May the Fourth (of October) Be With You!

Ah, Mid-Autumn Festival. A time of coming together, a time of thanks, but most of all, a time of…mooncakes. What are mooncakes you ask? Well, you’ve come to the right place. Often compared (in both shape and density) to a hockey puck, the mooncake is one of China’s most iconic pastries. Traditionally filled with  lotus […]

Comics Set During the Boxer Uprising

This list will be updated as new works are found or published. For Chinese language works, title translations are my own, unless otherwise marked. Suggest a comic here! Boxer Legends 《义和团传说故事》 series from Tianjin Fine Arts Press 天津美术出版社 1. Pagoda-Bearing Heavenly King Li 《托塔李天王》 Han Zuo 翰左, illustrated by Feng Zhichao 冯志超. May, 1959, F60, […]

Literature at the Margins: Learn Chinese, Read Sci-fi

In my experience learning Chinese over the past decade, one of the biggest challenges I’ve faced is getting enough practice reading (and writing) characters: “Study them every day, use them every day” 天天学,天天用 1 Characters take an inordinate amount of time to memorize, and the lack of spaces between words means that proper nouns, set phrases, […]