"Pulitzer-Winning Graphic Novel 'Feeding Ghosts' Receives Minimal Reaction"

The graphic novel Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir by Tessa Hulls, published by MCD in 2024, has achieved a significant milestone by winning the Pulitzer Prize on May 5. This prestigious award, widely considered one of the most esteemed in journalism, literature, and music in the US, underscores the novel's profound impact. Remarkably, Feeding Ghosts is only the second graphic novel to secure this honor, following Art Spiegelman’s Maus, which won a Special Award in 1992. Unlike Maus, Feeding Ghosts triumphed in the regular category of Memoir or Autobiography, competing against top English prose works worldwide. This victory is even more impressive as it marks Hulls' debut in the graphic novel genre.

Despite this monumental achievement in the field of comics, the coverage of the Pulitzer win has been surprisingly sparse. Since the announcement two weeks ago, only a few mainstream and trade publications, including Seattle Times and Publishers Weekly, along with one major comic book news outlet, Comics Beat, have reported on it. This lack of widespread attention contrasts sharply with the significance of the award.

The Pulitzer Prize Board described Feeding Ghosts as "An affecting work of literary art and discovery whose illustrations bring to life three generations of Chinese women – the author, her mother and grandmother, and the experience of trauma handed down with family histories." The book, which took nearly a decade to create, delves into the reverberations of Chinese history across these three generations. Hulls' grandmother, Sun Yi, was a Shanghai journalist who fled to Hong Kong after the 1949 Communist victory, later writing a best-selling memoir about her experiences. However, she suffered a mental breakdown from which she never recovered. Hulls grew up witnessing the struggles of her mother and grandmother under the burden of unexamined trauma and mental illness. She left home to explore the world's remote corners, eventually returning to confront her own fears and generational trauma, a journey she felt compelled to document in her graphic memoir.

In an interview last month, Hulls explained, “I didn’t feel like I had a choice. My family ghosts literally told me I had to do this. My book is called Feeding Ghosts, because that was the beginning of this nine-year process of really stepping into something that was my family duty.” Despite the acclaim, Hulls has indicated that Feeding Ghosts might be her last graphic novel. In another interview, she shared, “I learned that being a graphic novelist is really too isolating for me. My creative practice relies on being out in the world and responding to what I find there.” On her website, Hulls expresses her intention to transition into an embedded comics journalist, working with field scientists, indigenous groups, and nonprofits in remote environments.

As Hulls embarks on this new path, Feeding Ghosts remains a testament to the power of graphic storytelling, deserving recognition and celebration beyond the comics community.