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Gene Luen Yang on Boxers & Saints

by Sam Bloom
Oct 23, 2013 | Filed in Authors & Illustrators
In the September/October 2013 Horn Book Magazine, reviewer Sam Bloom asked Gene Luen Yang about the process of creating the two volumes of Boxers & Saints. Read the starred review here.

Sam Bloom: Did you write both volumes at the same time, or did one come before the other? How did you decide to split the story into two parts?

Gene Luen Yang: I outlined both volumes, but then scripted and drew Boxers before Saints. When I was researching the Boxer Rebellion, I couldn’t decide if I sympathized more with the Boxers or their Chinese Christian victims. The two-volume nature of the project reflects my ambivalence. The protagonists in Boxers are the antagonists in Saints, and vice versa.
Sam Bloom

Sam Bloom is a programming librarian at the Covington Branch of the Kenton County Public Library in northern Kentucky.

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