Never Safe For Work
Tlönista clears things up for those of you who don’t quite get it. Click through to see the girl version as well.
But yeah, go ahead and be as critical as you want, or as critical as you need to. But I’ve got no problems calling people on empty snark… just like no one should have a problem calling me on the same.
– Chris
I’m sure I’m being too sensitive about this, but this was annoying:
“Hm, front page story in the NYT Arts section…hipster manga just got a lot more hip in New York. This is definitely the art manga equivalent of the cover story on art comics from the NYT Magazine that kicked off the whole “comics are an art form” thing a few years ago.” – Heidi MacDonald, The Beat
That’s Heidi talking about Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s A Drifting Life coverage.
Seriously, if any hipster-douche can make it through an 850 page autobiography of a manga pioneer set in post-war Japan, I’ll stop automatically adding the word “douche” after the word “hipster”.
Really? Hipster manga? I actually can’t think of a more dismissive term than that. Anything outright critical could at least be argued, that’s just… yeah. Whatever.
Props to Peggy and D&Q for the amazing coverage though.
– Chris
P.S.: I am clearly biased because I’m hosting Tatsumi and D&Q in Toronto in 3 weeks, so feel free to ignore, but again, I’d like to stress: what-ever.
This is a fantastic article, a translation of a blog post/lecture by the Takekuma Kentaro, co-creator of Even A Monkey Can Draw Manga on the differences between Tezuka’s anime and manga, and Miyazaki’s anime and manga.
This is the sort of thing that the internet is for.
– Chris
A Drifting Life
By Yoshihiro Tatsumi
856 Pages, Softcover, $29.99/$39.99
Published by Drawn & Quarterly
I have no doubt that much will be written about this book when it is officially released this spring. There’s a deceptive density to A Drifting Life, Tatsumi Yoshihiro’s arms’ length autobiography. It’s a story told very directly, switching between the first and third person to describe a young man’s passion and struggle, set against a larger picture of a nation looking to rebuild after World War II. The 800+ pages of the book read quickly, but the ideas expressed are potent and the history chronicled Important (and largely unkown); the effect of completing the book is disorienting. At one point I flipped to the back looking for footnotes to try and match my own understanding of the origins of Japanese comics to the incredible amount of information Tatsumi dolls out in a few key chapters (though the entire birth of the manga industry, and Tatsumi’s own Gekiga can be found in these pages) (about the footnotes: there are none). At its heart A Drifting Life is a memoir, filled with a density of details to give it a setting and place that will be immediately familiar to Japanese readers of the last generation but that will largely evade North American ones. This is not a bad thing, if anything the unfamiliarity of the time and place of this story will add to the experience of the lead drifting through his life, tied only to the comic that I hope you’ll be holding in your hands.
– Christopher
Yoshihiro Tatsumi will be a Guest of Honour at the 2009 Toronto Comic Arts Festival, of which I am the Festival Director.
The following was written on January 2nd, 2009:
So following my last post on the recently completed Naoki Urasawa’s MONSTER, I went for a drink with my friends Derek and Gary, and we shot the shit about the series over beers. I have to say I feel a lot better about the ending having bounced my thoughts off of a couple of smart, well-read comics fans.
So, Spoilers.
Essentially, I wasn’t sure if all of the plot threads that had been developed had actually woven together in the end. My biggest problem was that the exact nature of the lessons were never really revealed. We even got to see into them at one point, but it seemed to be mostly recitations of a few songs and books… I ended up filling in the gaps, realising that the same sort of subliminal manipulation that Johan had been using throughout the series is the same way that he was manipulated, that the books/songs were part of that… but considering the volume of… data… dumped on the reader in the last few volumes, it would’ve been nice to get more than a peak through a partially-opened door. But yeah, I made my peace, and the theme of tearing down society being repeated from small to large (Johann manipulating individual children, the orphanage, the cartels, and finally a whole town) helped put all of it into perspective.
The other thing that bothered me was the cross-dressing. It was immediately obvious to me that Nina and Johann were switched during the scenes with the children being taken away to the Rose Mansion the first time, that it was Nina that was “awakened” and that Johan was fucked up in other ways, but I don’t understand why they were both dressed as girls as children. I suppose it’s because their mom would’ve gotten kicked out if she had two children rather than one? I don’t remember that being addressed though, and it just struck me as a little “surprise for surprise’s sake.”
