World Literature Today, the University of Oklahoma-based literary magazine, awarded “American Born Chinese” author Gene Luen Yang with its NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s and Young Adult Literature prize.
Yang received $35,000 for his work, which inspired the Disney+ series with the same name. In addition to the 2006 “American Born Chinese,” he has written dozens of other graphic novels, including three continuations of Nickelodeon’s “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” “Monkey Prince” and “Boxers and Saints.”
Yang told visitors of the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art that he became a comic book nerd when he was 5-years-old after his mother took him to a comic book shop where he purchased a Superman comic book.
“I took it home and I read it, and by the time I got to the very last page, I knew that I was in love,” he said.
Yang quit his job as a computer engineer and became a high school teacher, and in his free time, he drew comics.
“A group of cartoonists in the San Francisco Bay Area, we got together every week at somebody’s house, we would have dinner together, they would sit and write and draw together and we would talk shop and look at each other’s work and get feedback,” he said.
During this period, he created “American Born Chinese,” which he printed at Kinkos, now FedEx Office, and unsuccessfully sold at conventions.
In the late ‘90s, he said comic books were not doing well in the U.S., which turned around after the release of two autobiographical comic books which made the New York Times Bestseller list. After this, he was approached about his work and was able to publish “American Born Chinese.”
“So after this, everybody started entering into my world, inserting into the world of handmade comics, looking for the next graphic novel to add to…
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