Latest / Linen Suit & Plastic Tie / Rewind: Where Are Your Roots? ft. a Non-Fiction Graphic Novelist (Craig Thompson)

Transcript

Rewind: Where Are Your Roots? ft. a Non-Fiction Graphic Novelist (Craig Thompson) · Linen Suit & Plastic Tie

0:00
Welcome, Welcome to the Linen Suit and Plastic Tie podcast.
0:04
This is the podcast we want to unlock and analyze and
0:06
investigate the amazing, the epic, the awesome power of
0:10
storytelling and learn how to harness that power in our
0:12
everyday lives. I'm Goreth and I'm Kevin Kev.
0:18
I'm back home in Toronto in my childhood bedroom and I recently
0:22
was listening to you Armchair Expert with Adam Grant.
0:25
He did three amazing episodes. I'm listening to it as a trilogy
0:28
and he talked about this concept of maximizer with satisfieser.
0:31
This term maximizer with satisfieser was originated by
0:35
Herbert Simon, a noble lawyer in economics and a cognitive
0:38
psychologist. He coined the term satisficing
0:41
in 1950s. So it's this idea that satisfies
0:45
A strive for good enough. Like what's going to get me to
0:48
tomorrow? What's going to keep me as much
0:51
money as I need next while maximizers look for the absolute
0:54
best. How do I make sure I go to the
0:56
best restaurant? How do I make sure I went to the
0:58
best school? So you can even hear as I speak
1:01
the anxiety in it. And it's funny because I
1:04
struggle so many maximizer tendencies and I think good
1:07
enough is really hard for me. You know, it's a story of what
1:10
does good enough mean, right? Good enough.
1:13
Almost feels like a cop out. And again, we are constantly
1:17
trying to build the world to maximize this, right?
1:19
That's what Google Maps reviews came from.
1:22
And some people are going to fake what's this best for me in
1:24
this moment? Some people are like, what's the
1:26
highest rated thing? I think both lifestyles are
1:30
pretty subjective points of view.
1:33
And to your point on what's good enough, what is even good
1:37
sometimes, and sometimes our definition of good is also very
1:41
subjective, is a designed goal post or standard that are
1:47
defined that people buy in. And when you get enough people
1:51
to buy in on that story of, oh, this is good, That's how you can
1:56
build a foundation to say, what's better, what's the best,
1:59
what can I maximize? This is part of the reason I've
2:03
been reading Don Quixote as well.
2:06
You've been reading it for what? How long have you reading?
2:09
It Scott three years, three years the.
2:13
Mount trips, you've gone it with Kevin has Don Quixote, and he's
2:16
sitting on a porch reading Don Quixote.
2:18
It's, it's reading this book as as long of a journey as the
2:23
story itself as what I have to say.
2:26
But you might remember that I said this to you once.
2:30
I really like the story because Don Quixote, he's just a man
2:34
trying to reach his goal. Because I think it really
2:39
depicts the story of everyone. Even though supposedly this is a
2:44
madman doing crazy things. But aren't we all chasing some
2:50
kind of fable? Is the maximization or the
2:54
satisfaction we're chasing objectively there or they're all
2:58
kind of made-up that our stories we can buy into so.
3:02
It's all made-up and you know, just think about satisfies of us
3:05
maximize as well. No one is one thing, right.
3:08
Well, I think I have very extreme maximizing tendencies in
3:12
most things. There's stuff where I'm
3:14
satisfying. It's highly personal and it's a
3:17
spectrum, right? Sometimes you learn more this
3:19
way or that way. So it's extremely complex, but
3:22
by taking this lens and looking at these good enough,
3:26
satisfizing versus maximizing stories, you can ask yourself,
3:31
should I be maximizing this? Is it worth my time to be
3:34
maximizing? Or is good enough fine here for
3:37
me? I romanticize satisficing for
3:40
sure because I'm such a maximizer.
3:41
And I can see how it affects the stories I tell myself where
3:44
sometimes I have to be like, you're doing the best you can,
3:46
you're doing the best, and you're OK.
3:48
OK. My favorite once said to me,
3:50
Kevin, you know this. My favorite once said to me,
3:53
your mind sounds exhausting. And I'm like, yeah.
3:57
Yeah, I feel like you can. Besides your autobiography,
4:01
something else you can do authorship wise is a separate
4:06
quote books. That's just my therapist says.
4:11
My favorite says we love our quote books.
4:14
Here's a quote from Mayor Monroe before we move on.
4:17
Never regret anything because at one time it was exactly what you
4:21
wanted. And Speaking of looking back,
4:25
Kev, we have something kind of interesting and special for
4:28
today. Yes, Gaurav, this is going to be
4:33
a special episode where we rewind on a great conversation
4:38
with the fascinating storyteller all the way back in season 3,
4:43
Craig Thompson, who is a comic book artist.
4:49
And if you are into comic books, you might have heard of Black
4:54
Kids. Blankets is in every comic book
4:56
story. It is one of the most iconic
4:59
graphic novels ever made, period.
5:01
It is something that explores the depth and the expansion of
5:05
what's possible in comic form. This is a unique medium.
5:08
There are stories you can tell in this medium that you can't
5:11
tell with books or movies or TV's.
5:13
Yeah, but how we got connected is actually a really interesting
5:16
story as well, because I actually discovered one of
5:20
Craig's new comic series, Jensen Roots, back in 2022.
