And they filled something for you. Filled that gap. Yeah. What was your first comic that you-- >> Gene Luen Yang: The very first comic I got was a DC Comics Presents number 57 staring Superman and the Atomic Knights. >> Michael Cavna: Wow. And here you are writing Superman now. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, it's kind of crazy. It's a really crazy thing. >> Michael Cavna: Do you ever pinch yourself and-- >> Gene Luen Yang: Absolutely. Yeah. I think-- it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. I think if I had-- if I could go back in time and tell my 10-year-old self that I would be doing what I'm doing today, he would have just peed himself and melted. I mean-- ridiculous. >> Michael Cavna: I'm going to move on from that image, but, no, but you were more of a Marvel guy. DC was your first, but not your first love necessarily. >> Gene Luen Yang: No, no. I actually-- I mean my mom bought me that Superman comic. I actually didn't want it. The one I had wanted was a Marvel two-in-one staring the Thing and Rom the Spaceknight. >> Michael Cavna: Oh, wow. >> Gene Luen Yang: Both of whom were like way cooler than Superman, right? Superman is such a square. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah, but that's what your mom would buy you. >> Gene Luen Yang: Exactly. >> Michael Cavna: Your mom buys you Superman, right? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yes. Yeah. But then that Superman comic was mind-blowing. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah, that was it. And so but Marvel-- I mean Marvel is known for, for those that don't know, is flawed characters, often family dysfunction, youthful dysfunction. A lot of uncertainty. Instead of the big blue boy scout. It speaks to kids because of that, which so much good literature does, right? It speaks to you in areas that maybe you feel different or unusual. So, did Marvel do that for you? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, I definitely was more of a Marvel guy. I did read some DC. I-- when I was a kid, Justice League is not what we think of today. It was not Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman. It was actually a bunch of DC Comic's C- and D-list characters and they sort of operated in this weird sitcom environment where they were constantly making fun of each other. That was the one book that I loved. I loved that DC book. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Absolutely. Well, it was two years ago here at the National Book Festival, on Friday night there's a gala nearby and Gene was one of the speakers and he spoke about comics and he spoke about giving yourself permission-- any author, any writer-- to write cross-culturally, but due diligence. Do the homework. And you talked about Dwayne McDuffie, the late Dwayne McDuffie died at just 49-- fantastic writer, comics writer, animator. And you talked about as a young African-American boy he was turned on by Black Panther, again Marvel, which was written by two Jewish creators. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. Created by two Jewish guys. >> Michael Cavna: And they didn't, you know, you said it was so-- they were so unsubtle. They said we have to-- you can't just name him the panther, we have to call him Black Panther, right? We have to label it and yet to a boy like Mr. McDuffie, it spoke to him and so you spoke-- he gave one of the most rousing speeches they've ever had there on why we need diverse books. You can go online, you can certainly find it at Washington Post if you do Gene Luen Yang, National Book Festival, diversity, you'll find it. It's worth reading. You-- that was a powerful talk. Can you talk about some of your passion that went into that talk? >> Gene Luen Yang: Sure. I mean I think growing up in America, growing up with American stories, it was very difficult for me to find characters that look like me in the stories that I was watching and in the stories that I was reading. And I think, you know, there's a professor by the name of Rudy Bishop who talks about how literature serves as both windows into other people's lives and mirrors into our own and how kids really need to grow up with those windows and mirrors. And I felt like I had a ton of windows; I didn't really have any mirrors. So, when I encountered Dwayne McDuffie's work, you know, he used to write an online column and he talked about his love of Black Panther, who is really this flawed character, at least in terms of representation, but he talked about how Black Panther-- reading a Black Panther comic made him feel like African-Americans, black people, black people were inevitable. They became inevitable. They were no longer incidental to the story. And when I read that column, I though he is talking about something that I myself had experienced. The talk that I gave at the gala really came out of my-- it really came out of my experience as a teacher at Hamline University. I teach creative writing through a university in Minnesota and one summer-- the summer right before that gala, actually, we started talking a lot about diversity. And it was part of a larger conversation that all books are having. All storytelling. We're having it in terms of our movies, our television series, and our books. And, you know, a lot of my students expressed fear about writing diverse characters. They were worried about getting it wrong and what my response to that is-- well, in some ways, that's kind of good. It's good that you're scared that you're going to get it wrong, but what you should do with that fear is not necessarily shy away from the story you wanted to tell, that fear should really just drive you to do your homework. It should drive you to do your research. I really do think, though, that the diversity question-- it's two different questions. There is the question for the writer and then there is the question for the gatekeeper. