Abstract: As a branch of comics, the graphic novel, which came into being in the 1970s in the American cultural field, generally targets an adult audience and addresses serious themes. The development of the American graphic novel can be roughly divided into the pre-graphic novel period, the rising period, and the canonical period. At present, the graphic novel is marching to center from margin in the American literary field. The rise of the graphic novel as a new genre results from interaction of many factors, including the image-word narrative features of the graphic novel, the coincidence of the themes of the graphic novel and those of the public narratives in the historical context, and the opportunities provided by E-culture. The evolution of the graphic novel indicates that the English literary filed is opening up to the word-image narrative to adapt to readers' preference for image. It is suggested that the graphic novel can be taken as a new form to introduce Chinese literature to the English world, and more efforts should be taken to update our perception about narrative and medium in order to tell the stories about China to the world in a better way.

Key words: American graphic novel, narrative, evolution, comics, literature