A Drifting Life

Arrived on time and exactly as described. Thank you.

Over 800 pages, this is an epic masterpiece. It's such an intimate window into the authors life you almost feel like you are impeding privacy by reading. One japan's most influentisl artists, he's unafraid to show his raw emotion vulnerabilities. It's special to witness the beggining of a movement which was born out of passion not capitalism and to see how humble life was just to create. This is part biographical and part historical. An astonishing glimpse into a genius life. A loving masterpiece

I found A Drifting Life in my local library and I was instantly fascinated by it. I've read many biographies and memoirs of creators of American comics and accounts of the birth of American comic books in the 1930s and 1940s. I know very little about Japan and manga. Tatsumi captivated me with his story of his love of manga from his childhood through his development as a professional cartoonist, writer, and editor. It's hugely interesting to read about the world of comics and their artists in a culture that is vastly different from America.I was enchanted by Tatsumi's masterly use of seemingly simple yet deeply revealing art and by the narrator's passion expressed from the beginning of his secondary school years at the start of the book; Tatsumi''s love of comics both as reader and creator shines through. As a teenager I was moved by the dedication and devotion to the medium of comics in Steranko's History of Comics, Jules Feiffer 's The Great Comic Book Heroes and interviews in the Comics Journal with Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez. A Drifting Life also captures the excitement of reading comics, drawing comics, and exploring their potential to tell stories and reach new audiences. I was moved by the epilogue which says little about Tatsumi's achievements in later life (his face is drawn in shadow ) but pays tribute to his hero Osamu Tezuka. A wonderful book for not just for people who like manga, but for anyone who loves art and storytelling.

A truly stunning piece of work. This is thick in appearance but the ease at which the work unfolds means it is very easy to get through. As an autobiography and covering parts of the history of Japan after WWII finishes, it's nearly a masterpiece. The artwork starts as beautifully simple in approach and develops slightly as the story progresses. It's a very impressive black & white graphic novel, beautifully printed and simply written. Highly recommended if you are new to the genre. The style of drawing shows talent throughout but all in all it is a deeply fascinating approach to telling a very interesting autobiography of Japanese life. Well worth buying and highly inspiring to read.

I loved the story of Hiroshi Katsumi (Yoshihiro Tatsumi) a school-kid artist and writer obsessed with manga. Growing up in late 1940's post-war Osaka, he and his brother Okimasa begin having work featured in Manga Shonen and other magazines of the time. Hiroshi meets his hero Osamu Tezuka and embarks on a life-long career in the manga publishing world, the book follows his journey from a young mangaka creating short pieces for compilations and longer whole-book works to becoming a seasoned editor. Yoshihiro-san was an integral part of a group contributing greatly to a more modern adult style of manga. He and his artist friends named the movement `Gekiga' (Dramatic Pictures) which was heavily influenced by international cinema and literature. This is the best translated work from Yoshihiro-san i have read. The book is a satisfying autobiography that also manages to be both part history of post-war Japan and an essay on the birth of modern manga. I just wish that some of the early works mentioned in the story were available in English translation - The Civilizing Beast (1955), The Man Smiling In The Dark (1955) and Black Snowstorm (1956) look especially intriguing. The book is a very sturdy object- a 856 page weighty tome with solid binding, quality paper and is very good value for money. Designed and lettered beautifully by Adrian Tomine and well translated by Taro Nettleton. Highly recommended. A+

The book starts in 1948 where the author is 13 years old and embarking on single panels of manga and sending it into magazines, and finishes in 1960 when the author is 25 and a successful author of manga and a new style he created, "gekiga". The book is autobiographical, taking in details of Tatsumi's (renamed Katsumi HIroshi in the book) home life, his ill brother, his philandering father, his dedicated mother, and moving him through high school becoming progressively interested and committed to manga, until he becomes a full time manga artist and writer. The cultural and political history of Japan is documented as well but the main focus is on the development of manga in this postwar era and how it developed over these years. This is the best book I've read all year, comic books or otherwise, for so many reasons. The story is so well written and drawn throughout. We see Tatsumi's self doubt and determination to become a strong artist throughout and his admiration of artists he met when he started, particularly the superb Tezuka Osamu, but you can't help but notice Tatsumi today has surpassed Tezuka in skill to a whole new level. He writes ironically about attempting long works (48 pages! he gasps) all the while the reader is holding in their hands an 834 page book. And its not at all a struggle to read through all 834 pages. The story is so compelling that by the end I could genuinely read another 800 pages. The story of the manga artists is well told with its highs, betrayals, sense of adventure, creation, and originality all done by guys in their early 20s. Tatsumi does seem to "drift" into manga. While he wanted to become an artist in high school he quickly becomes a known name and ends up moving from Osaka to Tokyo and then becoming a contributing artist to half a dozen magazines, producing books, editing short story collections, editing magazines, and then starting the "gekiga" movement singlehandedly - he's only 25 years old by the end of the book! Its such a great comic book and deserves to be up there alongside "Maus" and "Watchmen" as one of the masterpieces of the genre. It's certainly Tatsumi's masterpiece. I also recommend getting the recently republished "Black Blizzard", one of Tatsumi's best loved books, and one of his works he writes about creating in "A Drifting Life" so its good to read alongside this book. Even if you're not a comic book fan this is a great book and one of the highlights of 2009 publishing. A virtuoso piece, a career best, a true masterpiece from one of the best comic book writer/artists that ever lived, I can't recommend this highly enough.