Finally, I had a general sense of unease about the very ending, the conversation between Tenma and the twins’ mother, and the ‘conversation’ between Tenma and Johan. Essentially, I thought the former should have been more explicit, and the latter seemed like a cheat. My friend Derek put forth the theory that the conversation between Tenma and Johan really didn’t happen, and instead, Tenma’s dream was actually the content of his conversation with the mother. Johan wouldn’t have known about the mother’s decision. That kind of works, for me, but it requires some logical leaps that aren’t really in the story. I’m inclined to be more foregiving because I enjoyed everything up to the end very much, MONSTER is really a fantastic page-turning read, but I also feel it’s the kind of series that, because it turned on its plot reveals, needed an ending that was really conclusive and put all of the toys back in the box. Abhay has the right idea in the comments section:
“I was really disappointed with Monster’s ending when I read it, but having looked at it again since, I think it’s an okay set of chapters on its own terms, that just suffers just in terms of the expectations that are built going into it, based upon 17 previous books with more at stake. On its own terms it’s as thoughtful and entertaining as any previous episode– just as an ending, I felt disappointed.” – Abhay
…and then I stopped writing. I got distracted by the site re-design, and my manga industry posts, and tenthousand other things. And now it is February 16th and I have something to add.
Since beginning to write a follow-up on my reaction to Monster, I’ve had a chance to really ruminate on the series and discuss it with people. A good number of my customers read this site now, and so they’ll come in to the store after reading something I’ve written here and ask me questions like “So you didn’t like Monster’s ending… should I keep reading it?” and my gut reaction is “Yes, of course.” Not because I’m a salesperson (heh) but because when I think about the time I spent reading Monster, I realize that I really, really enjoyed it. My disatisfaction with the ending was for what I thought were very specific reasons, but the ending very clearly didn’t ruin my enjoyment of the rest of it. And! And the more I thought about it, the more I really enjoyed it.
Okay, I’m going to stop talking in bold.
So, I went back and read the comments to my last post on Monster a couple of times and I think that, really, there are different readings of the series and some of them work and some of them don’t. Myk, one of the commenters, said this:
Well, it’s been something like two years since I read Monster, but I always thought that, as much as it is a riff on the classic “innocent fugitive wants to prove his innocence” theme, it is also an allegorical take on the creation process of an author.
Case in point, the huge role that books play in the second half of the series, how theMonster is created and all that. I saw Tenma and Johann as the two main forces an author has to fight with, when creating a work of fiction.
Tenma – the good guy – as the author’s side that is necessarily in love with the characters he created, who wants to preserve them, save them and keep the safe from harm.
Johann on the other hand as the destructive force, that knows that there must be destruction, tragedy, to propell the story forward to a conclusion.
So is Monster just an author’s extended internal monologue on how to treat his creations? Might be. Might be I’m reading too much into it. But at the very least I think people are not giving Urasawa quite as much credit as would be due. – Myk
And that’s fair. And the more I think about it, I do think that judging the series entirely on how it sets up, and then follows-through, on the plot is maybe not entirely fair to the work. Or as Myk said, extending enough credit to the author. I know that in the one comic I’ve written in the last 20 years, the plot wasn’t nearly as important as emotion and resonance, and so maybe I should extend the same consideration to the author?
Further, as you can see above I really was starting to come around on the plot, that most of my initial problems with how it came together worked themselves out once I was able to start a dialogue about the work. Sort of like an impromptu book-club, discussing the work to see if it succeeded or not. In short, I think Naoki Urasawa’s Monster is a successful series (though not without its problems), and I feel a lot better about it now then after I read the whole series in a single day (surprise, surprise). I’ve got no problem recommending it to folks, and I’ll be keeping copies of all 18 volumes on my bookshelf, to be re-read again sometime (maybe with a bit of a break between volumes though…).
Thanks to everyone who chimed in with their thoughts on the series both in the comments and at the store!
