Eric Luper's Random Musings

American Born Chinese by Gene Yang won the Printz Award this year. Here is a great interview with the author.

I loved American Born Chinese. I consider it to be an important and beautiful piece of work. Absolutely stunning, in fact. However, I'm wondering if graphic novels should be in the running for Printz Awards.

According to the American Library Association, who grants the prize, "the Michael L. Printz Award is an award for a book that exemplifies literary excellence in young adult literature." You can read the whole description of it here.

The functional terms in this description are:
- book
- literary excellence
and
- young adult literature

I suppose American Born Chinese fits all of these criteria, but I'm still not entirely convinced. At some level, it feels like graphic novels competing with traditional novels is like hockey players competing with bull fighters. This is not sour grapes (at least I don't think it is). It's just an entirely different medium. With graphic novels becoming so popular and such an integral part of every library, I'm wondering if it's time to give graphic novels their own award.

What are your thoughts on this?