“I lived in SigEp during the summer” was not something that I was expecting to hear from R.F. Kuang, an author I’ve heard so much about from friends and peers. Kuang discussed her 2022 novel Babel and 2023 novel Yellowface in a Q&A moderated by Professor Michelle Huang from the English department on Feb. 21. The Asian American Studies Program hosted this event, and 80 students gathered in Harris Hall to hear from Kuang.

Before the author’s talk began, Kuang introduced herself by saying, “Go ‘Cats,” causing the room to explode into a flurry of laughter. She went on to explain how she’d previously visited Northwestern, as her husband went to Northwestern for his undergraduate degree. This anecdote created a personal connection between Kuang and the audience, creating an amicable, inviting atmosphere in the room. 

Kuang’s author talk revolved around her novels and her experiences being a minority person in the publishing industry. She dove into how she deals with creativity and how her writing process goes. 

When asked about how she deals with differentiating between academic and creative writing, Kuang told the audience how she dedicates “only three hours a day” to creative writing pursuits. 

Kuang explained how she didn’t see exploring both her passions as a tradeoff in time and enjoyed the “pleasure going back and forth.” She added that she had to become more precise for her academic writing, comparing it to  “dancing in shackles,” a reference not only to her 2022 novel Babel, but to writing as well. 

Professor Huang asked Kuang, “Who did you write Yellowface for?,” a question that particularly intrigued me. Kuang responded, “I wrote it for me. I write everything for me.” She explained that when writing her stories, it has to come out of a place of curiosity or a burning question that she has about herself.

She disagreed with the idea that authors should tell a reader how to read a novel, as it comes off as condescending, because it makes it seem that you don’t trust the reader to read your story on their own.

Kuang made it clear that the reader has the capacity to come to their own conclusions and their own feelings toward the novels she writes. The only thing she had to say about reading Yellowface was that “people think the novel’s proof that white authors can’t write other races.” She added that “it’s not criticizing the act of cultural appropriation, but the idea that an author has to stay in their own lane.” Kuang emphasized that authors require the freedom to explore, pointing out how being confined to certain boundaries limits their creativity and stressing that such a mindset –one that avoided exploration –is dangerous.

Kuang later discussed the publishing industry and how she advocates for herself in comp titles, the industry term for books that are similar to the novel that one writes. Comp titles are used to help market books to consumers with established tastes. 

“Don’t comp other Asian authors if it doesn’t make sense,” she said. “Push for the comparisons that are about the text and not about you.”

Kuang also discussed her 2022 novel Babel. She told the audience that Babel is a critique of dark academia, specifically The Secret History by Donna Tartt. She called it an “inverted David Copperfield.” 

Babel is a historical fantasy novel set in the 19th century at the height of British imperialism. It follows the protagonist, Robin, a student at Oxford University who grapples with his role in expanding the empire through the knowledge of silver-working – which is magic in the world of Babel. The novel illustrates Robin’s complicity in the imperial project and inability to commit to a side, which ultimately culminates in his death. Kuang explained why she chose to end Babel the way she did with Robin’s death.

“Robin doesn’t make the heroic choice,” she said.

“He wants his role in the story to be over. He wasn’t brave enough to choose it,” she noted, with his complicity in the empire and never making a choice on his own.

The author talk also included a section for audience questions. Weinberg second-year Lakshmi Sunder asked Kuang how she tackles switching genres. Kuang’s advice to Sunder was to just “bounce into genres,” never letting oneself be categorized. Kuang refuses to be defined by genre and told the audience that it “would feel like death” to stifle her creative explorations.

“I thought she had a lot of great input,” Sunder later said. “I’m an aspiring writer of color and also a woman of color, so I thought she had a lot of great perspective.”

Kuang later talked about how she feels toward her own work and how she hates looking back at her 2018 novel The Poppy War due to her writing evolving since then. She uses this hatred as fuel to continue improving her writing and told the audience how it’s “healthy to hate everything you wrote” and how she would rather be “unhappy than pass the apex of my abilities.”

Her sentiment is one that I find myself grappling with as a fellow writer, as my past writings make me cringe as well. Hearing an author such as Kuang go through similar experiences resonated with me and other writers as well. 

 “It was cool to have this author talk at the moment to be like no matter what’s happening politically, art is going to continue to be made, and it’s going to continue to represent voices that aren’t represented,” said Weinberg second-year Haarika Palacharla.

Kuang’s talk was insightful and inspiring. It left me wondering about the various ways to approach a novel and left me waiting for her next one, Katabasis, which is coming out in August 2025.