5:26
I want to say it's around the time when he started this comic
5:30
series almost as a sequel to his life story in Plankets.
5:36
Jensen Roots is about Craig's upbringing, working in Wisconsin
5:42
doing the farm work as little boys with his brother.
5:45
And for me, born and raised in China, Jingseng is one of these
5:50
herbal plants that are very well known in Chinese medicine and I
5:54
stumbled upon his 11th issue at the time, which documented his
6:00
journey in northeastern China. It's also about the foundation
6:05
of the United States, the US, China, trade, relationship
6:09
between the two largest world economies, all tied to this
6:14
interesting story that you otherwise wouldn't have thought
6:17
much about. And a little earlier this year,
6:20
Craig has published Ginsen Roots in the graphic novel format.
6:25
It is a beautiful design and it has all the amazing arts and the
6:34
entire series combined in here. And we're very lucky to have
6:38
received a few copies of this graphic novel.
6:42
And so we thought it was a great time for us to revisit this
6:46
story, this conversation with Craig as well.
6:48
Yeah, and this is the first time it's in video.
6:51
So yeah, if you've listened to this before, this is definitely
6:55
a fun time to revisit it because we are going back watching an
6:59
episode that we never intended to hit video.
7:02
Yep. So without further ado, let's
7:05
get back to two years ago with Craig.
7:14
Now here's Gore Ribbon Gavin. And to start off our
7:20
conversation, Craig, can you tell us a little bit about
7:24
yourself? What is your story?
7:27
All right, My name is Craig Thompson.
7:29
I'm a graphic novelist. I, I feel like that term is is
7:32
kind of universal Now people suddenly know what a graphic
7:35
novel is. But say 20 years ago that wasn't
7:38
pretty much a mainstream terminology.
7:41
People are very confused if you brought up that term.
7:43
But basically I do book length comic books.
7:47
Until recently I've only done like 304 hundred 700 page
7:53
graphic novels and more recently I'm doing a serialized comic
7:56
book for the first time. I grew up in middle of nowhere,
8:00
rural Midwest of America in Wisconsin and pretty isolated
8:07
upbringing. And really it's this career in
8:09
comics that's really extended my my boundaries and my
8:12
relationship with the world and kind of got me out of that.
8:16
The trappings of a small town. I think you, you've built your
8:18
career in this kind of graphic, autobiographical genre of
8:23
graphic novels, right? It's a genre that people don't
8:25
often think about a media of comics because it's the medium
8:28
versus genre debate, right? When comic books is a medium,
8:31
it's an art form. It has so much room for so many
8:34
amazing genres like what you've worked in.
8:37
So tell us a little bit about why the autobiographical kind of
8:41
genre made sense for you. That's really hard in this space
8:44
because people like combo, that's for kids or combo, that's
8:47
superheroes, right? When I'm like, well, you just
8:49
saw a movie. How is Woods with art less like
8:53
intellectually stimulating that? But tell us about getting that
8:57
cook sold and the success. It had.
8:59
So with Blankets, that was a totally different era.
9:02
Again, that that came out 20 years ago and the graphic novels
9:06
really wasn't established as as a medium yet.
9:10
Of course, there had been Mouse, which to me by Arch Spiegelman
9:14
is still kind of the greatest graphic novel of all time.
9:16
But there was also Chris Ware's Jimmy Corrigan had come out in
9:20
the year 2000. That was three years before
9:22
Blankets, but that was serialized.
9:24
So there there wasn't this sort of thing of just all in one
9:29
swoop putting out a huge 500 page comic book.
9:33
But I was working with a really small publisher here in in
9:36
Portland, OR, which is where I'm living now and I've lived most
9:39
of my career. And it was just two guys, small
9:43
company and they were doing indie comics, which is called
9:47
another niche within the niche of, of comics and and they
9:53
didn't have any money or anything.
9:54
My advance for blankets was about $300 to do a 500 page
9:59
book. So that's not what I was paying
10:01
the bills with. On the other hand, they didn't,
10:03
they weren't really controlling. They kind of gave me free rein
10:06
to do whatever I wanted. I knew that per my contract,
10:09
well, I just have to deliver a book and and they're going to
10:12
have to publish it. So I felt like a little, you
10:15
know, privileged to be like, well, OK, so it doesn't matter
10:17
if it's 100 page book or a 500 page book, they're going to have
10:20
to publish it. Blankets, of course, is huge.
10:22
It's been on all these lists. It's it's known in the industry.
10:25
I think you can pick it up and honestly, any comic books at
10:27
this point. What was that experience like
10:29
when it when you're like, oh, this is catching on and it's
10:33
something so deeply personal. What was that experience like
10:36
for you? It changed everything.
10:39
You know, I, I still don't think I've really recovered from that
10:41
whole experience. I was like a working class kid.
10:47
I hadn't gone to college, you know, I really didn't have any
10:50
real life experience. I was quite naive and sheltered.
10:53
I thought the book would never find an audience.