For those who follow the work of Yoshihiro Tatsumi, this book is a treat. It's a wonderful manga memoir that took almost 10 years to create. The main protagonist is no other than Yoshihiro himself, using another name of Hiroshi Katsumi. In this book, he explores the journey he took to become a manga artist. It's an inspiring tale that looks into his relationship with his family, friend, fellow manga artists and publishers. The book title is apt as we see how Katsumi "drifts" along in his life, making the numerous career moves. Most of the time, you'll feel the doubt and uncertainty as he felt within the panels. The book, at over 800 pages, is smartly inserted with historical events to portray the passing of time. It starts in 1948 and ends, a bit abruptly, in 1960 where Katsumi took part in the demonstration against the Security Treaty. Throughout the book, we also learn how manga has evolved and affected the artists. I'll recommended this book to anyone who wishes to know Yoshihiro Tatsumi a little better, or a little bit of Japanese manga history.

Almost 900 pages of Tatsumi's love of manga and his detailed odyssey of becoming a master of the genre. Interspersed with social, cultural and political events occurring during the years of the author development in his beloved post-war Japan. Well drawn in black and white, although simply and sparsely, the story is somehow one dimensional and drawn out, but I admit I lasted the course, even though the reading was a little boring at times. A gorgeous book to own, beautifully presented and curated with a lot of details by Drawn & Quarterly.

Buena calidad de impresión y de papel. Como manga es un "imprescindible", es genial cómo retrata el Japón de la posguerra y el nacimiento del manga, al mismo tiempo es una autobiografía de Tatsumi, uno de los creadores del género. Es la segunda vez que lo compro, esta vez ha sido para un regalo. Y probablemente lo vuelva a comprar!

There have been many attempts at autobiographical graphic novels, Binky Brown and I Saw It among the earliest and Maus the best-known. I think it's fair to say that only fans of the genre and people interested in the specific issues explored were enthusiastic about these books. Yoshihiro Tatsumi has created something totally different, a memoir that speaks to everyone, in totally original form. He tells an absorbing story using a few simple words and a few simple lines. He uses panels to pace the story, to focus details, to show facial expression, to convey emotion; in ways distinct from written autobiographies, but also distinct from film-makers, painters, photographers and anyone else who ever tried to use art to convey the feeling and meaning of a life. I feel the reviewers complaining about the lack of depth are missing the point. The author's technique cannot go below the surface, he's drawing pictures. He can use those pictures to suggest depths, but not to explore them. A writer can spend thousands of words (or more) describing internal psychological states or conveying depth in other ways. Other graphic novelists, and also film-makers and painters, attempt to do the same by leaving realism behind or by including a lot of detail. Tatsumi confines himself to simple realism, but realism as perceived at the time, and stripped down to essential lines. He tells us what he saw and leaves it to us to imagine what went on below (and above, and before, and after). To take one example, a historian might want to know the name and background of the waitress in the restaurant beneath his apartment who tries to seduce him with comic results. An artist might paint a haunting evocation of youth and inexperience and lust. Tatsumi draws her as he saw her, essentials only, few facts and no reliable ones. Was she young and pretty, confident and cheerful, hardworking and promiscuous? We know he thought so at the time, nothing more, but also nothing less. He conveys the episode not in one detailed picture, but in a dozen quick sketches, with word balloons and backdrops. In this way we learn about his life in a different manner than any previous autobiographical work of art, we learn different aspects than we have ever encountered. This is not only a book for Manga fans. It's a story anyone can understand. The pain of having your ideas ignored or misunderstood. The pleasure of winning some degree of acceptance, and the frustration when others twist it for their own ends (but at the same time, the temptation of letting them do it, to gain recognition and money at the expense of artistic purity). The complex personal relationships, often searing, sometimes wondrous. The ups and downs of collaboration. The enigma of other people, those we love, those we respect and those we fear. All this with a backdrop of Japanese history and culture, a boy growing up, and an art form evolving. This is an extraordinary masterwork. It takes only a couple of hours to read and you will be drawn into it in a different manner from anything else you've ever experienced.