– Christopher
So lost in the insanity of my last few weeks was the news that Diamond Comics Distributors is de-listing 1018 different products published by Viz, including nearly 1000 different manga volumes. The books will no longer be available through Diamond whatsoever, although these books will still be available through bookstore channels. Here’s the official announcement from Diamond which ran on their website on January 12th 2009, phrased as a “Sale” for comic book store retailers:
VIZ Media has announced a sale on a wide selection of its manga volumes and anime DVDs, whereby retailers can save XX% off the SRP of those items while supplies last.
With more than 1,000 products offered at this discount, retailers that carry manga and anime should find this to be the perfect time to replenish their store’s stock. Among the many popular titles included in the sale are Bleach, Castle in the Sky, Dragonball, Fullmetal Alchemist, Inu Yasha, Mobile Suit Gundam and Naruto.
Click here [link removed] to see a full list of VIZ Media manga and anime titles that are included in this sale.
As mentioned, this sale on these items will run until stock levels for those items are depleted. After that time, they will no longer be available for reorder or back order, so retailers are encouraged to stock up without delay.
The list includes more than 100 different series of manga, including still-running series like Zatch Bell, Whistle, Ultimate Muscle, Prince of Tennis, Inu Yasha Animanga, Hoshin Engi, Crimson Hero, Case Closed, Beyblade, Beet The Vandel Buster, and Bastard, amongst many others.
Perhaps most importantly to readers of this site, this list also includes some of my favourite comics of all time, including Takehiko Inoue’s Vagabond, Osamu Tezuka’s Phoenix, Takao Saito Golgo 13, and Kazuo Umezu’s Drifting Classroom.
No announcement has been made about new volumes of any of these series, leading me to believe that the books will continue to be solicited as normal (I wonder if they’ll make the new cut-off!?) and then be purged periodically as here.
Here’s where I editorialize: Are You Fucking Kidding Me? I don’t think much else needs to be said. This move is, frankly, unbelievable. I knew about this when writing my post about the Diamond minimums and didn’t really realize it hadn’t been made public yet, it certainly informed my post, specifically my assertion that Diamond Comics Distributors can no longer effectively distribute comics… Unreal.
DISCLAIMER: In deference to my esteemed employer, I would like to point out to all customers of The Beguiling that we have found alternate distribution sources for all Viz products, and will continue to deliver all of the affected books to our various customers as long as they remain in print, and probably for years after. So, at least at our store you’ve got nothing to worry about.
The full list of de-listed manga (and books and DVDs) is visible after the cut, unless you’re reading this on feed, in which case you might want to hit NEXT.
– Christopher
“What Is The Big Picture Future Of Translated Manga? … I’d love to see someone address the future for this kind of publishing in more direct fashion that didn’t seem like a snow job … I mean, I assume the future is at least different from the present, right?”
– Tom Spurgeon, ComicsReporter.com
I’ve been putting together the big picture of the manga industry in my head for a while now. Here’s what I’ve got. No specific malice is intended, and I wish the best for all publishers mentioned.
Facts:
– The book industry is in flux. Serious, serious flux.
– Because of this, orders from bookstores are coming in more conservatively; lower or zeroed-out in some cases, with more stock being put in past performers. Sales at the top remain consistent or improving, the midlist is being shaken out badly. What I mean by that is, if you don’t have a top title with a recognizable brand, you’re seeing attrition in your sales for the first time maybe since you started publishing, and the bigger your midlist, the greater the attrition.
– The manga industry does more business in the bookstore market than in the direct market. Often by a ratio of more than 10:1 in favour of bookstores.
Supposition:
– This puts pressure and emphasis on other channels to shore up sales, and it’s why pubs have been investing in everything from direct-sales and digital downloads to paying increased attention to the Direct Market (comic book stores). The book market isn’t done, it’s in flux, but it has become even more important to exploit titles in as many ways as possible… or significantly adjust expectations for performance. Or both. More on that later.
Fact:
– The Direct Market is all non-returnable sales, and Diamond pays out promptly and regularly, and this is of great import to small and medium publishers of all stripes, comics or otherwise.