10:56
Like I, you know, I was like, well, even in the US, people
10:59
that grew up in urban centers going to relate to this super
11:02
isolated rural upbringing. People who grew up in secular
11:05
households, are they going to be able to relate to all these
11:07
religious themes? I felt like it, it was itself
11:11
very niche because it was about this very specific sheltered
11:15
childhood. But I think there ended up being
11:18
all these universal themes around first love, around
11:21
family, sibling dynamics, you know, faith and or falling from
11:27
faith. Those themes proved to be
11:31
universal around the world. I would say the number one
11:34
readership of blankets is probably India or maybe of my
11:37
books in general. And then after that, I mean,
11:42
after that it's a debate. But I've, I've had great success
11:45
traveling in the Middle East, South Korea, huge, huge blankets
11:49
like devoted fan base there. So yeah, those, those themes,
11:54
they, I guess what they say is like when you're specific, when
11:57
you try to make it as specific as possible, it becomes more
12:01
universal. You know, that's so important
12:04
too about the comic industry. I think this is one of the
12:07
things I love about this industry is I've read so many
12:09
cool niche stories. There's these stories that would
12:12
not have been made into movies, would not have been made into TV
12:16
shows because there's huge risks, right, to make movies, TV
12:19
shows with comic books, there's a lot less risk to get these
12:22
stories told. And that's how we had so much
12:24
amazing stuff in the non superhero genre.
12:26
Like image puts out so many cool things, all these independent
12:30
creators. You mentioned Mouse, which is
12:31
one of the most iconic graphic novels of all time.
12:34
Your work. And it's one of the beautiful
12:36
things about this industry is that you can try things and you
12:40
can get niche and you can learn that.
12:42
Oh, people don't have to have gone through the exact same
12:45
experience or this doesn't have to be based on IP.
12:48
We've heard for the last 70 years for the to find an
12:51
audience and I think that's one of the most beautiful parts of
12:54
this industry. Yeah, and, and you mentioning
12:56
that and also the fact that the both both of you live in Los
12:59
Angeles reminds me of all the sort of Hollywood meetings I've
13:03
taken with multiple studios, really big names, directors,
13:06
producers and a thing that I hear a lot from those people.
13:10
Because I always feel very humbled in the presence of
13:12
someone who's made some epic movie.
13:15
And then they sort of flip it on its head and say like, no, we
13:18
have a lot of respect for you because what you did with as
13:21
just one person, you know, we're just part of a team of hundreds,
13:24
sometimes thousands of people. So we're not going to take the
13:27
credit for that movie because we know we have a whole army of
13:31
people behind us. Whereas like what you do is like
13:34
one person very little resources, you know, I mean a
13:38
lot of time that's the main resource and and some hand pain.
13:42
Going back to blankets a little bit, because it's been 20 years
13:46
since the story came out and read around the world.
13:51
What's that experience like for you, knowing that the story has
13:55
been so popular for such a long time and looking back, are the
13:59
end of parts of the story where you will take a look at how you
14:02
told it back then and feel like you might have told it
14:05
differently now? Definitely.
14:06
I think every book is just sort of like a little bookmark in
14:10
that moment in my life. Like I couldn't write any one of
14:14
my books at a different time. It'd be very strange to write a
14:18
book like Blankets now as an almost 50 year old man.
14:20
It'd be almost creepy, I think, to be like looking back on a
14:25
high school romance and making a book about it.
14:27
But it wasn't. It was an appropriate thing to
14:29
be doing at age 23 when I was still sort of, my heart was
14:33
still caught up in some of those things.
14:37
Working on a project, I can only see the flaws.
14:41
The page I'm working on that day is the page I hate the most.
14:44
Usually, like a week later I can look at that page and be like,
14:47
it's OK, the flaws are OK. I don't.
14:49
It's out of my control now. And that experience increases as
14:53
time goes by. So once, once a book is in
14:55
print, it really feels like it's been born.
14:58
It's its own entity. It's no longer a physical part
15:01
of me. And really it does have a life
15:05
of its own the way a child might.
15:07
You know, you don't, You don't necessarily blame a parent for
15:11
how well you do blame a parent for how the child turns out, but
15:14
certain elements that are outside of a parent's control.
15:18
And the blankets might be the little golden child in my
15:20
family, but it's it's different from me at this point.
15:24
You know, I'm a different person.
15:25
I couldn't couldn't write that book.
15:28
There are elements that I envy a lot where I look back and I'm
15:30
like, oh, I had like a sort of creative purity at that age.
15:33
You know, it says 2325 S full of like this creative energy and
15:39
youth. And I can see that in the pages.
15:41
So I'm grateful for that. So it sort of is a time stamp on
15:44
who I was as an author and person at that time.
15:47
And then there's other elements I'm sure are just completely
15:49
cringy to me. But are they cringy for the
15:52
right reason? Are they just cringy because I'm
15:54
more of a like a cynical adult at this point?
15:58
Who knows? Was there ever the temptation to
16:02
do spin offs or sequels or get into some of those side
16:05
characters? That's a great question because
16:08
there's been a lot of pressure over the years from publishers
16:11
and readers to do Blankets too. Basically the sequel.
16:17
Because, you know, honestly, the books that followed Blankets,
16:20
which are Carne de Voyage and Huppy B and Space Dumplings,
16:25
none of those books have had the impact of Blankets.
16:29
So there was always this pressure to basically do a
16:32
sequel and I always resisted. I'm like, no, I don't want to
16:35
repeat myself. I don't want to exploit or ride
16:40
on the coattails of a previous success.