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: Right? >> Michael Cavna: There is the page and the pen. >> Gene Luen Yang Yeah, absolutely. >> Michael Cavna: What we're seeing on the page is the mirror and then what we can't see, who is getting an opportunity to create. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yes. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. ^M00:16:35 >> Gene Luen Yang: Exactly. So, I do think from the writer's perspective, you know, I know from being a writer myself, you are constantly dealing with fear. You are constantly dealing with mental obstacles and, as a teacher of writers, I am really reluctant to add any more obstacles into writers' minds, right? But then, from a larger perspective, from the perspective of a gate keeper, when you look out there and you say, you know, for-- let's say for Asian-Americans. Let's say, you know, 80%-- if you find 80% of stories about Asian-Americans are not written by Asian-American authors, there's something kind of funky about that, right? And it's not the responsibility of the writer to deal with that. The writer is just dealing with his or her own fear. >> Michael Cavna: Absolutely. >> Gene Luen Yang: That's the-- that's the responsibility of the gate keeper. >> Michael Cavna: Absolutely. Yeah. It's so, so true. Now, how did you find early on, you're pursuing comics and things are opening up, did you find it difficult? Were you running into walls? Were you running into windows? Can you talk about sort of your early ears as a creator, as a writer? >> Gene Luen Yang: I came up through comics in the 90s. In the 90s, nobody knew what a graphic novel was. That was not a popular term. In the 90s, Marvel Comics had declared bankruptcy and people were expecting it to just blink out of existence. In the 90s, you could go to Comic-Con in San Diego and you could get tickets same day. On Sunday, there were more exhibitors on the floor than there were attendees. It was a really bleak time to be in comics, right? >> Michael Cavna: Except for the lines. Shorter lines, but everything else was bleak. You've already talked about it; it's a revolution. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, it really is. So, when you're-- when you're-- like there are no gatekeepers when there's no money around, right? >> Michael Cavna: They disappear mysteriously. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, they mysteriously disappear. So, the bad thing about that is that, you know, when I came up in comics through the 90s, I was not expecting to ever be able to make a full-time living-- I was never expecting to be able to make money at it period, right? But the benefit of that is that I just felt like I could tell whatever story I wanted and no one was going to tell me no. Mostly because only 16 people were reading it, but-- >> Michael Cavna: And so you pursued-- you became an educator and you've worked with high school students, you recently-- is it Bishop O'Dowd? >> Gene Luen Yang: That's right. Yeah. I taught at Bishop O'Dowd high school in Oakland, California for 17 years and that was not-- that was more than just a day job for me. That was not something that I was doing while I was trying to make comics. >> Michael Cavna: Oh, yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: It was because-- I mean, I genuinely like teaching. Teaching's kind of awesome. >> Michael Cavna: Oh, yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: It's a really awesome profession. >> Michael Cavna: And so you taught computer science. >> Gene Luen Yang: I did. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. So, how did you balance that with creating comics? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, for years, the way I would live is I would wake up a little bit early, I'd work on some comics before I went to work. I'd go to work and then when I got home, after dinner, I would work on comics again. I just didn't watch a ton of TV. Stopped talking to like half of my friends. You know? >> Michael Cavna: Now, here's the question. Did you tell your students that you were doing this or did you maintain being a comics creator for as long as you could as like a secret identity, if you will? >> Gene Luen Yang: At the beginning, I totally told them. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: I remember my first two years of teaching, the very first day of every semester I'd be like I am also a cartoonist. Because I thought would be-- yeah, I thought they would think I was cool, but they totally didn't. No, it didn't work at all. No, no. They thought it was-- they thought it was a dorky, dorky thing. And even worse than that is when things got hard in my class they would ask me comic book-related questions to get me sidetracked. Yeah. >> Michael Cavna: And would you get sidetracked? >> Gene Luen Yang: Oh, yeah. Absolutely. So, after a while, after a couple years, I just made sure that they were two separate worlds. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Keep it-- >> Gene Luen Yang: It really felt like two separate identities. >> Michael Cavna: You had to have that different identity. Yeah. Yeah. Well, can you talk a little bit about, you know, you have depicted yourself in comics at times and here what we see on the screen, if we could go to it, we just saw model sheet, but could you talk about, you know, what we're seeing here? Just talk about the origin of this. >> Gene Luen Yang: Sure. This is a page from American Born Chinese and in this scene, the main character, Jin, Chinese-American boy, is thinking about his classmate's curly hair. And this eventually leads to him getting a perm. This is actually loosely based off something that a friend of mine in junior high did. I had this friend who was Chinese. He was fairly popular, he was athletic, you know, in seventh grade he had a bunch of girlfriends. And then when he came back from eighth grade, we-- you know, I didn't see him all summer. When he came back from eighth grade, he came back with a perm. In general-- in general, perms on Chinese people are a bad idea. Just in general. At least Chinese men. And I remember because he was like the most popular kid in our little group, nobody said anything, but that always stuck out to me in my head. Like I didn't understand why he would get a perm. So, in the book, I play with that a little bit. You know? The perm for Jin is a way of him expressing his own insecurities. I don't know if that's true of my friend, like my actual, actual friend, but that's the story purpose it serves in the book. >> Michael Cavna: When you were creating American Born Chinese, which, again, came out about a decade ago, I mean it's a masterwork. Did you feel as though you were creating a masterwork in the process or were you just one perm at a time? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, first, thank you for saying that. When I was doing American Born Chinese, I was doing it as mini-comics. I finished a chapter, I would Xerox it, I'd staple it by hand, I'd take it to local conventions and sell it. There was a comic book store in Berkeley, California that was willing to sell Xerox comics and I sold it through there. So, like literally 16 people read it, you know, in that form. It's not a-- I mean I just-- what I wanted to do was I wanted to impress my cartoonist friend. I wanted like Derek Kirk Kim to read the book and go oh you did a pretty good job. >> Michael Cavna: And did he? >> Gene Luen Yang: He did. >> Michael Cavna: OK, so you impressed 16 friends at a time. And can you talk about this? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. This is-- this is the-- this is Jin with the perm. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Yeah. Look at that. >> Gene Luen Yang: My friend actually looked more ridiculous than that. It was-- I'm not skilled enough to capture the actual ridiculousness of what a Chinese man looks like with a perm. >> Michael Cavna: OK. And what about this? >> Gene Luen Yang: This is a page from Boxers and Saints, which up until this point has been my most time consuming project. It's a two-volume graphic novel all about the Boxer Rebellion, which is a war that was fought on Chinese soil in the year 1900. I have two volumes because I personally could not decide who the good guys were. So, in one book the Boxers are the good guys. They're these Chinese teenagers who believed that they could call the Chinese gods down from the skies and these gods would give them super powers so they could fight off the foreigners and in the other book it is the Chinese Christians who are the good guys who were the enemies of the boxers. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Well, there's two parts of that I want to take and, first of all, did you realize-- I mean it's like reading two epics. You get two epics for the price of one. Did you realize what you were getting into when you couldn't decide which side to take that you-- it would be this tome? >> Gene Luen Yang: In my original-- in my original proposal, I had proposed one book that would be about 200 pages and I just kept writing and writing and writing and it just got-- it got out of hand. It got-- >> Michael Cavna: It's over 500, approaching 600? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, it's over 500 pages. Yeah. It just got out of hand. >> Michael Cavna: So, the boxer side, to me, had-- you can't get the Marvel geek out of you. I mean when they're calling the gods, it also plays like fantastic superheroes to me. Was that intentional? >> Gene Luen Yang: I mean it was Chinese Shazam. Like I would read about this history about these kids, you know, getting possessed by these old, old Chinese legendary heroes and it really felt like I was reading about Shazam. You know? That's what it was like. And I don't know if that's-- I mean that's probably the superhero geek in me as well. >> Michael Cavna: Absolutely. >> Gene Luen Yang: I really-- as I was researching, I saw a lot of parallels between Chinese opera and American superheroes and that's why I have Chinese opera in this scene. So, the way these kids would find out about these old, legendary Chinese heroes was through opera. They didn't have comic books. They didn't have cartoons. They didn't have TV shows. They had these traveling acting troops that would go from one village to the other, performing traditional Chinese opera. >> Michael Cavna: Absolutely. >> Gene Luen Yang: And they were colorful, they were full of superpowers, and they were basically inspired by their pop culture, these operas, the same way we are. And in some ways this possession, you know, this Chinese Shazam dynamic really felt like