Why am I passionate about this?

I am the Goldthwaite Professor of Rhetoric and Japanese at Tufts University. I’ve lived in Japan for 8 years beginning when I was 17 when I travelled to Tokyo and lived on my own, teaching English, and studying Japanese. I became a scholar of Japanese literature, and then in the 1990s became interested in Japanese animation (anime) and in animation in general. I’ve written five books on either Japanese literature or anime-related subjects, and I am currently working on a project comparing the animated films of the Walt Disney Studio with the films of Studio Ghibli.


I wrote

Book cover of Miyazakiworld: A Life in Art

What is my book about?

It’s about the Japanese animation director, Hayao Miyazaki, probably the most important animator since Walt Disney. Miyazaki’s films were initially…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of Japanamerica

Susan J. Napier Why did I love this book?

This book has remained consistently influential and thought-provoking from the time it was written in 2006. Kelts uses the notion of the moebius strip to analyze the sometimes surprisingly rich and complex dynamics in the mutual relationship between Japanese and American popular culture. He explains how much each country’s art and entertainment culture has influenced the other in an interweaving tapestry of history, art, and inspiration. At a time when the question of cultural appropriation is still a provocative subject, Kelt’s book reminds us of how fruitful cultural interchange can be.

By Roland Kelts,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Japanamerica as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Anime, or Japanese animation, is Asia's equivalent of the Harry Potter phenomenon in the rest of the world. While Hollywood struggles to fill seats, Japanese anime releases are increasingly outpacing American movies in sheer numbers and, more importantly, in the devotion they inspire in their fans. But just as Harry Potter is both "universal" and very English, anime is also deeply Japanese, making its popularity in the rest of the world surprising. "Japanamerica" is the first book that directly addresses our experience with anime and the Japanese pop phenomenon, covering everything from Hayao Miyazaki's epics, the burgeoning world of hentai,…


Book cover of Hayao Miyazaki

Susan J. Napier Why did I love this book?

This gorgeous catalogue is an event in itself that commemorates an even more interesting event, the fact that the brand new Museum of the Academy of Motion Pictures chose as its first special exhibition not the work of an American director, and not the work of a live-action auteur but the work of a Japanese animation director who lives and creates thousands of miles from Hollywood. The catalogue is not only beautifully illustrated with scenes from Miyazaki movies and reproductions of many of Miyazaki’s storyboards, but also contains some excellent essays by the exhibition’s curators, including Jessica Niebel and Daniel Kothensculte. The curators draw on their film and art expertise to give insightful, sensitive readings of the director and his contributions to the world of cinema.

By Hayao Miyazaki, Jessica Niebel,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Hayao Miyazaki as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A richly illustrated journey through the extraordinary cinematic worlds of beloved filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki

For over four decades, Hayao Miyazaki has been enchanting audiences of all ages. His animated films, often featuring children navigating unfamiliar and challenging worlds, offer timeless explorations of youth and what it means to grow up. Celebrated and admired around the globe for his artistic vision, craftsmanship and deeply humanistic values, Miyazaki has influenced generations of artists. The universal appeal of his evocative natural settings and complex characters, many among them strong girls and young women, cuts across cultural boundaries.

This book is published on the…


Book cover of Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts

Susan J. Napier Why did I love this book?

Another catalogue (sorry!) but also another opportunity to delve into a rich and beautiful world, this time not Miyazaki’s but the world of Walt Disney and the European Rococo as seen in a special exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. At first glance, this pairing seems an unlikely juxtaposition since the ornamental art of the Rococo flourished in the 18th century. As the beautifully illustrated catalogue and excellent essays by the curator Wolf Burchard amply demonstrate, however, both Walt Disney and the many superb artists who worked for him drew creative and aesthetic inspiration from all aspects of Rococo art. These range from decorative anthropomorphized teapots (think Mrs. Potts in Beauty and the Beast) or the flamboyant costumes and hairstyles of the period, (illustrated in a mesmerizing scene from Cinderella) to Fragonard’s exquisite painting “Girl on a Swing” that shows up briefly but memorably in Frozen 2. This catalogue shows how richly beneficial cultural interchange can be.

By Wolf Burchard,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Inspiring Walt Disney as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

How Walt Disney and the Disney Studios wove the aesthetics of French decorative arts into the fairy-tale worlds of beloved animated films, from Cinderella to Beauty and the Beast and beyond

Pink castles, talking sofas, and objects coming to life: what may sound like the fantasies of Hollywood dream-maker Walt Disney were in fact the figments of the colorful salons of Rococo Paris. Exploring the novel use of French motifs in Disney films and theme parks, this publication features forty works of eighteenth-century European design-from tapestries and furniture to Boulle clocks and Sevres porcelain-alongside 150 Disney film stills, drawings, and…


Book cover of Frame by Frame: A Materialist Aesthetics of Animated Cartoons

Susan J. Napier Why did I love this book?

This is a book for animation aficionados who really want to think about the nuts and bolts of animation. As someone with a tendency to revel in the world building of the finished product of animation, be it a Miyazaki movie or a Disney film, this book re-orients me to the materiality of the medium itself. And yes, traditional animation is a material medium! Frank looked at thousands of animation cells, literally frame by frame, and in her book provides us with a glimpse of the enormous labor, expertise, and occasional mistakes that go into creating even a seven-minute short subject. She brings back from the past the many women who were the inkers and in-betweeners in American animation studios and makes us realize the enormous effort (and tedium) that went into producing the fluid and flexible cartoons that Hollywood is known for.