My Experience:
– Let’s talk about the DM for a moment. The Direct Market has never embraced manga. Manga has never really embraced the direct market. I officially think it never will, despite it being in the best interests of both to do so.
Example 1: The best-selling manga, and one of the best-selling graphic novels of the year, is the series Naruto. At The Beguiling, we received Naruto Volume 33 through non-Diamond channels 2 and a half weeks earlier than Diamond shipped it… The same time as mass-market book retailers. NARUTO is a major, proven title with strong sales that was available at major book retailers with better customer-visibility more than 2 weeks before comic shops had a shot at it. How can Viz and Diamond allow this to happen on, INARGUABLY, the most popular manga in the world? How can a Direct Market store participate in this sytem?
Example 2: I only received 10% of my order for NAOKI URASAWA’S MONSTER VOLUME 17 on the week it shipped from Diamond (which, again, was weeks after we’d received it elsewhere). MONSTER is, by all accounts, is exactly the sort of manga title that is made for direct market comic book stores: MONSTER is an action thriller with a great hook, solid art, and a wide appeal to non-manga-readers. We got 1 out of every 10 copies we ordered. No explanation from Diamond. The other 90% of the copies ended up shipping the same week as MONSTER VOLUME 18, two months later (and, again, after we’d received vol. 18 through other channels).
– So in the last two months Comic Book Stores have been fucked-over on a) Viz’s #1 manga overall, and b) Viz’s #1 manga for comic book stores. But it gets better.
Example 3: Why did the Comic Book Shop Exclusive version of Osamu Tezuka’s BLACK JACK Volume 2 ship two weeks after the mass market paperback through Diamond? Vertical and Diamond cut a special deal to specifically target and “enfranchise” direct market comic book shops, by offering them a limited edition of Vertical’s most important release of 2008. A limited edition hardcover with an extra story, available only through comic book stores, and promoted very well too! I’m not a fan of the move from a consumer standpoint–I think adding exclusive and desirable content in a considerably more expensive package is a bad practice, disenfranchising the consumer. But the book is inarguably excellent, and the bonus material pretty essential, overall. So I got on board with it, and promoted the first hardcover release and the series. So what happened? Diamond and Vertical shipped the second, comic-shop exclusive hardcover edition of BLACK JACK two weeks late with no notice, warning, or explanation, hurting our sales on the book and causing consumer confusion on a limited edition, high-end item.
Supposition:
– I am not convinced that things will ever get better in the Direct Market, for manga. I feel that Diamond Comics’ near-monopoly is the only thing it has going for it, and when the product is available elsewhere they just can’t compete as distributors. When they do have an exclusive–a monopoly–on an item, look at the haphazard way in which that item is handled! Ultimately, faith by publishers in the direct market is often misplaced.
– That said, I think that faith in the direct market by publishers is absolutely necessary, and it’s going to take publishers and smart retailers demanding both change and accountability in the system for it to pay off. It is important specifically because:
– I predict seeing more deals like the Previews-Exclusive versions of Black Jack, because often, those deals come with either cash (Vertical could use cash) or a guaranteed print run, something like “Diamond will buy all 1,500 limited copies of Black Jack up-front, which guarantees 1,500 copies sold up-front,” which dramatically subsidizes the print runs of smaller or medium-sized publishers. Tokyopop could use some of that right now, something along the lines of the recent Battle Royale or Warcraft omnibus volumes, although more smartly conceived. There’s tons of manga material on the market right now from many different publishers that has more to do with a direct-market comic shop clientelle than it does with the mass-market, and it makes sense to try and use these series to drive readers from the ailing bookstore market into the DM. Strike while the iron is hot, that sort of thing.
– Actually, just thinking about it, Dark Horse has the greatest incentive to do something along those lines, as their manga sales through the direct market are considerably stronger (percentage-wise) than outside it. Not to be a dick about it, but as a market leader DC has shown little-to-no leadership or vision when it comes to their manga line, CMX, and that’s a real shame too. For example, if I could publish one thing at Dark Horse, I’d do a special-edition bind-up of the first three volumes of Astro Boy, regular comic-size, in hardcover, to tie into the upcoming release of PLUTO from Viz. Those Astro Boy books contain the origin, some of the best early stories, and the complete WORLD’S STRONGEST ROBOT arc. 650 pages, nice format, throw in an essay by Frederik Schodt, and slap a decent price tag on it. Comic Shop Exclusive. Easy money.