cosplay to me. It felt like-- you know? >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: Like if-- if-- if they weren't in such dire situations, if their country was not literally falling apart all around them, they would still have this impulse to become their heroes, right? The same way we do. >> Michael Cavna: But that's amazing to even attempt, if you think about it. We're going to-- you're going to take the Boxer Rebellion, something that serious, but let's work Shazam and let's work cosplay into that. I mean that's amazing. And I will say on the saints' side, you know, you deal with Christianity and it feels like you're calling upon your own religious upbringing in some way. You can't do that without-- I would think-- doing that. Can you talk about that side of it? >> Gene Luen Yang: Sure. I-- I grew up-- I grew up in a Chinese Catholic community that met right outside of San Francisco and then I think like most adults who consider themselves a part of a faith tradition, I did go through a period of really serious doubt and then eventually I came back. I came back to the faith tradition of my childhood, but in a different way. Definitely in a different way. So, the saints' side was really inspired by one of my relatives. I have a relative who converted to Catholicism as an adult and when she was a kid-- when she was born, she was born under a bad luck day on the traditional Chinese calendar and because she was born on this day she had a grandfather that hated her. She had a little sister that was born on a good luck day and whenever the grandfather had treats, she would-- like the little sister would get the treats, but she would not. As an adult, she converts to Catholicism. She converts to this faith of another culture and she never connects these two things together, but it seemed to me so obvious. ^M00:26:55 You know? She was-- she couldn't find a place for herself in the beliefs of her family, so she looked for the beliefs of this other culture. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. It's so powerful. It's such a multilayered work. If you haven't read Boxers and Saints, I highly recommend it. And here we're talking about transformation, right? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. This is the Shazam moment. This is the-- the possessing god is actually the first emperor of China. He's the guy who made China into a single unified country. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. And you're mixing the big splash panels with the smaller panels. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. And this is actually a ritual that the Boxers did that I found in my research. They would bow a certain-- like they believed they had to perform this ritual in order to call the Chinese gods down, so they would bow a certain way, they would eat ashes, they would like-- they would write these charms and eat the ashes of the charms. They would breathe-- they would control their breathing in a certain way and when this happened the gods would come down and take over their bodies. >> Michael Cavna: And we'd get something like this. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. Yeah. And that's another transformation. >> Michael Cavna: So, not just superheroes, you were-- I mean you must have really studied opera visuals and really-- >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, I got a bunch of books about Chinese opera. And, like I said, looking at it from the lens of somebody who grew up on like superhero comics, it all looked like it was using the same language. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Yeah. On some level, I'm sure it was. Yeah. And then you got the Avengers. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, yeah. That's exactly what it is. The Avengers. >> Michael Cavna: There is a super team, historically set. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah and Boxers and Saints is definitely my bloodiest book. By far. Like, in the beginning, if you look at-- if you look at the boxers' book especially-- in the beginning, I tried to keep all of the violence off panel. You know, you just see splashes of blood flying. And then by the end I was just like-- >> Michael Cavna: Which is what you do-- and Secret Coders gets pretty bloody, right? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, in the later volumes. Lots of decapitations. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. So, can you talk about this work? >> Gene Luen Yang: This is from a book called Level Up, which I did with a friend of mine named Thien Pham. He's one of my best friends, but every now and again I do hate him. And level up is actually about a young man who loves video games, but one night he's visited by these angels and these angels tell him that it's his destiny to go to medical school. It is inspired by the life of my brother. I have a brother who is younger than me, he's four years younger. He is actually a medical doctor. So, he is the Asian parental dream. And when he was going through med school, he would tell me all these stories about what he had to do, right? >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: And-- are any of you doctors? Or you must know doctors, right? Doctors look-- they look so professional in their little white suits, those little white jackets, but what they had to do to get that doctor degree is gross. It's disgusting. So, my brother would call me up, he'd tell me all these stories about gross things that he would have to do, how he'd have