16:41
You know, that's I just want to reinvent myself with each
16:44
project. And this newest book, Ginseng
16:47
Roots, just sort of organically ended up being a form of a
16:51
sequel. And even that sort of happened
16:54
reluctantly. I wasn't going to lean into the
16:57
autobio in this new project, but as I got deeper into it, I
17:02
realized that that was the actual important story.
17:05
So I mean, maybe this is a perfect segue to talk about what
17:08
Ginseng Roots is. And previous to Ginseng Roots,
17:12
I've only done graphic novels, so I've only done book length
17:16
comics and I really wanted to break that cycle.
17:21
I just knew I didn't have the stamina for it.
17:23
Again, I'm like, I wanted to work in smaller bursts and get
17:29
feedback from readers much more soon.
17:32
Get that sort of validation maybe.
17:35
But also I wanted to reconnect with like what comic books were
17:38
to me as a kid. And as a kid they of course were
17:41
just these disposable newsstand pamphlets, you know, that came
17:46
out every month. I'm like, I want a chance to do
17:48
that. So with Ginseng Roots, yes,
17:51
write an entire script for the whole I had an outline for the
17:55
series and that's about it. And then I just took each issue
17:59
at a time, each chapter at a time, and released it.
18:05
The initial inspiration was to do a book about ginseng, which
18:09
is probably best known as a medicinal herb in Chinese
18:13
medicine. It's maybe wanted the plant and
18:17
the root itself to be the protagonist of the Ceres.
18:20
And I was going to use it as a springboard to explore a lot of
18:23
different topics. And one of those is global
18:25
trade, because ginseng is the origins of EU s s trade
18:30
relationship with China, which becomes more and more important,
18:33
you know, every year. So before this was ever a
18:36
nation, French Jesuit priests were exporting wild ginseng from
18:41
the New World back to China. They knew right away that this
18:45
was a lucrative herb. And then the same happened with
18:50
the American Revolution was basically funded by ginseng
18:53
sales. This newly minted country owe
18:57
this incredible debt to France. So one of the first things to
19:01
pay off that debt was shipping basically furs and ginseng to
19:07
China. And so origins of our country is
19:10
tied to this route. So I wanted to focus on the
19:13
route, but when I would tell people my elevator pitch, I
19:16
could see their eyes glaze over. Unless in fact, maybe they grew
19:20
up with Chinese medicine and they had more of an intimate
19:22
knowledge. But otherwise, there are people
19:23
like, oh, like ginger and I'm like, no ginseng.
19:26
And like people have this very like, I don't know, human
19:31
centric sort of narratives that they glom onto.
19:34
So I could tell people weren't that interested in the plant.
19:37
So then I would say, well, you know, I worked in ginseng as a
19:40
kid from ages 10 years old to 20.
19:43
I would work 40 hour weeks in my summer working in ginseng fields
19:48
in rural Wisconsin. And then people's interest was
19:51
was piqued. They're like, wait, what?
19:53
Ginseng in Wisconsin and what, you were like 10 years old
19:56
working 40 hour weeks? So that's when I realized like,
19:59
oh, the personal story might be the even more important element
20:03
of this. And I started by focusing again
20:05
on my relationship with my brother because we're the ones
20:08
that did that work together. Then I learned actually from my
20:13
sister that she had a very complicated relationship with
20:17
the ginseng, like she got the most traumatized by ginseng of
20:20
all of us. And I must clarify that my
20:23
brother and I, I don't think we feel traumatized by ginseng.
20:26
We were very grateful for it because we were like poor
20:30
working class kids. And so working in the ginseng
20:33
gave us spending money of our own.
20:36
And I probably would not be working in comics if it wasn't
20:38
for that spending money. So we were getting paid a dollar
20:42
an hour to do this work. And that translated to 1 comic
20:46
book an hour for us. And so we were stoked.
20:48
You know, we saw it as oppressive as it kind of was the
20:52
last. It meant like we could buy comic
20:54
books and then later skateboards and whatever else.
20:57
Yeah, I mean, this is a common theme we see throughout our show
21:00
and when we talk to storytellers, how important it
21:02
is to bring in that human element, finding a way to
21:05
connect with people. It's it's come up with so many
21:07
of our creators and our storytellers just explaining how
21:10
once they started writing, they realized, oh, we have to tell
21:13
this personal thing. It makes it more impactful.
21:15
It makes it more deep. I think it's really interesting
21:18
in your work too. Like you were talking about
21:20
doing a Seri Ice thing. That's a huge way of comments
21:22
started getting that immediate feedback, hearing my fans are
21:25
liking, building stuff around them, learning how they're
21:28
connecting. What was that experience like
21:30
creating this time with this book where you are getting this
21:32
immediate feedback? Tell us a little bit about
21:35
storytelling in that kind of realm versus what you've done in
21:37
the past. Like it was a little
21:40
disappointing, a little bit. It wasn't as much as I wanted
21:43
because along with reader feedback and and and say
21:46
critical feedback in general, I was also secretly hoping that
21:51
interview subjects would come out of the woodwork and experts
21:55
that someone might like chime in and be like, Oh, you got that
21:57
wrong. I'm actually a scientist that
21:59
does this sort of studies in this.
22:01
And then they could then end up being an element of the book
22:08
know if that happened. But as I say that out loud, I do
22:11
realize that some of the relationships that stemmed out
22:15
of this project, I mean, I never could have in my wildest dreams
22:18
thought they were going to happen.