– But I think almost any publisher outside of the top 4 would be foolish not to leap at the chance of a Previews Exclusive, because cash or guaranteed print runs and the resulting press and buzz in the fan-community are nothing to sneeze at in these troubled times, particularly on work with a higher price point.
Facts:
– Speaking of work with a higher price point, Drawn & Quarterly has really paved the way for art manga in North America with their high-quality reproductions of material by Yoshihiro Tatsumi over the past 3-4 years. Most manga fans would lose their shit if a new 200ish page release had a $19.95 or $24.95 price-point, but any serious graphic novel buyer considers that a reasonable price point, and even when you take the disparity of print runs and the cost of translation and licensing into account, it’s hard to imagine those books aren’t profitable.
Supposition:
– It’s entirely possible to successfully publish good manga in North America, if everyone involved reconsiders their point of view on what successful means. The art-comix model espoused by D&Q–good books, released less frequently with lots of fanfare and a 10-cent per page price point rather than less than half that… for some releases. I don’t think anyone should expect Naruto-level sales, or even the sales levels that midlist titles hit a few years back, but if buy-in quantities are going to be capped by bookstores because they want to limit their exposure, doesn’t it make a kind of sense to make sure the price-point is higher on each of those units? At least when the material is intended for anyone outside of the mainstream shonen/shoujo demographic.
Experiences:
– The market could not absorb the number of releases that were crammed into it over the last few years, and that’s even before the ‘economic crisis’. Tom Flynn from ICv2 calls me up every once in a while and asks me about how things are going with the manga, and I answer him. He’s particularly interested in yaoi, it’s a section that we stock both wide and deep, and have had some real success with. I haven’t really had a chance to talk to him very much for the past 4 or 5 months, but where once my answers were along the lines of “selling well” and “no, there aren’t too many releases to keep track of” and “sales remain consistent” my answers recently might have been “I am completely swamped with this stuff, and releases are outstripping sales.” I think that’s the manga industry in miniature; a successful niche market with strong potential that was simply outstripped by the number of people wanting a piece of it, and dumping material into the category. DMP should take a lot of the blame for this, with 8-10 yaoi releases almost every month, almost all of which are dropped into the market with little-to-no-fanfare. At least pubs doing 8-10 books per year have a 30 day dedicated promotion cycle. I feel like DMP is relying on the niche market’s pre-existing familiarity with individual titles/authors through the scanlation circuit, which is just weird. (But then, DMP have also been aggressively promoting their online sales/digital manga initiative in 2008, trying to bypass all markets and go straight to the consumer, so maybe they’ve learned a lesson after all?) But DMP’s sin isn’t even close to unique, like I said, it’s the manga industry in miniature. What DMP’s done in Yaoi, releasing dozens of books into a category that couldn’t support them is just magnified for the industry as a whole, with hundreds and hundreds of volumes of manga released by a dozen publishers with no support, no promotion, no audience, and it’s no wonder that bookstores, comic stores, and consumers are a little shy.
– At least there were fewer series dropped entirely in the middle of their serializations this year. Unless all of that stuff that’s being “reorganized” by Tokyopop ends up cancelled for good. Or, uh, ADV. Or DramaQueen. Or… Nevermind.
Closing Thoughts and Predictions for the Year Ahead:
– I think the market can support mature work at a different price-point, and we’ll see more of that from many publishers. As long as that market doesn’t become flooded (more than, say, 30 releases per year across all publishers) I think it’ll be a strong category for the next few years.
– The market will publish fewer series and fewer volumes, and attempt to put more ‘oomph’ behind each series they launch.
– The top licenses and series will remain mostly unchanged, as will their sales levels.
– The market will continue to experiment with higher price-points, bind ups (multiple smaller volumes in one big volume), and higher end formats. The market will realize that there is a mass-market and a collector’s market (yes, even for manga) and begin to produce material for both.
– Smart publishers with comic shop friendly material will do more “Previews-Exclusive” books, to try and capture some of the money in that market.
