I read R.F. Kuang’s Yellowface over the summer, with the intention of adding it to my “Lost Voices in American Literature” course. After reading it, I was very interested in the discussion that would arise when we finally discussed the book in class. I thought, on the first couple of days, that students wouldn’t say much and that we just look at the way that June Hayward steals Athena Liu’s manuscript and the impact of social media on our lives. However, as we looked at the novel over the course of a few class periods, I really started to become interested not solely in June stealing Athena’s work but really in the discussion of “literary theft” because that thread runs throughout the novel, not just with the main storyline of June’s actions against Athena.

June narrates the novel, working to convince us, and herself, that her theft of Athena’s manuscript wasn’t really as bad as people imagine it. She justifies her actions in a few ways, but one that stands out is that she proclaims that she didn’t “steal” Athena’s work but rather that she “collaborated” with Athena on the unpublished manuscript. This line of reasoning falls flat, though, because we see June’s thoughts as she picks up the manuscript after seeing Athena die in front of her by choking on a pancake. For a split second, she thinks about asking Liu’s family and estate to work on the manuscript, but instead of doing that she steals it, editing and revising it on her own, and publishing it under her own name. She literally becomes a thief, stealing Athena’s work.

However, over the course of the novel, the question arises, again and again, about whether or not an author, any author, steals someone else’s work, ideas, or story. June, in order to placate her own conscience, accuses Athena of theft when she spoke with a Korean War veteran the National Museum of American History. June met Athena at the museum, and when they walked to the exhibit detail American POWs during the war, Athena, looking at a letter from a nineteen-year old soldier, started writing in her notebook. After that, she talked to a veteran in a wheelchair, asking him, as she wrote in her notebook, “And do you remember how that felt?”

Upon seeing Athena and the man, June thought, “Jesus Christ . . . She’s a vampire.” June accuses Athena of appropriation, claiming she “collected true narratives like seashells, polished them off, and presented them, sharp and gleaming, to horrified and entranced readers.” June doesn’t see what Athena does as research. Instead, she sees it as “theft,” coming very close to “plagiarism,” which is what June does herself. June claims she had “seen Athena steal before,” but that Athena would say that she worked to “try to make sense of the chaos,” to take the stories and the lives of individuals, to give them a voice, and “to bring those bloody histories to the fore.” She proclaimed that she worked to bring a voice to those whose voices languished in the void of silence.

Later, when June’s narrative about The Last Front begins to unravel, she encounters someone on social media who shares a similar experience with Athena. The poster details how they saw Athena, tape recorder in hand, speaking to Korean War vets, and then six months later, her story “Parasalis Over Choson” debuted. Readers praised it “as one of the more faithful depictions of POWs in Korea.” The poster, though, didn’t feel comfortable with the story after seeing Athena interview the vets. The poster concludes by stating, “[I]f we’re talking about literary legacies, I think this is important to bring up” because, as they argue, Athena seemed to put forward that the story came totally out of her imagination.

June and the poster each present Athena’s process as “exploitation” and “stealing,” but is what Athena does in these moments “theft”? Fiction, no matter the genre, is based in 90% or more of reality, the other 10% is the facade, the garnish that arises to fill out the story. Yet, that reality comes from stories. Artists listen; they take the time to sit with what they see and what they hear all around them. Then, they take that stimuli and put it into their own stories. Real life exudes from the page in every story I have written, from seeing a woman holding her child and asking for assistance in Chicago as people in a restaurant stared at her through the glass as they ate to the story of my mom telling me about my grandmother’s suicide, which occurred in the room I knew, for my whole life, as the home office.

Along with observing the world, artists exist within communal networks where artists take inspiration from works they read, see, or hear or from conversations artists have with other artists, as they discuss their craft. Seeing students commune during a workshop, June thanks back to these moments and misses the communal nature of writing. She tells us, “It has been so long since I thought of writing as a communal activity,” where she and others would share their works in progress instead of hiding them from one another in fear that they would “scoop their ideas and publish before they can.”

Taking inspiration from others, or what classical rhetoricans would refer to as “imitation,” is not “theft.” Remember, Quintilian, in Institutes of Oratory, points out why imitation is important in invention and the creating of art. He writes, “Our minds must be directed to the imitation of all [the artists’] excellences, for it cannot be doubted that a great portion of art consists in imitation, since, though to invent was first in order of time and holds the first place in merit, it is of advantage to copy what has been invented with success.” This does not mean one should plagiraize; it just means that “imitation” is part of creation because, whether we want to admit it or not, we populate our art with the inspiration of others.

Now, June does steal Athena’s manuscript, yes. However, the discussion over the course of Yellowface calls upon us to think about the ways that artists create art. It calls upon us to think about the process as a communal process instead of one of “isolation from jealous peers.” I want to pick up on this thread in the next post, looking at some other moments in Yellowface where June comments on “literary theft.” Until then, though, what are your thoughts? As usual, let me know in the comments below. Make sure to follow me on Bluesky @silaslapham.bsky.social‬.