**MANGA TOP 100** En un tiempo cuando la cantidad superó por mucho a la calidad y hay más títulos que tiempo para leerlos. Cuando individuos sin talento, de todos los países y en cada uno de los medios, alcanza el éxito entre comunidades y consumidores más y más ignorantes (en consecuencia, menos exigentes), y grandes figuras de la Literatura, la Música y el Cine aseguran que “el Arte está muerto” (moción que no secundo). En esta época, en la que se cosifica al ser humano, se celebra el extremismo y los jóvenes crean personajes de sí mismos en esa perenne búsqueda de identidad personal. Cuando el dinero es el mayor motor del mundo y todo parece seguir una tendencia intrascendente, efímera. Hoy. Hoy es importante mirar atrás. No con el propósito de identificar el punto donde las cosas empezaron a ir mal, sino reconocer que incluso en un mundo tan jodido como aquél en que hemos convertido éste han habido enormes personajes, en cualesquiera espacios y ámbitos, incluyendo el Manga, que produjeron Arte, cuando Arte era eso y no artista, ahora un término difícilmente real y probablemente mundano. El Manga, pues, llegó a ser, a desarrollarse, gracias a la perspicacia y capacidades, la agudeza e intelecto de hombres y mujeres quienes, desde el Siglo XII, pero más destacadamente posteriormente a la Segunda Guerra Mundial, dedicaron su tiempo y esfuerzo a la fabricación de mundos alternos impresos en un ingrediente por naturaleza sencillo: la hoja de papel. Osamu Tezuka es el primer nombre que viene a la mente, y es con semejante justicia que Yoshihiro Tatsumi, su contemporáneo tristemente desconocido en el continente americano, lo sigue de cerca. Yoshihiro Tatsumi (1935-2015) es adjudicado, entre otras cosas, con la invención de la “novela gráfica”. Parcialmente cierto, su más valioso apéndice al Arte gráfico fue aquél de iniciar el movimiento “Gekiga”, que se refería a la elaboración y uso de ilustraciones más “serias” en un período cuando el Manga (o el cómic, para tal efecto) era estrictamente ligero e infantil (ergo, considerado para niños). Si el término desapareció al poco tiempo fue porque el Manga adoptó dicha corriente y, sin dejar de ser Manga, los autores sintieron una mayor libertad para crear historias oscuras, realistas, dramáticas o violentas (es decir, el sub-género fue absorbido y se volvió obsoleto). El Gekiga, sin embargo, permitió que los practicantes—incluyendo a Tezuka, que se unió al movimiento con obras como “Phoenix” y “Adolf"—abordaran los temas que deseaban sin limitarse a lo que era éticamente aceptable. Asimismo, el Gekiga, nombre de la revista fundada por Tatsumi, abandonó el hasta entonces concretado formato de cuatro viñetas, lo que atrajo a un impresionante número de aspirantes (provocando el acrecentamiento de sub-géneros) y propició, después, la Época de Oro del Manga. Tras años de éxito y diversos reconocimientos, y probablemente por la insistencia de editores preocupados porque escribiera sus memorias (algo que Tezuka nunca hizo) antes de “expirar”, Tatsumi publicó su autobiografía como no habría podido hacerlo de otra forma: en Manga. En el año 2008, y sin haber sido parte de publicaciones semanales/mensuales (quizás el motivo por el que el primero en adquirir la licencia internacional fue Drawn & Quarterly, editorial no especializada en Manga), aparecieron los dos volúmenes tankobon de “A Drifting Life” (en español, “Una vida errante”), el fenómeno literario que rápidamente recibió excelentes críticas, fue integrado a las listas de “Mejores Manga de la Historia”, alcanzó los más altos rangos de ventas anuales a nivel mundial (el #3 en la prestigiosa lista del New York Times), y fue presentado con dos premios Eisner, el Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize y, en 2012, el Angouleme International Comic Prize, una de las preseas por obra gráfica (junto con el Lucca Comics & Games, de Italia) más importantes en Europa. “A Drifting Life” es muchas cosas a la vez. Una autobiografía (obviamente) que es el retrato de un Artista brillante, la historia del Manga y el recuento social-cultural de un Japón varias veces derrotado y perjudicado (hasta la actualidad) por la catástrofe de Hiroshima; la crónica del amorodio hacia el pueblo y gobierno estadounidenses, y el inventario—cuidadoso escrutinio—de todo el Arte producido (y llegado a Japón) entre 1945 y 1960. Hiroshi Katsumi (el mismo Tatsumi, modificando su nombre) es un niño devorador de historias, y entre todos los autores que encuentra en los locales de libros en renta (Y10 por tres libros), hay uno que despierta su pasión y ambición por el dibujo: un joven genio, apenas unos años mayor, de nombre Osamu Tezuka. Inspirados