22:20
It's interesting what sort of emerged organically through this
22:24
process. And it did help to have, like, a
22:26
couple of issues in print when I was going to, like, the ginseng
22:30
festival in my hometown and saying, this is what I'm working
22:33
on and a business card to help some people take me seriously.
22:37
Like, OK, I'll sit down with an interview with you.
22:40
Important parts of the book to me are in the middle and they're
22:43
the chapters that focus on Chua Vang, who's a Mong immigrant
22:48
farmer in my, I should clarify, his father was an immigrant and
22:53
he's a second generation, but he's comes from this like legacy
23:00
of first generation Mong immigrants growing ginseng.
23:05
And then also there's an issue focused on Will Sue who comes
23:09
from that with both of them a couple weeks ago.
23:11
I went back to Wisconsin two weeks ago and reconnected with
23:16
both Will and with Chua to just sort of like gather their
23:20
thoughts about the series as a whole.
23:22
And I talked with Will, who's one of the biggest growers in
23:25
the region. Like his family is a is a mega
23:29
grower by agricultural standards.
23:31
You'd say they were corporate farming, but they are still a
23:33
family farm. Did 2 1/2 days of interviews
23:38
with the other major grower in my hometown and I didn't end up
23:44
using any of that footage. And I sort of realized I had a
23:49
little bit of a bias because the other grower was was a white
23:52
farmer. And I don't think it was a
23:55
conscious thing, but somehow like the immigrant story just
23:59
emerged as being integral to what Ginseng Roots was.
24:02
You know, like I ended up as an author having a bias towards
24:05
that. I mean, I think Chu a Vang's
24:07
story, Will Sue's story, there was something really emotional
24:11
at the heart of their family stories.
24:12
And it was a very much a family story that I glommed onto.
24:15
But as much as it was that it was also about the immigrant
24:18
experience. So I don't know if I would have
24:21
predicted that that's what this book was going to be about.
24:25
I think you make a lot of great points right here and also
24:28
throughout your series, and this conversation is a great example
24:33
of how this story is bringing people together in very
24:36
surprising ways. It just so happens that, you
24:40
know, we were in the comic book store when Issue 11 came out,
24:43
and that's an issue about China, about your journey there.
24:48
I didn't know what I was going to expect, but it's such
24:52
accurate depictions of what the country looked like in the vivid
24:59
details of people's lives there. And that's what intrigued me to
25:04
actually bind the rest of the series.
25:06
And as I read through it, there's just this consistent
25:09
feeling of surprise of your early life as a farmer.
25:14
And I think people have a perception of what America is
25:20
like as a country. What we talked about labels here
25:22
a lot on this podcast. When you think about America,
25:25
you think about New York or LA, Silicon Valley, advanced
25:29
technologies and all that stuff. What people don't realize
25:31
though, is America is one of the world's top agricultural
25:36
producers. Agriculture is such a huge part
25:39
of this country and its economy, with depictions of the rural
25:44
life and farm activity in America in this very country has
25:50
been lacking, I think. So it's in very kind of
25:55
refreshing for me as I read through that and also finding
26:01
resonance and connections with my own cultural roots because
26:05
coming from China, you get very well educated on the
26:09
agricultural history and culture.
26:13
Even though I'm a city boy, I never really did far in myself.
26:17
Those are the stories I kind of resonate with because that's
26:20
what you get taught growing up. And it's very interesting for me
26:24
to see how these seemingly very distant people on opposite side
26:29
of the world can have such similar stories and, and values.
26:35
And I think that's really thanks to the stories you're depicting
26:39
here in Ginsen Roots. Thank you.
26:41
I mean, that's the best possible feedback.
26:43
I I, I could receive in and as you were talking about it, I
26:48
was, I was just thinking like, maybe I'm the only cartoonist
26:51
who grew up working in ginseng. I'm not sure.
26:53
Actually, I know I'm not the only because in in issue 7,
26:57
there's a an artist Dua Shaka her who also who's among
27:01
cartoonist in in the same town I grew up in in Wisconsin that did
27:07
a story about working in ginseng as a kid too.
27:09
But we're probably the only two. But in Los Angeles, there must
27:13
be plenty of storytellers that came from small rural towns,
27:18
farming towns. And it it is weird that there
27:21
aren't more stories or depictions of farming life out
27:24
there. You associate it maybe with
27:26
country music and sort of right wing politics, But the first
27:30
thing that popped to mind was Minari that that that movie like
27:34
a Korean American family, that rural Midwest like Arkansas to
27:40
to start a farm. It reminds me a little bit of
27:45
Werner Herzog's Stroetzek. I don't know if I'm pronouncing
27:49
that properly, but famous Herzog film about this band of weirdos
27:54
from from Berlin or Austria. I can't remember who moves to
27:59
rural Wisconsin to pursue the American dream.
28:03
It'd be fun to watch those two movies back-to-back.
28:07
And I have a really hard time conjuring any movies or, or, or
28:12
great stories about farming right now.
28:14
It's weird that it's that it's, it's, it's not avoided.
28:18
It's also weird that again, it's associated with maybe right wing
28:21
politics and country music. Because if you look at, you
28:25
know, Democrats, you know, they're self-employed.
28:28
They're, you know, diverse population, you know, like
28:31
especially now, I mean, who does farm work?
