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Susan J. Napier

{{Short description|Professor specializing in Japanese literature}}

{{Use American English|date=December 2023}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=September 2022}}

{{infobox writer

| image = File:Susan J. Napier (2012 New York Comic Con - Day 3 - 014) (cropped).jpg

| caption = Napier at New York Comic Con in 2012

| birth_name = Susan Jolliffe Phelps

| birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1955|10}}

| birth_place = Massachusetts, United States

| alma_mater = Harvard University

| occupation = Professor, anime critic

| nationality = American

| subject = Japanese literature

| parents = {{ubl|Reginald H. Phelps|Julia Phelps ({{nee|Sears}})}}

| notableworks = {{idp|

| signature = Susan J. Napier signature.svg

}}

Susan Jolliffe Napier ({{nee|Phelps}}; born October 1955) is a professor of the Japanese program at Tufts University. She was formerly the Mitsubishi Professor of Japanese Literature and Culture at the University of Texas at Austin. She also worked as a visiting professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University, and in Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Napier is an anime and manga critic.

Biography

Susan Jolliffe Phelps was born in October 1955, the daughter of Reginald H. Phelps (1909–2006), a historian and educational administrator, and Julia Phelps ({{nee|Sears}}; {{died in|1995}}).{{cite web |url=https://obits.masslive.com/us/obituaries/masslive/name/reginald-phelps-obituary?id=13777765 |title=Reginald Phelps Obituary |page=16 |work=The Republican |location=Springfield, Massachusetts |publisher=Advance Publications |date=September 30, 2006 |accessdate=September 5, 2024 }}{{cite news |title=Sunday Services |work=The Morning Union |location=Springfield, Massachusetts |publisher=Advance Publications |date=October 15, 1955 |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-morning-union-sunday-services/155002699/ |via=Newspapers.com }} She was raised in Cambridge, Massachusetts,{{cite web |url=http://www.tufts.edu/home/feature/?p=napier |title=Don't Call Them Cartoons |page=1 |last=Cohen |first=Georgiana |publisher=Tufts University |date=April 30, 2007 |accessdate=September 5, 2024 |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20130416023116/http://www.tufts.edu/home/feature/?p=napier |archivedate=April 16, 2013 }} graduated from Radcliffe College, and obtained her A.B., A.M., and PhD degrees from Harvard University. She married Ron Wells Napier on August 20, 1977, at King's Chapel,{{cite news |title=Weddings |work=Boston Sunday Globe |location=Boston, Massachusetts |date=August 21, 1977 |page=62 |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-boston-globe-weddings-napier-phelps/155002751/ |via=Newspapers.com }} and their daughter, Julia Napier, was born on December 29, 1989.{{cite news |title=Banking house promotes Napier to London post |work=Baxter Bulletin |publisher=Multimedia, Inc. |location=Mountain Home, Arkansas |date=February 24, 1990 |page=7 |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/baxter-bulletin-banking-house-promotes-n/155002779/ |via=Newspapers.com }}{{sfn|Napier|2018|loc=Acknowledgments}} Napier taught Japanese and video at the University of Texas at Austin, and began working at a university in New York around 1985.{{cite news |title=Ron Napier on Wall Street |work=Baxter Bulletin |publisher=Multimedia, Inc. |location=Mountain Home, Arkansas |page=6 |date=July 19, 1985 |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/baxter-bulletin-ron-napier-on-wall-stree/155002764/ |via=Newspapers.com }}

