American Born Chinese
A 2006 graphic novel by Chinese-American artist Gene Luen Yang that weaves the legend of the Monkey King into a poignant allegory of identity and adolescent anxiety.
American Born Chinese is a 240-page graphic novel published in 2006 by First Second Books, written by Chinese-American cartoonist Gene Luen Yang. The work progresses through three seemingly independent intersecting storylines: the first is a myth of the Handsome Monkey King adapted from the first seven chapters of Journey to the West, though Yang replaces Rulai Buddha with a Christian-style supreme deity, "Tze-Yo-Tzuh"; the second is a school-age story about a Chinese-American teenager, Jin Wang, who suffers from identity anxiety as the only Asian student in his school; the third is a comedic plot involving Danny and his cousin "Chin-Kee," who visits every winter break—a character who is extremely caricatured and embodies every Western stereotype of Chinese people. The three threads converge in the end: Chin-Kee is actually the Handsome Monkey King in disguise, sent to enlighten Jin Wang, and Jin discovers that "Danny" is a white alter ego he created. The book won the 2007 Michael L. Printz Award and the 2007 Eisner Award for Best New Graphic Novel, and was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Award for Young People's Literature, making it the first graphic novel to be nominated for the award and a milestone in Chinese-American literature. In 2023, it was adapted into a series of the same name by Disney+, directed by Justin T. Ober ده and starring Michelle Yeoh, Daniel Wu, and Constance Wu.