pictures, politics & geekery

Make Mine Manga, an interview with Melinda Beasi

Melinda Beasi is founding editor of Manga Bookshelf and a great manga blogger in her own right. WWAC contributor, Claire Napier, interviewed her. It’s a long and awesome conversation. Go check it out.

I think an argument could be made that, in the simplest terms, this demonstrates the universal power of storytelling. That a middle-aged lady in western Massachusetts can feel such a strong connection to stories told by writers thousands of miles away, despite numerous cultural differences, is a pretty powerful testament to both the skill of those writers and the power of the medium they are working in.

I mention the medium specifically, here, because I think its visual nature is actually a major factor in making that connection so quickly and easily. As a reader, I don’t have to rely on my imagination alone to envision the world the artist has created, so things that might otherwise register as a cultural barrier are actually quite clear.

I am not sure what this says about either culture, except perhaps that I expect there is value for each in listening to the stories of the other. I have some pretty highfalutin’ ideas about the value of storytelling, including a deeply held belief that it is through stories that we (humans) share the most vital truths about ourselves and the universe we live in. I honestly believe that storytelling, in all its forms, is the most important thing we do as a species. So with that in mind, certainly cross-cultural storytelling can be an important tool for understanding each other.

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I love both of these women. That is all.