28:33
It's immigrants as migrants, you know, it's Mexican workers, you
28:36
know, but also the over the last 100 years it's been like, you
28:40
know, Chinese workers and then, you know, Filipino and, you
28:43
know, like, so it's also the immigrant story.
28:47
I don't know, it is interesting that it's not a story that we
28:50
focus on more. Maybe it's not sexy enough for
28:52
cinema, but but I'd like to change that.
28:59
I think the example I've been using is Yellowstone.
29:01
That's probably the big example right now that's been really
29:04
taking up steam. It's still a little bit more
29:07
secessiony and mafia esque and a little bit more fictionized, but
29:11
I think it's a huge part of the country that their story wasn't
29:14
being told. And by telling stories that
29:17
connect with them, you access this huge audience that's been
29:21
overlooked. And it's huge a storytelling.
29:22
You got to find that audience that's being underserved and
29:25
find a way to super serve. Them I agree completely.
29:27
I don't think I had that sort of agenda though.
29:29
I, you know, I didn't deliberately try to figure out
29:34
in a sort of a mercenary way of like who's the untapped market
29:38
the way a Hollywood studio with would.
29:39
But. But yeah, I was feeling that
29:43
missing. And also, you write what you
29:46
know, right? I mean, I don't have a lot of
29:49
experiences, but I happen to have this very weird,
29:52
idiosyncratic childhood working in ginseng gardens.
29:57
I'm curious what your audience of the series has been looking
30:03
like. Did a lot of urban American
30:05
readers reach out to you? I wondered, you know, what the
30:08
urban population's reaction is to such a, you know, farming,
30:13
rural based story. Well, I think comic book readers
30:17
are probably primarily urban, you know, I think it's more
30:21
exciting to like get small town readers.
30:25
I've done a couple events back in near my hometown too, and I
30:28
have people who have never seen a comic book in their life and
30:33
working class people picking up a comic book because of like
30:36
what we were talking about earlier representation because
30:39
like, wow, this is this. We can respond, you know, like
30:42
we can relate to this. That's much more unique and
30:46
exciting to me. But I I, yeah, over over my
30:48
heart. A lot of white kids doing farm
30:50
labor in America. I was maybe the last generation,
30:54
but I think half of our agricultural labor done in
30:58
America is children. They just start, you know, the
31:00
children of Mexican migrants and, you know, other migrants.
31:06
So I, I think people have turned a blind eye.
31:09
Will Sue talks about it in issue 9.
31:11
He's like, you know, people don't want to know where their
31:16
meat comes from. They just want to, they just
31:19
want that meat on their plate. Basically, we don't want to know
31:22
what happens on a farm. We don't want to know where our
31:24
food comes from. And, and that's part of the
31:26
major problem with the world too now is like there's not a
31:30
acknowledgement of the labor and the practices that go into the
31:36
things we consume. I mean.
31:39
It's and I do have a little story to tell there because I
31:43
know, yes, people tend to not be interested in where their food
31:46
comes from. But if you're a kid growing up
31:49
in China, one of the earliest poems you get taught is actually
31:55
about where food comes from. It describes farmers, or in the
32:01
ancient times when they're harvesting at noon in a very hot
32:05
day. The condition is so harsh that
32:08
you have sweat literally dripping down into the soil.
32:12
And at the end of the poem, it's a rhetorical question that asks,
32:17
do you know that every grain of rice in your meal is harvested
32:23
from extremely hard work? So I think, yeah, it's a very,
32:28
you know, fundamental, simple poem or, you know, almost kids
32:33
story that most if not every Chinese kid get told.
32:38
And I think that's one of the major cultural differences I
32:42
notice as I come to a different country and learn about this
32:45
different culture is that it's almost drilled into into your
32:49
head that you have a respect for the farmers, the farming
32:54
population, that agriculture is such a foundation to so many of
32:59
the, you know, how how our world is running because everybody
33:02
needs to eat. Yeah, it's super cool.
33:04
Please send me that poem like that.
33:07
Basically it articulates everything I've been working on
33:11
for the last few years better than I could do it.
33:13
I guess. That's profound.
33:15
Yeah. And I, I think your book is
33:17
doing that too, not just, you know, the story itself, but I
33:21
have, I've also been reading the letters at the end of its issue,
33:25
the way your story is able to, you know, connect and resonate
33:30
with farmers not only across the United States, but across the
33:34
world. I think you have letters from
33:36
the Netherlands, which you know, feels also unreal to me.
33:41
How what does that meant to you? I mean, to do these
33:43
autobiographical stories, to delve into your past, to really
33:46
think about it, to travel, to have these discussions.
33:51
How has that helped you deal with your past by kind of
33:56
creating an IoT out of it? Well, some.
33:58
Sometimes I refer to blankets as sort of my coming out story, or
34:03
I've actually heard it described that way from queer readers,
34:08
that they identify with blankets because for them it reflects
34:11
their own coming out story. For me, it was coming out as not
34:16
Christian to my very fundamentalist Christian
34:18
parents. And these autobio projects
34:22
really force me to have some awkward conversations, you know,
34:29
with family in real time, you know, that maybe I would avoid.
34:35
And it's not therapeutic. I can't say that making art is
34:39
necessary therapeutic therapy's therapeutic either.
34:43
There has to be some sort of long term benefit, you know,
34:48
certainly, certainly in terms of, I don't know, self-awareness
34:51
and self acceptance. Hopefully ultimately.