– Diamond will announce new initiatives in making their manga services more competitive.
– Every major manga publisher will have a significant digital manga plan by the end of 2009. This will involve free, subscription, or digital download-based programs. There will be no consistent format, design, or website, because everyone thinks that their way is best and there’s nothing to be gained by working with your competitors. Sorry consumers!
– We’ll lose at least two publishers this year. No specific inside knowledge, but the market can’t support the number of titles being produced, and not every pub can survive with lower sales. I don’t want to put any specific pub in the deadpool, that’s not cool, but I can’t see things continuing as they are for some of them.
– Kodansha will start their own publishing concern for manga this year! Unless Everything I Know Is Wrong. And hey, I wouldn’t be surprised if it is.
—
So what did I get wrong?
– Chris
According to news coming down the wire, Kodansha seems to have refused to “refresh” any of their licenses currently held by Tokypop in Germany. The news was apparently made in a mailing sent out by Tokyopop to their fans, and is effective as of December 31st, 2008. It will affect the German publication of series Beck, Cromartie High School, School Rumble, Perfect Girl, and Hell Girl, only one of which (Beck) is published by Tokyopop in North America.
I can’t find anything official on the story, but here’s what I’ve found online so far:
AnimeOnDvd forums
World Of Hentai Forums (German Language)
Manly Manga and More… (scroll down)
An admittedly bad translation notes that “Reasons for this sudden decision are unknown, but it says that it is not related to the cooperation between Kodansha and Tokyopop Germany has to do,” which implies to me that it has nothing to do with Tokyopop Germany, and everything to do with the parent company and their relationship to Kodansha.
Tokyopop and Kodansha have had a rocky relationship for years, reportedly being exacerbated by the launch of Del Rey’s manga imprint and Kodansha awarding top manga properties XXXholic, Tsubasa Resevoir Chronicle, and Negima to the new pub instead of to TP, leading to statements that Kodansha refused to license to TP any further. In recent years, Kodansha licenses had been showing up at TP again (including BECK), but many of Tokyopop’s biggest back-catalog titles are Kodansha licenses, and losing them would substantially reduce their catalog.
This is also interesting news for industry watchers like myself who have been wondering what was going to shake out from all of the rumours of Kodansha setting up their own manga publishing arm here in North America. I had been assured that it was going to happen, but 2008 came to a close and no official movement was made. Maybe it was just a licensing waiting game? Tokyopop has been playing their cards very, very close to their respective chests in the last few months since the company’s very public difficulties, I’m wondering if we’ll get any word on the status of Kodansha’s english licenses any time soon. At last public statement, and pardon me for being too lazy to find the link, TP did say that they still had the BECK license (amongst others) but that was many months ago now.
Maybe someone with a better relationship with TP’s Marco Pavia can find out something I can’t.
– Christopher
So for Christmas I decided to treat myself a to a complete reading of Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, an 18 volume manga series translated and published in English by Viz. I’d read the first five volumes as they were coming out, but unfortunately got sidetracked as the series progressed. Since I had a free day, deliberately clear of any obligations, I decided I’d give it a go.
So, honestly? It’s just an exceptionally well-done comic. There’s no way to look at this and not recognize the incredibly high level of craft, the sheer ability put into this series. The character development, the labrynthine plot, and just how compelling it is as a story! There wasn’t one point while reading that dragged for me, where I wasn’t propelled into the next chapter, the next book. And the art! It’s understated, probably doesn’t give the best impression on the ‘flip-test’, but it’s pretty clear that Urasawa and his legion of assistants can draw pretty much anything; any expression, any angle, any background character, and dozens of unique faces and body-types and even body language. He has a wonderful gift for caricature too, character faces that could seem cartoony (or in some cases grotesque…) work very well within the context of the story. The series is in almost every respect fantastically accomplished.
The thing that bugged me, is bugging me, is the ending. It’s why I am blogging at 5:10am instead of, you know, being asleep for when I have to get up for work in 3 hours. 🙁
I’m having a hard time reconciling the decisions of some of the characters, and am… unclear… on how some of it played out. I’ve got theories on some of it, and my theories are leading me to be more disappointed than not. I think part of the problem is that enough of the “plot” was resolved, but a lot of it was left open-ended as well, giving us instead the emotional resolution we needed. But in a page-turner thriller graphic novel series, I’m not… entirely… ready to just accept the emotional resolution and forget the rest.
