Gene Luen Yang
“Be generous through your art.” This is the lesson that the celebrated author of graphic stories such as American Born Chinese and Dragon Hoops distilled from his reading of Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. On October 25 in the Student Union Theater, Yang sat down with his publisher, Mark Siegel of First Second Books, to discuss comics, storytelling, and an extraordinary career of firsts: the first graphic novel to be a finalist for the National Book Award; the first comic artist to win a “genius” grant from the MacArthur Foundation; and the first graphic novelist to win the Steinbeck Award. True to the theme of generosity, all attendees received a copy of one of Yang’s books, signed by the author.
