Librarian
Pictures Run Riot: An Extremely Brief History of Manga
Detail from My Alcoholic Escape from Reality by Kabi Nagata (2019).
"Manga" — the Japanese word for comics, comic strips and caricature — is derived from the Chinese ideograms "Man" (involuntary) and "Ga" (pictures). It can be translated in several ways, including "whimsical sketches," "sketches made out of sudden inspiration," "lighthearted or derisory pictures," "pictures unbound" or "pictures run riot" (Serchay, 2010, p. 55; Bouissou, 2010, p. 22; Rousmaniere, 2019, p.22). While manga in its current form grew out of the US occupation of Japan following WWII and the concurrent importation of American comic books and animation into the country, its roots lie in a rich history of sequential narrative art and dramatic storytelling tropes reaching back centuries.
On this page you can browse highlights from the library's collection, as well as find resources on the history and theory of the art form. The subsections provide an overview and reading selections of the different editorial categories of manga (adapted from Shige Suzuki and Ronald Stewart's Manga: A Critical Guide).
- Shonen: "This literally means 'boy.' In the context of manga, the term can also refer to the target readership of boys, usually of school age (six to eighteen years old)" (p. 228).
- Shojo: "This literally means 'girl.' Yet, the term also refers to several different concepts. Shojo can refer to young girls as a target audience...while several scholars discuss the term as referring to an in-between, volatile state of 'being'...between girlhood and womanhood" (p. 228).
- Seinen: "Literally means 'young man.' In the field of manga, seinen...refers to manga that target late teens to adult male readers. Some seinen manga target a younger demographic—college students to men in their mid-thirties—while others target much older readers" (p. 228).
- Gekiga: "...commonly translated as 'dramatic pictures.' Japanese comics creator Tatsumi Yoshihiro coined the expression in 1957...to differentiate the works he created for young adult readers from existing 'manga' that were considered back then as something for children. From the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s, gekiga developed as a movement just as the first generation of postwar manga readers were gradually maturing. Since then, gekiga has come to be somewhat loosely used to mean a type of story manga with little or no humor for mature readers" (p. 223-224).
Staff Picks
My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness
The heart-rending autobiographical manga that's taken the internet by storm! An honest and heartfelt look at one young woman's exploration of her sexuality, mental well-being, and growing up in our modern age.
Slum Wolf
A gritty collection of graphic short stories by a Japanese manga master depicting life on the streets among punks, gangsters, and vagrants. Though virtually unknown in the United States, Tadao Tsuge is one of the original masters of alternative manga, and one of the world's great artists of the down-and-out.
Chainsaw Man, Vol. 1
Denji's a poor young man who'll do anything for money, even hunting down devils with his pet devil-dog Pochita. He's a simple man with simple dreams, drowning under a mountain of debt. But his sad life gets turned upside down one day when he's betrayed by someone he trusts. Now with the power of a devil inside him, Denji's become a whole new man--Chainsaw Man!
The Drifting Classroom, Vol. 1
Sho, a sixth-grader, and his friends fight for survival after a strange earthquake engulfs their entire school sending themselves, students, and teachers into an alien world.
The Push Man and Other Stories
Over four decades ago, Yoshihiro Tatsumi expanded the horizons of comics story-telling by using the visual language of manga to tell gritty, literary short stories about the private lives of everyday people, earning him the title of "grandfather of Japanese alternative comics."
Shiver: Junji Ito Selected Stories
This volume includes nine of Junji Ito's best short stories, as selected by the author himself and presented with accompanying notes and commentary.
20th Century Boys, Vol. 1: Friends
Humanity, having faced extinction at the end of the 20th century, would not have entered the new millennium if it weren't for them. In 1969, during their youth, they created a symbol. In 1997, as the coming disaster slowly starts to unfold, that symbol returns. This is the story of a gang of boys who try to save the world.
Manga and Manhua: History and Theory
Hokusai X Manga: Japanese Pop Culture Since 1680
Early Japanese popular culture, in the form of the coloured woodcuts of artists like Hokusai and Kuniyoshi, achieved world fame after Japan's opening. The pop culture of today, from manga to anime, has also conquered the globe. Now the sheets and books of woodcuts by the most famous renowned ukiyo-e artists confront the visual mass media in the comics and cartoons of modern Japan.
Comics and the Origins of Manga: A Revisionist History
Reveals how popular U.S. comics characters like Jiggs and Maggie, the Katzenjammer Kids, Felix the Cat, and Popeye achieved immense fame in Japan during the 1920s and 1930s, and influenced the development of Japanese comics.
Manga and the Representation of Japanese History
This edited collection explores how graphic art and in particular Japanese manga represent Japanese history. The articles explore the representation of history in manga from disciplines that include such diverse fields as literary studies, politics, history, cultural studies, linguistics, narratology, and semiotics.
Manga: Sixty Years of Japanese Comics
An accessible introduction to the development and diversity of Japanese comics from 1945 to the present.