I don’t really want to read it again at this point, as I am tired, but I kind of hope I get to wake up tomorrow and there’ll be lots of discussion in the comments section here. I know there was lots of discussion when this series wrapped up in Japan (and in scans), and lots of… heated… commentary arose out of it, but honestly I tried to stay away knowing that I’d read it all one day for myself.
Anyway, your thoughts would be welcome, dear readership, if you’ve read it yourselves. Maybe I’ll try and coax some of my buddies out for a beer after work tomorrow (today…) and we can try and figure it out.
Until then, feel free to let loose in the comments section!
– Chris
A Drifting Life
By Yoshihiro Tatsumi
$29.95, Trade paperback, 6.5 x 8.75 inches, 840 pages, b/w.
978-1-897299-74-6
The 840 page epic autobiography of a manga master, edited and designed by Adrian Tomine.
Over four decades ago, Yoshihiro Tatsumi expanded the horizons of comics storytelling by using the visual language of manga to tell gritty, literary stories about the private lives of everyday people. He has been called “the grandfather of Japanese alternative comics†and has influenced generations of cartoonists around the world. Now the visionary creator of The Push Man and Good–Bye has turned his incisive, unflinching gaze upon himself. Over ten years in the making, A Drifting Life is Tatsumi’s most ambitious, personal, and heart–felt work: an autobiographical bildungsroman in comics form, a massive 840 page book edited and designed by Adrian Tomine. Using his life–long obsession with comics as a framework, Tatsumi weaves a complex story that encompasses family dynamics, Japanese culture and history, first love, the intricacies of the manga industry, and most importantly, what it means to be an artist. Alternately humorous, enlightening, and haunting, this is the masterful summation of a fascinating life and an historic career.
[Chris’ Note: This is so awesome.]
********
Shortcomings: New Trade paperback edition
By Adrian Tomine
$ 14.95, Trade paperback, 6.5 x 9 inches, 104 pages, b/w
978-1-897299-75-3
The 2007 New York Times Book Review Notable Book, now in a new paperback.
Lauded for its provocative and insightful portrayal of interpersonal relationships, Adrian Tomine’s politically charged Shortcomings was one of the most acclaimed books of 2007. Among many interviews and reviews in outlets around the country, Tomine was interviewed by Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air and also in The Believer, New York magazine, and Giant Robot. Shortcomings landed on countless “best of†lists, including those in Entertainment Weekly and The New York Times; was praised by Junot DÃaz in Publishers Weekly; and was the subject of a solo review in The New York Times Book Review that drew comparison between Tomine and Philip Roth. The groundbreaking graphic novel now returns in paperback.
********
32 Stories: Special Edition
By Adrian Tomine
$ 19.95, Box with 8 facsimile mini comics, 5.5 x 8.5 inches, varying page lengths for each mini comic.
978-1-897299-76-0
Adrian Tomine’s first book, now redesigned in a special box set edition.
Redesigned to coincide with the release of Shortcomings in paperback is a brand new edition of Adrian Tomine’s first book, 32 Stories, that collects his inaugural mini-comics in a special edition. This onetime printing includes facsimile reprints of the seven mini-comics packaged in a slipcase, as well as an additional pamphlet containing a new introduction and notes by Tomine. Between the ages of seventeen and twenty, Adrian Tomine self–published a series of “mini–comicsâ€: small, hand–assembled booklets that he wrote, drew, and distributed himself. Entitled Optic Nerve, these comics were comprised of short vignettes and stories which displayed a youthful energy, an unabashed sense of experimentation, and the first hints of the distinctive, realist style that Tomine would go on to perfect. Over the course of those three years, word of mouth spread about these comics, and something that began as a teenage hobby was recognized as the arrival of a promising new talent. This special edition of 32 Stories presents those rare, early mini–comics for the first time in archival facsimile form: all seven issues in their entirety, faithfully reproduced and collected in one box.