Along the way, Frank touches on the poetry of Emily Dickinson and the fascination with montage evinced by European and Russian critics such as Walter Benjamin and Sergei Eisenstein to enhance her analysis of the subtleties of a seemingly simple art form. This book is a powerful theoretical treatise that is not an easy read, but it is an important one for those who want to think about animation in general.

By Hannah Frank,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Frame by Frame as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

At publication date, a free ebook version of this title will be available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.

In this beautifully written and deeply researched study, Hannah Frank provides an original way to understand American animated cartoons from the Golden Age of animation (1920-1960). In the pre-digital age of the twentieth century, the making of cartoons was mechanized and standardized: thousands of drawings were inked and painted onto individual transparent celluloid sheets (called "cels") and then photographed in succession, a labor-intensive process that was divided across scores of artists and…


Book cover of Sharing a House with the Never-Ending Man: 15 Years at Studio Ghibli

Susan J. Napier Why did I love this book?

And here is your dessert course! 

Fluent in Japanese and with a background in Japanese literature, Steve Alpert worked initially at Disney in Japan and then for a number of years at Miyazaki’s Ghibli Studio and writes about his experiences in this delightful and frequently hilarious book. He gives us fascinating details about Miyazaki and his fellow director Takahata and producer Suzuki, especially in relation to what are perhaps the two most famous of Miyazaki’s movies, Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away.

The chapter on Princess Mononoke is particularly interesting as it includes a detailed and very funny account of negotiations between Ghibli and Disney as to how to translate the film’s elegant Japanese script and complex worldview into something that could be understood by an American audience. The Disney executives keep asking Alpert “Who’s the bad guy?” and seem unable to cope with the answer that “There is no bad guy." Not only does the book provide a window into the world of Ghibli, but it also engages with some of the significant and frustrating culture clashes that can still occur in our rapidly globalizing world.

By Steve Alpert,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Sharing a House with the Never-Ending Man as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This highly entertaining business memoir describes what it was like to work for Japan's premiere animation studio, Studio Ghibli, and its reigning genius Hayao Miyazaki. Steve Alpert, a Japanese-speaking American, was the "resident foreigner" in the offices of Ghibli and its parent Tokuma Shoten and played a central role when Miyazaki's films were starting to take off in international markets. Alpert describes hauling heavy film canisters of Princess Mononoke to Russia and California, experiencing a screaming Harvey Weinstein, dealing with Disney marketers, and then triumphantly attending glittering galas celebrating the Oscar-winning Spirited Away.

His one-of-a-kind portraits of Miyazaki and long-time…


Explore my book 😀

Book cover of Miyazakiworld: A Life in Art

What is my book about?

It’s about the Japanese animation director, Hayao Miyazaki, probably the most important animator since Walt Disney. Miyazaki’s films were initially known mainly in Japan but, from the 1990s, as Japanese animation (anime) became increasingly popular throughout the world, Miyazaki became recognized as a brilliant, influential, and entertaining auteur.  

While the designation auteur usually refers to directors of live-action films, such as Coppola, Tarantino, or the Coen brothers, I tell people that Miyazaki is a kind of Super-Auteur who, while working with a talented staff of brilliant and enthusiastic people, is still the main person behind everything – ranging from the numerous detailed storyboards he creates, the worlds and characters that he imagines, even the lyrics of each film’s theme song.

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Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

By Mimi Zieman,

Book cover of Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

Mimi Zieman Author Of Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m an OB/GYN, passionate about adventuring beyond what’s expected. This has led me to pivot multiple times in my career, now focusing on writing. I’ve written a play, The Post-Roe Monologues, to elevate women’s stories. I cherish the curiosity that drives outer and inner exploration, and I love memoirs that skillfully weave the two. The books on this list feature extraordinary women who took risks, left comfort and safety, and battled vulnerability to step into the unknown. These authors moved beyond the stories they’d believed about themselves–or that others told about them. They invite you to think about living fuller and bigger lives. 

Mimi's book list on women exploring the world and self

What is my book about?

Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.

The team attempts a new route up the East Face without the use of supplemental oxygen, Sherpa support, or chance for rescue. When three climbers disappear during their summit attempt, Zieman reaches the knife edge of her limits and digs deeply to fight for the climbers’ lives and to find her voice.


Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

By Mimi Zieman,

What is this book about?

The plan was outrageous: A small team of four climbers would attempt a new route on the East Face of Mt. Everest, considered the most remote and dangerous side of the mountain, which had only been successfully climbed once before. Unlike the first large team, Mimi Zieman and her team would climb without using supplemental oxygen or porter support. While the unpredictable weather and high altitude of 29,035 feet make climbing Everest perilous in any condition, attempting a new route, with no idea of what obstacles lay ahead, was especially audacious. Team members were expected to push themselves to their…


5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in Japanese popular culture, Hayao Miyazaki, and Japan?

Hayao Miyazaki 12 books
Japan 513 books