to put his hands in places that hands just don't belong. It's just gross. And every time he told me one of these stories, I thought, man, this would really work great in a graphic novel, but the problem is when I'm trying to think through a story, I want like a narrative thread. I want some kind of underlying dramatic spine that kind of ties everything together and what he was giving me was not that. He was just giving me one interesting thing after the other. Oh, I had to collect my own fecal matter to examine my own gut flora. You know? Or oh, I had to label hemisected human heads. And then finally one day he calls me up and he gives me that thread. So, this is what he says. He calls me up and he says, you know, I'm thinking about being a gastroenterologist. You all know what that is? That's a doctor who specializes in the digestive tract. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. >> Gene Luen Yang: Like from the beginning to the end. My brother is an incredibly, incredibly squeamish person. When we were kids, I remember we had these action figures that were a certain color of yellow and he gave them away. Like I came home one day and they were gone. I was like what happened to the action figures and he said well they kind of looked like barf and I couldn't deal with it, so I gave them away. That's how squeamish he is. So, I said to him-- I said out of all the people I know, you would make the worst gastroenterologist because you-- like you realize you are going to be like elbow deep in human fecal matter? You're not going to be able to deal with it. And he said well, but the other day I did this colonoscopy and it was kind of like playing video games up somebody's butt. >> Michael Cavna: Oh man. Oh. >> Gene Luen Yang: And as soon as he gave me that, that was my narrative thread. >> Michael Cavna: Wow. Like Pac Man. Everything takes on a different-- >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. I mean it just-- I saw the entire story unfold like-- >> Michael Cavna: I just give you credit you didn't call it GI Joe meets GI tract. That would have been [inaudible] than that, but no, but it's beautiful. Even the way you do it in blue monochromatic-- >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, well I can't take credit for that. That was from-- that was Thien Pham. He did the art on that one. >> Michael Cavna: It's wonderful. Well, here we have-- you spent a year following a high school basketball team. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, a season. >> Michael Cavna: A season. I'm sorry. A season. What-- as you've said, you know nothing or knew nothing about basketball, so this wasn't like a passion project sport-wise. What compelled you to say I want to follow a team, a high school team, for a season? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, basketball was always a point of pain for me when I was a kid. Mostly because I sucked at it. You know? And then I was relatively tall for an Asian, so within Asian communities at least, people would look at me and expect me to be good at it and then as soon as they saw me on the court they were like oh. I was a train wreck. I was a train wreck on the court. So, I never liked basketball. That just started to change fairly recently. My son had something to do with it. He started getting interested in basketball, he plays for a school team now. Jeremy Lin had something to do with it. And then I started paying attention to basketball stories. Books had something to do with it because I started reading basketball books and what I realized was that basketball specifically as a sport has all sorts of overlap with culture, you know? There is a reason why certain cultures gravitate towards basketball because-- like for instance-- for instance, in early immigrant Catholic communities, basketball was huge and basketball-- like Catholic universities still dominate basketball. If you look at the NCAA tournament, Catholic universities are usually overrepresented. Right? And it's because-- because of Catholic immigrants because Catholic immigrants, when they came to this country, they could not afford to maintain fields. Maintaining a grass field was too expensive, so they immediately just put all of their athletic resources into this sport that only needed two hoops, a ball, and some concrete. Right? And then in China as well. China actually learned how to play basketball about a year after it was invented because of these YMCA missionaries. And they immediately latched on to the sport. They latched on because these YMCA missionaries told them, you know, the health of your country is tied to the health of your bodies. So, they look at these missionaries, these missionaries grew up, you know, eating a western diet. They were usually like six inches taller than the average Chinese person at the time and then their country was falling apart all around them. This was right after the dynasty fell apart and they're like that makes sense. So, they started playing basketball. And basketball was one of the few things that Chairman Mao did not excise out of his country. The few western elements that Chairman Mao did not excise out of the country when the communists came into power. So-- so to this day the Chinese are fascinated with basketball. It's like the second-largest-- it's the fasting growing sport in the country, right? And it all dates back to that original idea. Strong bodies lead to a strong country. So, you know, I started reading about basketball. It became really fascinating