por éste, Katsumi y su asiduamente enfermo hermano, Okimasa, comienzan a trazar Manga en cuatro viñetas, enviándolo a las diferentes revistas de las que son lectores asiduos, mas es Katsumi quien primero y más rápidamente adquiere notoriedad gracias a su trazo e ingenio. En conjunto con otros niños, él establece una sociedad de mangakas que da por resultado su participación en la revista Mainichi Shimbun, publicación que, como lo más normal, le permite acercarse y convivir con el mismísimo Tezuka. Aunque breve, esta sólida relación le abre las puertas a una relación con demás editores y personalidades del medio. Entre tumbo y tumba, Katsumi se integrará a diferentes editoriales (entonces no existían la “exclusividad” ni los Derechos de Autor en Japón), sobreviviendo a los estragos del éxito y las penas del fracaso, y conociendo a los compañeros mangakas con quienes, años después, se aventuraría al establecimiento del Gekiga. Tatsumi es sumamente categórico y diáfano en la exposición de su “yo” pasado. El balance de sentimientos e inseguridades, en unión al constante reportaje del Japón post-guerra, es escalofriante en su honestidad y precisión. A lo anterior, como debe preverse de un Maestro de su oficio, se suma un sinnúmero de homenajes y referencias al Arte que lo inspiró (especialmente el Cine y la Literatura) en su desenvolvimiento profesional y creación artística. No obstante la obra no se presenta dividida en partes o etapas, cada uno de los años, cual estampados, es una recreación íntegra de una vida dedicada al Arte—al Manga; la enfermedad y enemistad (temporal) con su hermano, la carencia económica, la vacilación y abandono eventual del dibujo, el amor por Tezuka, la depresión y ansiedad por cumplir las metas y las exigencias de los editores (a veces discrepantes, pero en síntesis exactamente como se las presenta en “Bakuman", de Ohba y Obata—algunas cosas nunca cambian). Todo esto, como un solo compuesto, es lo que la realidad paga y deja, y pocas obras—sean libro, película u obra de teatro—comprenden: las características, particularidades y propiedades de no sólo haber transitado sino dejado huella en el mundo. Katsumi, el personaje, crece sin prisa por llegar a su destino; el lector lo acompaña y, sin exageraciones, crece con él. El punto acaso más importante que debe citarse, en especial para lectores aclimatados al Manga contemporáneo, es el Arte. Personajes, escenarios y fondos son explicados y manifestados—tal vez comprometidos—con sencillez y minimalismo. Esto no es extraño ni inválido, empero la obra fuera publicada en 2008. Tatsumi trazó su obra rigurosa y puntualmente de acuerdo al Arte de los 50’s y 60’s, cuando “menos era más” y la franqueza (aparente simplicidad) del Arte se compaginaba con los grandes expositores de Japón, Estados Unidos, Francia e Italia. Más relevantemente, seguido parece que el extraordinario mangaka no trabajó sólo: el lector percibe la idea que Tatsumi bosquejó con el puño de Takao Saito, Alexandre Dumas, Humphrey Bogart y, por supuesto, Osamu Tezuka. Porque ¿qué carajos es un Artista si no los Artistas que lo han inspirado? Yoshihiro Tatsumi y Hiroshi Katsumi son dos personajes (uno en la realidad, otro en la fantasía) que ameritan nuestro estudio, respeto y aprecio. “A Drifting Life”, disponible en tomo único (omnibus) de Drawn & Quarterly (en asociación con The Japan Foundation). Más de 800 páginas que pasan volando. Mi calificación: A+

incredibly interesting. it's like being in japan right after WWII. so many details of daily life that paint the picture of Japanese society then. a precious reference. I can only imagine what readers with a manga predilection must feel reading this.

Although it has just come out and I've only read it once, I have no hesitation in saying that "A Drifting Life" is a manga classic. If you have read and enjoyed "Barefoot Gen," the more mature Tezuka works, or even newer manga like "Monster" or "Pluto" by Urasawa you need to check this out. The art is simple and easy to read. The story is engaging and interesting all the way through. It really left me wanting more - I read all 800+ pages in one weekend. You get to see how classic manga was made and get insight into the industry. This is not manga for kids. This is an intriguing story for adults. I would also recommend it to those who are new to manga/graphic novels because it is an extremely easy and intuitive read. Don't be intimidated by the page count. I read manga 5-10 times quicker than prose/regular books, and at least twice as quick as regular american comics. I hope he writes a sequel because I am interested to know what his life in manga was like after this book ends.