In 1991, Napier published Escape from the Wasteland: Romanticism and Realism in the Fiction of Mishima Yukio and Oe Kenzaburo. Her second book, The Fantastic in Modern Japanese Literature: The Subversion of Modernity, followed in 1996.{{cite web |url=http://ase.tufts.edu/faculty-guide/fac/snapie01.gerrusasia.htm |title=Susan J. Napier |publisher=Tufts University |accessdate=September 5, 2024 |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110117174134/http://ase.tufts.edu/faculty-guide/fac/snapie01.gerrusasia.htm |archivedate=January 17, 2011 }} Napier first became interested in anime and manga when a student showed her a copy of Akira. Napier then saw the film, which led to the creation of her third book, Anime from Akira to Princess Mononoke: Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation,{{cite web|url=http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2001-05-01/anime-lecture-at-mit|title=Anime Lecture at MIT|date=May 1, 2001|publisher=Anime News Network|access-date=November 27, 2009}}{{cite web|url=http://www.utexas.edu/features/archive/2004/anime.html|title=An Anime Explosion|last=Gerrow|first=Robin|year=2004|publisher=University of Texas at Austin|access-date=November 28, 2009|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091013232114/http://www.utexas.edu/features/archive/2004/anime.html|archive-date=October 13, 2009}} which was revised in 2005.{{cite web |url=http://www.palgrave-usa.com/catalog/product.aspx?isbn=1403970521 |title=Anime from Akira to Howl's Moving Castle |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |accessdate=September 5, 2024 |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20051230191514/http://www.palgrave-usa.com/catalog/product.aspx?isbn=1403970521 |archivedate=December 30, 2005 }} Napier's From Impressionism to Anime: Japan as Fantasy and Fan Cult in the Mind of the West was published in 2007, which discusses anime fandom in greater depth.{{cite web|url=http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2007-03-30/susan-napier-presents-new-book-on-american-anime-fans|title=Susan Napier presents new book on American anime fans|date=March 30, 2007|publisher=Anime News Network|access-date=November 27, 2009}}{{cite journal |title=Review: Napier, Susan J.: From Impressionism to Anime: Japan as Fantasy and Fan Cult in the Mind of the West. New York and Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan (2007) |last=Denison |first=Rayna |author-link=Rayna Denison |journal=Participations: Journal of Audience and Reception Studies |volume=6 |issue=2 |date=November 2009 |pages=437–439 |url=https://www.participations.org/06-02-16-napier.pdf }}

Napier met her husband, Steve Coit, the year she started researching her book Miyazakiworld: A Life in Art, which was released eight years later in 2018.{{sfn|Napier|2018|loc=Acknowledgments}}

Works

  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=The Fantastic in Modern Japanese Literature: The Subversion of Modernity |place=London |publisher=Routledge |year=1996 |pages=272 |isbn=978-0-415-12458-4 |ref=none }}
  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=The Worlds of Japanese Popular Culture: Gender, Shifting Boundaries and Global Culture |title-link=The Worlds of Japanese Popular Culture |editor=Martinez, Dolores P |year=1998 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=0-521-63128-9 |chapter=Vampires, Psychic Girls, Flying Women and Sailor Scouts |chapter-url-access=registration |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/worldsofjapanese0000unse |ref=none }}
  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=Anime from Akira to Princess Mononoke: Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |year=2001 |pages=311 |isbn=978-0-3122-3863-6 |ref=none }}
  • {{cite journal|doi=10.1215/10679847-9-2-467|title=Confronting Master Narratives: History As Vision in Miyazaki Hayao's Cinema of De-assurance|year=2001|last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |journal= Positions: East Asia Cultures Critique|volume=9|issue=2|pages=467–493|s2cid=144130648 |ref=none }}
  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=Meet Me on the Other Side: Strategies of Otherness in Modern Japanese literature |pages=38–55 |year=2006 |publisher=Routledge|place=London |isbn=978-0-415-36185-9 |ref=none }}
  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=Cinema Anime: Critical Engagements with Japanese Animation |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/cinemaanimecriti00brow |chapter-url-access=registration |editor=Brown, Steven T |year=2006 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |isbn=978-1-4039-8308-4 |chapter='Excuse Me, Who Are You?': Performance, the Gaze, and the Female in the Works of Kon Satoshi |ref=none }}
  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams: Japanese Science Fiction from Origins to Anime |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |year=2007 |pages=269 |isbn=978-0-8166-4973-0 |chapter=When the Machine Stops: Fantasy, Reality, and Terminal Identity in Neon Genesis Evangelion and Serial Experiments: Lain |ref=none }}
  • {{cite book |last=Napier |first=Susan J. |author-mask=3 |title=From Impressionism to Anime: Japan as Fantasy and Fan Cult in the Mind of the West|date=March 11, 2008 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |isbn=978-1-4039-6214-0 |pages=272 |ref=none }}
  • {{Cite book|title=Miyazakiworld: A Life in Art|last=Napier|first=Susan J.|author-mask=3 |publisher=Yale University Press|year=2018|isbn=978-0-300-22685-0|pages=344}}

References

{{Reflist}}

External links

  • [https://web.archive.org/web/20140123205320/http://ase.tufts.edu/grall/faculty/napier.asp Tufts faculty guide]
  • {{anime News Network|people|14387}}
  • [http://www.nausicaa.net/miyazaki/mh/impressions.html Napier's review of Princess Mononoke] at Nausicaa.net
  • [http://us.macmillan.com/author/susanjnapier Palgrave Macmillan author profile]

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Category:1955 births

Category:21st-century American women

Category:American Japanologists

Category:American women academics

Category:Anime and manga critics

Category:Harvard University alumni

Category:Harvard University faculty

Category:Living people

Category:Scholars of Japanese literature

Category:Tufts University faculty

Category:University of Texas at Austin faculty

Category:Radcliffe College alumni