35:01
We've learned so many Great stories and insights from you
35:05
today, Craig, and to be mindful of your precious time, we have
35:10
this closing segment called Suspenders.
35:13
We ask you a fun random question that's unrelated to anything
35:17
whatsoever, and you can give us any answer you feel like.
35:20
OK. Question of the day is if you
35:26
could have a conversation with any non human species, which
35:31
species would you choose and why?
35:37
Total accident. It's.
35:38
Great. I mean, mushrooms is the first
35:40
thing that comes to mind, but I don't know if that's a generic
35:43
answer. I do think there is something to
35:46
to fungus being like, you know, and and the spores of fungus
35:49
maybe having to do with the origins of human consciousness.
35:53
You know, in that documentary Fantastic Fungi, there's a
35:56
theory that the sort of expansion of like the primate
36:01
brain happened from ingesting probably psychedelic mushrooms.
36:05
So I don't know. I think there probably is some
36:07
message that fungus is in dialogue with human
36:12
consciousness in some way. That's a pretty hippie answer
36:17
though. No, it's a great answer.
36:19
We, we love it. Thank you so much for joining
36:23
us. This was super special, super
36:25
insightful. We really appreciate you staying
36:27
extra time as we dealt with all the technical difficulties.
36:30
Really appreciate it. Of course, my pleasure has been
36:34
mutually like expansive for me. So thank you guys.
36:45
Welcome to Top Hat. This is the part of the episode
36:47
where we analyzed in the set some of the amazingly cool
36:51
storytelling lessons we got from this week's at Split
36:54
Storyteller. And this week we went back in
36:57
time to a previous season with a previous guest, Craig Thompson.
37:02
Now welcome back to 2025. I hope you enjoyed watching that
37:05
episode for the first time in video.
37:09
You were never planning on releasing the video so even if
37:11
you listened to that episode when it came out, you just saw a
37:13
whole new lens of pre video LSPD pod.
37:18
Kev, what was it like for you? Before we get into it, going
37:21
back in time, what was it like for you watching our show from 2
37:25
years ago? Yeah, it's really special,
37:29
Gaurav and a lot of mixed feelings.
37:32
One, we have definitely gotten so much better at this hosting
37:35
thing. Just looking at that raw footage
37:38
back then, how we talked, how much we had to edit down versus
37:42
how we are the most recent season as host, we definitely
37:47
improved, which love to see that.
37:49
But even back then, as I re listened to the 1st edition of
37:54
this episode, I was surprised by how much I learned from that
37:59
conversation all over again. And it's just this really
38:04
fulfilling feeling that when you know you're creating something
38:08
that you yourself enjoy and believe in, it's hard to
38:12
compare. Yeah, You know, it's funny.
38:15
Every time we do this reflection episode, I'm reminded of how
38:18
much we grow every episode, right?
38:20
And I never send out our first few episodes because you can't
38:24
hear us. That's my common joke.
38:26
Like the audio is bad, the editing is bad.
38:28
We were going back and forth editing.
38:31
We were trying different mics. We've talked about how we're
38:33
recovering perfectionist, but we're doing nothing to recover,
38:36
right? It's going back to that thing we
38:38
were talking about where this show was a lot about
38:41
satisficing, right? This show was a lot about it's
38:44
good enough to get it out right, because if we if we maximize the
38:47
show, we would never got out the first episode.
38:50
But the more we did it, the better we got.
38:52
Obviously it's still a fight, but every single guest quality
38:57
is the same. So it's almost like we're
38:58
working hard to be worthy of the people we had in our first few
39:01
episodes. Yeah, absolutely.
39:03
So let's dive back into this rewind, you know, listening back
39:09
to our lessons from two years ago.
39:12
Grov, what are some of your takeaways?
39:14
You know, I'm gonna go back to something I said in the first
39:17
time we did this episode. Is that comic book as a medium,
39:21
right. This is so, so important to me
39:23
as a lifelong comic book reader. I mean, as I've gotten older, I
39:27
still read some of the stuff I did as a kid, but my tastes have
39:29
gotten older. I'm currently reading Saga,
39:31
which is definitely adult comic book series.
39:34
Last year I read all of the Invincible series, which is a
39:38
superhero thing. And this is the thing about
39:41
comic books is it is not a genre.
39:44
It is not a Kitty thing, it's not about superheroes.
39:46
It is a medium. It is just another form of
39:48
storytelling, like books are like movies are like TBR.
39:52
Yeah. And Craig's work are prime
39:55
examples to the complexity or the possibilities that the
40:01
medium of comic books can provide because as diverse the
40:07
fictional or superhero genres of comic books stories can get,
40:11
there is still a vibrant market of nonfiction, in Craig's case,
40:16
autobiography, memoir style, type of stories that are
40:19
delivered in this. Format.
40:21
I would think of the distinction between comic books and books.
40:27
Like the distinction with film and TV 1 is not a not a subset
40:31
of the other. They bear similar elements in
40:35
the way they delivered the story, but as we said, it is a
40:39
vibrant medium that contain almost endless possibilities of
40:44
the types of story you can tell. And another really interesting
40:47
take away as I really listen to this conversation from Craig was
40:52
his own self doubt almost about even his most popular book
40:59
Blankets at the time. Is is this deeply personal,
41:04
deeply specific story that he had at the time going to connect
41:10
with a wider audience in the United States, which was vastly
41:14
different from his identity tied to that story because it talked
41:19
about his very rural upbringing when the vast majority of comic
41:23
audience very urban. But people connected with
41:27
blankets nonetheless because they were still relatable themes
41:31
in his story about the coming of age, about first love, family
41:36
relationship with faith and falling out of faith.
