I’ve never really been a fan of comic books, North American or otherwise, though I know that somewhere in a closet back home in Canada there is a stack of them sitting covered in dust and yellowing with age =) But in Japan, 漫画 (pronounced manga) is fulfilling a completely different role than that of entertainment for me, it’s helping me learn little nuances and colloquialisms that I’d never imagined I’d be using having been here for such a short time.
The literal translation of the word 漫画 is “whimsical pictures”, although in it’s present form the word is used to describe any manner of comic book published in Japan. Though there are many similarities that may be drawn between 漫画 and it’s North American counterpart, 漫画 occupies a significantly different cultural facet here in Japan. Economically, the number of 漫画 sold in Japan in a single week is equivalent to the number of comic books sold in all of North America in an entire year and within Japan 漫画 is well respected as both a form of literature and as an art form, with historical pieces of 漫画 dating from as far back as the middle of the 18th century.
In North America the content published within a comic book must adhere to the regulations of the Comic Code Authority (CCA). Established in 1954, the CCA was created in response to mounting public concern that the material being printed in many comic books was inappropriate for the medium’s target audience. While the CCA possessed no actual legal authority over the industry, many stores simply refused to sell books which did not brandish the CCA’s seal of approval. As a result, many once popular comic book characters simply vanished as the stories with which they were associated were essentially prohibited.
In my opinion, one of the reasons why 漫画 has become so prolific within Japanese society is because there is no analogous organization or set of rules dictating what can be published, aside from basic indecency laws that apply to all printed materials. As a result, the authors and illustrators have been allowed to explore a myriad of genres and ideas through their art form, and this in turn manifests itself in the form of 漫画 suitable for anyone and everyone.
North American comic books exist within two main genres, comics (often refered to as funnies) and classical stories of good versus evil, often detailing the exploits of super heroic characters, savoury and otherwise. In Japan however, 漫画 are generally classified as belonging to one of five categories: 子供 (kodomo, meaning “children”), 少女 (shōjo, “teenage girls”), 少年 (shōnen, “teenage boys”), 女性 (josei, “women”), and 成年 (seinen, “men”). Within each of these categories exist a veritable array of genres covering nearly every subject imaginable.
Above: A 漫画 titled “Jesus” that I found in a used bookstore. The caption underneath the title reads, “It is a legend of the god of death smeared with blood and eveloped in a blaze. He is a professional combatant and assassin who has never missed the target he aimed at. He is called Jesus. A revenger. No one knows his real name and his past.”; a true testament to the lack of understanding of Western culture that seems so prevalent in Japanese society. I still think of going back there to buy it, if only for it’s novelty =)
The vast majority of 漫画, within the context of 子供, focus on stories of children learning to come to grips with the trials of everyday life, such as academic pressure from teachers or parents, and learning to cope with feelings of ostracism from fellow students, though usually these stories are done in jest or contain fantastic elements.
Personally I perceive 女性 and 成年 to be the most diverse categories of 漫画. The story lines within these books is often as intricate as a television drama would be in North America. Since these 漫画 are aimed toward adult audiences there really is no limit as to what manner of imagry can be portrayed and all genres are healthily represented, from stories involving ordinary people and their daily lives to outright pornography and any fetish you can imagine.
But it is 少女 and 少年 with which the word 漫画 has become synonymous within North America. Analogous to 子供, 少女 and 少年 deal with issues pertaining to teenage life, typically set against a backdrop of comedy or action and adventure. Academic success and popularity are cornerstones of these categories as well, but unlike 子供, romantic interests also tend to occupy a significant amount of character development. Differences between gender roles in Japanese society are echoed within 少女 and 少年, with 少女 art often being very flowery and romantic interests often being the focus of major story arcs. In contrast, 少年 tend to revolve around action sequences, with the art work being more fierce and the language slightly more abrasive.
平仮名 (hiragana) and 片仮名 (katakana) are comparable to large alphabets, containing 42 characters each (though specific combinations and the addition of diacritics allows each syllabary to represent more than 100 possible sounds). 漢字 (kanji), on the otherhand, is ideogramatic and each of the more than 2,000 characters can be used to represent combinations of sounds or specific ideas. Unfortunately, written Japanese is a seemless blend of all three scripts, and for many foriegners this can make the very idea of trying to become literate seem more than overwhelming.
However in 子供, 少女 and 少年漫画 all 漢字 is paired with 振仮名 (furigana), small-font 平仮名 used to indicate the pronounciation of the associated 漢字; the reason being that even children born and raised in Japan are not fully literate until they’ve completed all of their mandetory schooling. For somebody such as myself though, this means that even a limited literary ability can be put to good use.
Above: Set in a fictious 19th century Europe, D. Gray-man is an interesting series that revolves around the life of an exorcist named Allen Walker (the character at left in the above image). Walker is part of the Dark Organization, a loose nit agency tied to the Vatican whose purpose is to prevent demonic forces from destroying mankind; the character beside Walker in the above image is Satan. I have yet to figure out why the series is actually called D. Gray-man =P
I purchased volume one of D. Gray-man, and I’ve been slowly translating it hoping to improve my vocabulary. Unfortunately, what I started to realize is that colloquial Japanese is considerably different than the Japanese taught in most textbooks. But even though it often takes me on the order of an hour to properly translate a spread of text, I’m finding the experience to be fun and extremely rewarding.
Above: On page 27 of volume one we meet the main antagonist, Satan. In this panel he is encouraging one of his アクマ (akuma, meaning demons) to grow stronger before revealing it’s true form; in D. Gray-man, アクマ reside within the bodies of those people whose lives are wrought with despair.
Remembering that Japanese is read from top to bottom and from right to left, I managed to translate this particular scene as:
Bubble 1: Yoo-hoo; my menace!
Bubble 2: My lovely Akuma…
Bubble 3: More and more killing is the way to grow stronger.
Hrm… perhaps that wasn’t exactly the best panel to use as an example =(
But let me remind you that this is 少年漫画. While some dialogue may seem quite abject at first glance, D. Gray-man is a simple story that revolves around the struggle between good versus evil, and aside from the occassional terrifyingly depicted demon, this 漫画 is just plain fun. I’ll be able to provide more of a synopsis and analysis of the story once I’ve been able to translate a more substantial amount of the work.
To ensure that my translations are at least relatively accurate I’ve gotten into the habit of bothering some of the Japanese staff at work. Typically after work, on the train ride home, I’ll pull out the 漫画 along with several pages of notes and ask either Saeka or Yurie to look over my interpretations. So far they’ve been more than happy to oblige and they seem to think that the rate of my progress is more than fantastic, so I guess I’m doing something right =)
Well, to those of you that sat around long enough to make it to this paragraph, let me apologize for trying to use so much Japanese in today’s entry. I’m really trying to make an effort to use the kanji I already know as much as possible so that I can become all the more familiar with the symbols. It’s a bit of a personal goal of mine to complete at least a brief weblog entry entirely in Japanese before my birthday in November.
Whether or not I can actually achieve that goal is a different story, but until that time passes I’m going to study like it’s 1999… or something =P
Alexander