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Backlist Offered Again
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Abandon The Old in Tokyo (New 2nd printing)
By Yoshihiro Tatsumi
$ 19.95, Hardcover, 6.5 x 8.75 inches, 224 pages, b/w.
978-1894937-87-0
New printing of one of Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s key titles.
Abandon the Old in Tokyo is the second in a three-volume series that collects the short stories of Japanese cartooning legend Yoshihiro Tatsumi. Designed and edited by Adrian Tomine, the first volume, The Push Man and Other Stories, debuted to much critical acclaim and rightfully placed Tatsumi as a legendary precursor to the North American graphic-novel movement. Abandon the Old in Tokyo continues to delve into the urban underbelly of 1960s Tokyo, exposing not only the seedy dealings of the Japanese everyman but Tatsumi’s maturation as a story writer.
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Good-Bye & Other Stories (O/A)
By Yoshihiro Tatsumi
$ 19.95, Hardcover, 6.5 x 8.75 inches, 224 pages, b/w.
978-1897299-37-1
Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s recent book.
Good-Bye is the third in a series of collected short stories from Drawn & Quarterly by the legendary Japanese cartoonist Yoshihiro Tatsumi, whose previous work has been selected for several annual “top 10†lists, including those compiled by Amazon and Time.com. Drawn in 1971 and 1972, these stories expand the prolific artist’s vocabulary for characters contextualized by themes of depravity and disorientation in twentieth-century Japan.
Some of the tales focus on the devastation the country felt directly as a result of World War II: a prostitute loses all hope when American GIs go home to their wives; a man devotes twenty years of his life to preserving the memory of those killed at Hiroshima, only to discover a horrible misconception at the heart of his tribute. Yet, while American influence does play a role in the disturbing and bizarre stories contained within this volume, it is hardly the overriding theme. A philanthropic foot fetishist, a rash-ridden retiree, and a lonely public onanist are but a few of the characters etching out darkly nuanced lives in the midst of isolated despair and fleeting pleasure.
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The Push Man & Other Stories (O/A)
By Yoshihiro Tatsumi
$ 19.95, Hardcover, 6.5 x 8.75 inches, 224 pages, b/w.
978-1896597-85-0
Groundbreaking first book by Yoshihiro Tatsumi.
Designed and edited by one of today’s most popular cartoonists, Adrian Tomine, The Push Man and Other Stories is the debut volume in a groundbreaking new series that collects Tatsumi’s short stories about Japanese urban life.
Tatsumi’s stories are simultaneously haunting, disturbing, and darkly humorous, commenting on the interplay between an overwhelming, bustling, crowded modern society and the troubled emotional and sexual life of the individual.
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Scrapbook (O/A)
By Adrian Tomine
$ 24.95, Trade paperback, 8.5 x 12 inches, 204 pages, color
978-1896597-77-5
The ultimate collection by one of the most recognized talents in graphic novels.
This essential book includes over a decade of comics and illustrations Adrian Tomine, from Pulse to The New Yorker and Esquire, collected together for the first time in one sharply-designed book. Scrapbook is the first comprehensive Adrian Tomnie collection. here you’ll find the complete run of strips which was originally published in Tower Records’ Pulse Magazine which Adrian started when he was only 17, along with comics originally published in Details and a host of other magazines of the past decade. A large section of Scrapbook is dedicated to Tomine’s extensive illustration and design work, featuring his best material over the years from virtually every major publication in America including The New Yorker, Details, Esquire, and the late JFK Jr.-edited George. Tomine’s art has also graced popular album covers and posters for bands such as The Eels and Weezer and posters and it’s all included here in this beautifully packaged book.
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Sleepwalk & Other Stories (O/A)
By Adrian Tomine.
$ 17.95, Trade paperback, 7.5 x 10 inches, 102 pages, b/w
978-1896597-12-6
An early key title by Adrian Tomine.
Collecting the first four issues of Adrian Tomine’s acclaimed comic series Optic Nerve, this book offers sixteen concise, haunting tales of modern life. The characters here appear to be well-adjusted on the surface, but Tomine takes us deeper into their lives, subtly examining their struggle to connect with friends and lovers.