41:38
As he said, those are highly relatable.
41:42
And it's as Craig said, when you go as specific as possible with
41:47
your story, it almost becomes universal again.
41:51
And it is through telling the deeply personal aspects of your
41:57
story, even with Jensen roots, those are the things that
42:01
connect with people, that attract the audience was
42:04
authentic and personal and true to you, which is obviously
42:07
something we've talked repeatedly on this show.
42:11
Yeah, I mean, again, it goes through this idea we talk about
42:13
a lot about how stories can educate, right, If there's some
42:16
obvious ways. Like, as a kid growing up in
42:18
Canada, I learned a lot about American government from The
42:22
West Wing, and a little bit more as I got older.
42:25
From Hamilton, right? Romanticized a little bit, but.
42:29
Yeah, but that's how you start, right?
42:31
That's how you start to go deeper.
42:33
Exactly. And ginseng rings roots, you
42:35
learn things about trade, you learn things about the culture.
42:37
Like I'm not going to have the experience where I go to this
42:40
part of the world where ginseng is growing.
42:42
Not everyone gets that opportunity.
42:44
So through stories you learn about trade, you learn about
42:46
cultures, you learn about how this all works and even though
42:48
that's not the primary purpose, it helps people learn and that's
42:52
the beauty of storytelling. It's it's a way that builds
42:55
empathy with one another. And this is a deeply personal,
42:58
very specific story, but allows you to learn about all these
43:01
really big universal feelings because you can relate to that
43:05
story. You can apply it to yourself.
43:06
You can see the art, you can see the emotions.
43:09
And we've seen this time and time again comes to mind is
43:12
Carrie Sun. We interviewed her since this
43:15
episode came out and Carrie Sun wrote this autobiography of her
43:21
journey through working at this big firm as an assistant.
43:25
And it's funny because we don't we don't read a lot of books
43:28
about the assistants point of view.
43:30
And she narrated herself. We listened to the audio book on
43:33
Spotify. I remember I was in New York a
43:35
lot for work listening to this as walking through the streets
43:38
of New York, I learned a little bit more about her story.
43:41
I was able to build more empathy.
43:43
And there's some universal elements of that that we can all
43:46
learn from. And this is the thing about
43:48
autobiographies that are so powerful.
43:50
And even if you're not going to write 1 to publish, you can look
43:54
back at your life as a story, as a story where you're the main
43:57
character, main character energy, and you can try to write
44:01
it to see, oh, that's why I had to go through that.
44:04
Or I'm so glad there was ups and downs because it made my story
44:07
more interesting. And to be clear, it's really
44:09
hard to do. It requires you to sit down
44:12
right out. This is why I made this
44:14
decision. This is why this happened.
44:16
This is why I couldn't do this in the moment.
44:18
And that's really, really hard. But sometimes doing that, doing
44:21
that work, looking at your life as a story can help you see, oh,
44:25
that just made it more interesting.
44:27
Yeah. And even though not all of us
44:31
are going to be writers or comic artists, we are constantly
44:35
telling our own stories when we talk to other people and the
44:39
day-to-day conversations, big and small.
44:42
And it's important to remember that the stories you have
44:46
already are very interesting, that people will find
44:50
fascinating when you understand the value in your own story and
44:55
tell it in a compelling way. And we see this in Craig's
45:00
stories, in a lot of his own work.
45:05
And who knows, we might end up finding unexpected connections
45:10
with people because of the ways we connect with each other's
45:14
stories, the way we did with Craig this time.
45:18
For those of you who are deeply interested in this conversation,
45:23
make sure to check out Ginseng Roots Again, the graphic novel
45:27
is available wherever you can find a comic book store, so go
45:31
check it out. But.
45:33
Otherwise, Kevin. Kevin, how many did they send
45:35
us? There's actually quite a few and
45:39
there's only two of us there's. Only two of us, so I think they
45:43
sent us four. I think maybe we should give
45:45
away a couple. You know, let's send it out.
45:48
We're gonna give away 2 copies of Ginseng Roots to enter all
45:52
you have to do is leave a review and rating on Spotify and or
45:57
Apple Podcasts. You can get 2 entries if you
46:00
leave a review on both platforms.
46:02
All you have to do is once you leave the review, take a
46:04
screenshot, follow us on Instagram and send us a message.
46:08
So step one, leave a review on Apple Podcast and or Spotify.
46:14
Step 2 Follow us on Instagram and Step 3 send us a screenshot
46:18
and you will be entered to win. Yeah, it's a win, win, win offer
46:22
y'all. You get to enjoy amazing stories
46:25
like Craig's Jensen Roots. You help us score our show.
46:29
We obviously will benefit a lot from that.
46:32
And of course, we all help Craig spreading the words around about
46:36
the graphic novel. So make sure to follow us on
46:41
Instagram at LSPT Pod. Also TikTok, LinkedIn linen suit
46:46
and plastic tie. Leave a comment, leave a review
46:49
everywhere you listen. And subscribe on YouTube.
46:53
We're on YouTube this season. And we'll see you next time.
46:57
Thanks for listening and watching.