Craig Thompson burst onto the comics scene in 2003 with his graphic memoir Blankets, which won multiple Harvey, Eisner, and Ignatz awards. Blankets was followed up by the travelogue Carnet de Voyage, and the graphic novels Habibi and Space Dumplins.
Now, Craig is back with a followup graphic memoir, Ginseng Roots. Part childhood reminiscence, part tutorial in herbal medicine, part exploration of American empire, Ginseng Roots takes the reader from rural Wisconsin to China and Korea and to modern-day Portland, Oregon.
Craig sits down with S.W. Conser in the KBOO studios — where in 2003 he became the very first Words and Pictures guest — to talk about cross-cultural solidarity, analog and digital art, family and community, faith and activism, and the challenges of comics journalism.