to me and then I discovered this amazing story that was happening right on my campus. I went and talked to the coach of the varsity team. His name is Lou Ritchie. That's him right there. That's my drawing of him right there in the lower corner. And he told me that he was an alum of O'Dowd. He had also gone to the same school where we were both teaching and when he was a junior he had gone with his team, the varsity men's basketball team, to the California State Championship. They were down by one with seven seconds left. He gets the ball in his hand, he puts it up, it goes through the hoop, they're up by one, the buzzer sounds, everybody freaks out. Everyone's celebrating and then the refs invalidate that last shot. >> Michael Cavna: Oh, man! >> Gene Luen Yang: They invalidate it because one of his teammates had his hand over the rim, so it was-- >> Michael Cavna: Like a goal tending. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, it was offensive violation, but Lou plays this tape back for me over and over again. He goes, look, do you think his hand was over the rim and I got to admit, hard to tell. So, Lou goes-- Lou goes on, he plays for UCLA, he plays for Clemson, he gets a hamstring injury, it's over, and then he comes back to O'Dowd as a coach. And, as a coach, he leads six teams to the California State Championship and he loses all six times. >> Michael Cavna: Not on a goal tend each time, though? OK. >> Gene Luen Yang: No, not on a goal tend each time, but he never redeems himself. You know what I mean? He never redeems himself. So, supposedly the 2014-2015 season was his best chance at finally winning. >> Michael Cavna: And we're not going to say what happened. >> Gene Luen Yang: So, I mean-- it's over, right? I can tell you what happened. >> Michael Cavna: I mean the book isn't out, so it's up to you. It's up to you and your publisher, right? >> Gene Luen Yang: Well, I'll tell you this. They made it to the State Championship and it was an amazing game. It was the most amazing basketball game I have ever, ever seen. It was crazy. Yeah, afterwards I-- Thien, who I did Level Up with, he's also a cartoonist, after that game was over, he calls me up and he goes I hate you. You just got the-- you just got the best ending ever. I hate you so much. >> Michael Cavna: So, you can guess. So, but to me in terms of diversity and cultural richness, you've got two, you know, you and I talked about this, there's sort of two distinct levels. One thing-- we can get into the team in a moment, but you talk about school. You have teachers. You said within the cafeteria groups sat-- we think sometimes only kids sit according to whether you're a nerd or drama club or whatever, but you said there was among the teachers sort of divisions. Can you talk about that? ^M00:37:20 >> Gene Luen Yang: I mean there were a few teachers at that school that would drift from group to group, just like there are a few kids that do that, right? But a lot of us, most of us, would sit with our own kind. So, all the nerdy teachers would sit together, all the drama teachers would sit together. All the PE teachers would sit together. So, like, me and Lou-- Lou was not the kind of guy that I would normally be friends with. You know? He's a jock. He walks around with a swagger that I just don't have that I find really intimidating. But, as I got to talking to him, I realized that he and I just have a lot in common. He also loves books. He also loves statistics and numbers. He's like a nerd at heart. He's a nerd who knows how to play basketball. That's all it is. Right? And I think that's going to be something I talk about in the book as well, how he and I became friends. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Well, also you found out this richness about the team. You found out this richness about the-- like there was one-- was there one player who actually-- was he wearing headgear? Was he wearing, you know, religiously? Can you-- >> Gene Luen Yang: He wasn't-- no, he wasn't wearing headgear. So, there was this one Sikh player and he was the only Sikh player in the league. He did not observe kesh, so he didn't-- he didn't wear the traditional-- the traditional head coverings. But, when I followed team, I realized that he just-- he just took a lot of crap. You know? People would call him a terrorist from the stands. People would call him an Arab. People would call him Osama been hoopin', which he laughed at. He thought it was funny, but it also was really irritating and what I realized was that, you know, if you look at the history of basketball, basketball has always been this weird pot of racial tensions. You know, early on there were a lot of ethnic teams, they played it up. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah, it was the immigrant experience they grew up in. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yes. Yeah, they played up their ethnicities. There was a Chinese team that played early on in the history of basketball and they would-- they would speak in Cantonese even though they all spoke English way better than they spoke Cantonese. The Harlem Globetrotters started off as a gimmick team and eventually they transcended that, but they started off as a gimmick team. So, that racial animosity, I think when we look at it as modern people, we look at the modern basketball court, we think that's gone. We're over it. We're past it. Because nobody goes and insults each other explicitly, right? Except for this one Sikh kid. Like most people who go and watch basketball, they know not to insult any of the African-American players, so they take all that tension and they direct it at this one Sikh kid and it was-- it was just a little bit-- it was a little bit shocking for me to see. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. And how did he deal with it? I mean, you know-- >> Gene Luen Yang: He-- yeah, that's something that I talk about in the book, but he-- eventually it just-- he just-- he just learned that he had to let it be like water off a duck's back. You know? And I don't even know if-- I mean I don't think that's fair to him. I don't think that's the best way for him to deal with it, but that was the way that he kept playing. He-- what he wanted was he wanted his game to speak for him. You know? >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. You've always written on many layers and written obviously things and family friends can all feed that in, but before you were always writing fiction. You have freedom. Here, nonfiction. You're a reporter. You're a journalist and you're in the locker room and sometimes it's-- sometimes you're disappearing in the locker room and sometimes, you know, it's always are you affecting the story that you're covering when you're present, right? >> Gene Luen Yang: Exactly. >> Michael Cavna: So, there's a host of challenges you face by writing a nonfiction narrative. How is that going? >> Gene Luen Yang: It's-- it's been really hard. I got to say it's been really hard because-- because it's a cartoon, there's automatically a level of fiction there, right? The way I'm drawing them is not the way they actually physically look and even the action I have to both simplify and exaggerate in order for it to work on the comics page. So, what I try to do is I try to make sure all the words are accurate, but then the pictures have to lie a little bit. You know? In order for it to work as a graphic novel. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. So, we talked about O'Dowd, did you-- being in schools for a couple decades, did you see a difference in how graphic novels were received? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yes. Absolutely. When I got on that campus, no teachers were using graphic novels in the classroom, even me. And now I can at least count half a dozen, if not more. >> Michael Cavna: Was it ignorance, bias, and prejudice? What-- a mix of all that? >> Gene Luen Yang: I think it was just a lack of awareness. You know? Actually, I take that back. When I got on campus, there was one class that used a graphic novel and it was a holocaust history class that used Maus. But, at that point, I think when people thought of literary graphic novels, they only thought of Maus and now they think of Persepolis, they think of Smile. You know? It's been amazing. >> Michael Cavna: And they-- you make sure they think of Boxers and Saints all the time. Part of that too is-- one thing you said to me several years ago was that librarians get it sooner because they're on the front lines. >> Gene Luen Yang: Yes. >> Michael Cavna: You know, teachers, you're in your classroom, you can have your lesson plan, but teachers are every day getting the requests. Can you-- you saw a shift there, too? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. Absolutely. I mean librarians have always been on the front lines. Right? Librarians realize that the presence of graphic novels increases overall circulation by 30%. That's something that most librarians have seen, have firsthand experience of. And it just takes the rest of us educators a little bit more time. >> Michael Cavna: Another thing where we're seeing a profound change is what I would call gender equity and geek culture. Some studies, depending on how you define geek culture, actually have said roughly 50-50% boys and girls, men and women. I know when I-- when I first as a teenager went to San Diego Comic-Con, I talked to Stan Sakai about this. He would bring his family and he said often in a room my wife, my daughter might be the only women anywhere near-- it was so male dominated and there are reasons for that, but the-- web culture has changed things, but discovering the appeal of certain books to girls, YA classrooms, we-- that-- I believe that's another area where we're seeing a revolution, right? >> Gene Luen Yang: We are. We are. >> Michael Cavna: It feels-- I have a daughter and it feels massive. Can you talk about that? >> Gene Luen Yang: It's hugely massive. I think it's hugely massive, right? I think it's taken this long for publishers to realize that young girls love comics. You know? It took-- like Raina had a really hard time-- >> Michael Cavna: Raina Telgemeier. >> Gene Luen Yang: Had a really hard time selling Smile and now everybody-- every publisher is trying to get their own Smile. I think it's-- I think it's wonderful. I think it's amazing. I think it's such a hopeful time. >> Michael Cavna: It really is. I mean I've talked with Scott McCloud this [inaudible], he thinks within a decade women are going to dominate comics. He thinks the pendulum is going to swing. All I will know is like the first time my daughter-- Raina Telgemeier was unknown and she walked up to the booth and she said I like this and Raina smiled because there was something there. And I listened-- >> Gene Luen Yang: And then millions of-- >> Michael Cavna: Millions topping the best seller list. Yeah. Absolutely. >> Gene Luen Yang: It's an incredibly hopeful time to be-- >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. So, as you travel around, you're seeing-- >> Gene Luen Yang: Oh, we did get the-- >> Michael Cavna: Did we get it? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah, we did. >> Michael Cavna: Do we have time for any questions or do we have-- couple questions? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Yes. >> Hi. I work for a company that makes water filters with writing on them for water sanitation education and it's always a challenge to make things culturally appropriate and to do your due diligence and to make things fit. How do you go about researching cultures where you can't necessarily go-- you have to rely on forums or other people, do you-- do you have to immerse yourself? What is your practice? >> Gene Luen Yang: Yeah. It's hard. Right now I'm writing the new Superman book. It's set in Shanghai. I've never lived in Shanghai before; I've only visited twice. What I've been doing is I've been reading a lot. I read-- I read books about what modern China is like. I read blogs about people-- by people who live there, and I've also gotten-- I've also been lucky enough to get in touch with people who actually live in Shanghai, so I can email them questions and stuff. Like what music are you guys listening to, that sort of thing. But it's always that-- I think it's always hard to do your due diligence, but I'm thankful that you're doing it. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Absolutely. And one thing you said in your talk in 2014 was do the homework, find people, vet it. Find people who really know it and go through it. >> Gene Luen Yang: Find insiders, I think that's-- you just can't-- you can't replace that. >> Michael Cavna: Yeah. Absolutely. Yes. Right here. >> Thank you. Really enjoy your talk. I'm proud that I share some part of your Asian parts and, as you can tell, I have two boys. And so I have a question, very practical. This is a parenting-- you have-- your parents have this-- I guess this extremely successful parenting model for you and your brother, so I want to do both. Please come and-- what your parents-- the tips, three or five, and I can emulate. >> Gene Luen Yang: My parents? My parents-- my parents-- well, OK. So, my dad was very much a typical immigrant dad. He gave me three choices in life: doctor, lawyer, or engineer. And I kind of did one, right? I majored in computer science and I kind of did it. And when I was a kid especially, I just ended up fighting with him a lot. I wanted to do cartoons. He wanted me to do something more practical. As an adult, I look back and I see that-- I think my parents had a point, especially my dad. Health insurance is an important thing. And now I really believe that-- I believe in a balance. I believe in the balance of pursuing your dreams while respecting the wisdom of your parents. While getting health insurance. ^M00:47:15 >> Michael Cavna: So, if some of your kids only want to be comics creators and never want to do anything else, you're good with that? >> Gene Luen Yang: No. Well, what I would tell them-- what I would tell them is this-- is-- is in order for-- I-- in order for you-- so, not every cartoonist agrees with me and there are plenty of successful cartoonists that use a different model, right? But what-- but the model that I felt like I follow was this. In order for you to protect-- perfect your craft-- not even perfect it. In order for you to work on your craft, it's going to take you 10 years of losing money. At least 10 years of losing money. How are you going to feed yourself those 10 years? If you're planning on feeding yourself with art, you're going to end up drawing things that you do not want to draw. That is not going to help you develop as an artist. So, you need to find some other way of feeding yourself while you work on that art. >> Michael Cavna: Sure. And what if your child says I'm going to feed myself on the MacArthur Genius Grant? ^M00:48:05 [ Laughter ] ^M00:48:07 We have time for one-- one? >> So, I originally had a ton of questions about Avatar: The Last Airbender. Huge fan. >> Gene Luen Yang: Me too. >> But, I'm also a graphic novel artist. I actually graduated from Carnegie Mellon for music major and then I got into comics later. So, I was wondering, for you, what was like your step one in terms of like getting your work out there so people know it exists and then like-- >> Gene Luen Yang: My step one was printing it out. Was taking it to Xerox. Eventually I moved to offset printing, which was a little bit more expensive, and then just handing out. Like selling it by hand at shows. That was my step one. Nowadays, if I were to do it over again, I would still do that because I love print, I love holding something physical in my hand, but I would also try to use the web. For sure. I think networking was hugely important to me. I met some cartoonists who were at about the same place in their careers, really, really early on and we ended up pushing each other. As soon as one of us met an editor, all of us would meet that same editor because we would get introduced and that was incredibly important. >> Thanks. >> Michael Cavna: Well said. OK. Well, your wife just texted me. She says, OK, you are a genius. So, thank you. You're there. Thank you. Please give a big round of applause to Gene Luen Yang. >> Gene Luen Yang: Thank you. Thank you all for staying. Wonderful to talk to you all. Thank you. >> Michael Cavna: All right. >> Gene Luen Yang: Thank you. >> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress. Visit us at loc.gov. ^E00:49:39