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Two of the most interesting (deranged, over the top, extremely fun but also WTF) books I read last year were Henry Lien’s Peasprout Chen: Future Legend of Skate and Sword and Peasprout Chen: Battle of Champions. So when I discovered that Lien had written a book about storytelling, Spring, Summer, Asteroid, Bird: The Art of Eastern Storytelling, of course I had to read what the author of Peasprout Chen has to say about storytelling, even though I generally approach the idea of Eastern and Western storytelling styles with a healthy dose of suspicion.

To sum up this suspicion briefly, I think that people often look at a snapshot of what Eastern and Western storytellers are doing right now, and then draw conclusions about The Eternal Differences of Eastern and Western Storytelling that aren’t Eternal at all, since they would be completely blown out of the water by a wider historical view.

For instance, I’ve seen the argument that “Western stories must have conflict,” which (although there are obviously outliers) is a pretty good summation of the current Western vision of how stories work… but in the 19th and early 20th century, stories about the characters having good times with no conflict were an accepted and popular literary mode in America and England, especially in children’s books.

Given this viewpoint, it’s perhaps no surprise that I think the book is strongest when it focuses on the differences between Eastern and Western animated children’s stories (for which read “Studio Ghibli” and “Disney”). The artform has only been around for about a hundred years and it’s been dominated by a handful of main companies, so one person can meaningfully encompass most of what’s been released. And the differences are striking, as I think anyone who grew up on Disney and then saw a Ghibli film can attest. Wait, you don’t have to have a villain? You don’t even have to have conflict? The kids can just ride in the catbus?

The weakest part IMO is the chapter where Lien argues that Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go is telling a profoundly Eastern story, because rather than rebel against their circumstances, the characters accept their fate and try to live the best lives they can within that context. Now I’m sure this is something that happens in Eastern stories, but this is also a theme with deep roots in the history of the English novel. Admittedly a theme that is deeply out of fashion right now! One that literary critics and internet pundits complain about at length when they discuss nineteenth century English novels! And then other critics/pundits reply, “Isn’t trying to live the best life you can in limited circumstances the TRUE rebellion, though?”, because Western critics/pundits have generally accepted that Rebellion is the moral standard by which literary works should be judged and by which we should all live.

So in that sense I suppose I’ve talked myself into agreeing with Lien, at least to the extent of agreeing that Ishiguro is telling a story that is alien and upsetting to current Western literary sensibilities… but it’s alien and upsetting in a way that has Western roots just as deep as the Eastern ones. Mansfield Park makes people blow a gasket for pretty much the same reason.

Reading the book is a bit like going to a coffee shop with a friend and having a good rousing literary argument. You may have some quibbles, you may indeed have some big disagreements, but it’s a stimulating and enjoyable experience nonetheless.

However, fair warning, it will not give you any new insight into why Peasprout Chen is Like That. Peasprout will simply remain a bizarre and beautiful mystery.