Tatsumi, Yoshihiro 1935-

PERSONAL:

Born 1935, in Osaka, Japan.

CAREER:

Graphic novelist. Has worked for Himomaru Publishing, Osaka, Japan.

WRITINGS:

GRAPHIC SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS

Good-Bye and Other Stories, Catalan Communications, 1988.

The Push Man, and Other Stories (originally published in 1969), translated by Yuji Oniki, edited and designed by Adrian Tomine, Drawn & Quarterly (Montréal, Quebec, Canada), 2005.

Abandon the Old in Tokyo (originally published in 1970), Drawn & Quarterly (Montréal, Quebec, Canada), 2006.

Also author of graphic stories published in Japan. Tatsumi's works have been translated into Spanish, French, and Swedish.

SIDELIGHTS:

Decades before graphic novels and short stories for adult audiences gained popularity in the United States, Yoshihiro Tatsumi founded the genre in his native Japan. Beginning in the 1950s, he created "gekiga," meaning "dramatic pictures." Writing and illustrating these tales when the defeat in World War II was still fresh in most Japanese people's minds, Tatsumi began telling stories of ordinary people suffering quietly in urban settings such as Tokyo. Usually unable to express their psychological fears and needs verbally, these characters find release in unusual, bizarre, and even dangerous ways. Accompanying his stories with illustrations that range from the highly detailed and realistic to the expressionistic, Tatsumi has found a niche outside the mainstream while still gaining a large and respectful fan base. It was not until 2005, however, that his translated collection The Push Man, and Other Stories won him attention in North America.

A young boy during World War II, Tatsumi was the son of parents who ran a laundry business. The family was so poor that the young Tatsumi attended school irregularly because education had to be paid for at the time. He found comfort in comic books, which could be read in rental book stores in which customers could pay a small hourly fee and read as many comics in that time as they wished. Becoming a fan of comic book artist Tezuka Osamu, Tatsumi learned that the artist lived close by. He visited Tezuka, who took the teenager under his wing and gave him encouragement. Eventually, Tatsumi found work with rental shop company Hinomaru Publishing in his home of Osaka, but as the economy improved in Japan and comic books and paperbacks became more affordable, the rental industry collapsed. Tatsumi left Osaka for Tokyo in 1957, where he and some of his friends started creating comics in the gekiga style.

When asked by interviewer Kai-Ming Cha in PW Comics Week why he chose to create such bleak stories of ordinary people, Tatsumi replied: "In essence, the works were a continuation of my everyday life, my reality, especially the works published in the Drawn & Quarterly books. They're sort of a parallel to ‘shisosetsu,’ the ‘I’ novel, a genre in Japan. [Shisosetsu novels use the first-person narrative to reveal the feelings of the protagonist and emphasize individuality.] Something like that. It was a reflection of my own feelings, being caught between success and work. I had a lot of drive to succeed but I was faced with disappointments. I had a lot of frustration that I wanted to get out in my work, in a way. I wasn't thinking of my readers. In a way, I succumbed to the idea that my works couldn't be a big hit anyway so I might as well create the work that I wanted to create and express what I was feeling."

American graphic novelist Adrian Tomine is responsible for editing and designing the collections of Tatsumi's works that have reached America. The Push Man, and Other Stories contains tales originally published in Japan in 1969, and Abandon the Old in Tokyo's stories are from the following year. Yet, critics have repeatedly noted that they read in many ways like modern compositions. "It's been over thirty years since these stories came out," as Carlo Santos pointed out in a Animé News Network review of the former collection, "but the main themes, such as companionship, self-worth, and family, are still universal issues today." Santos did discover some flaws in this book, though, especially "the repetitive characters that shuffle through each story" and the overuse of the grim image of abandoned or even dead babies. The critic, however, asserted: "The dramatic stories in The Push Man are a welcome addition to the Western understanding of Japanese comics." In Straight.com Amanda Growe commented: "The art in The Push Man is a bit dated, but this doesn't dampen the freshness of the stories." In a Publishers Weekly review, however, a critic stated that "Tatsumi draws marvelously evocative settings, and his stories flow with dreamlike ambiguity."

Abandon the Old in Tokyo features the same cast of troubled individuals, some pursuing mundane careers, while others find employment in seedier occupations. One character is reminiscent of the author: he is an artist who cannot find work and so pursues graffiti only to be condemned as a pervert. Other tales become simply pathetic, such as the story of a businessman whose company closes its doors, yet the man still goes to his empty office every day. Time International contributor Austin Ramzy described the collection as "a revealing time capsule and a strangely moving portrait of survival in a land where everything is changing." "No one captures urban Japan quite like Tatsumi," asserted a Publishers Weekly critic.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, October 15, 2005, Gordon Flagg, review of The Push Man, and Other Stories, p. 39; September 1, 2006, Gordon Flagg, review of Abandon the Old in Tokyo, p. 70.

Kirkus Reviews, September 1, 2005, review of The Push Man, and Other Stories, p. S1; July 15, 2006, review of Abandon the Old in Tokyo, p. 702.

Library Journal, September 15, 2005, Steve Raiteri, review of The Push Man, and Other Stories, p. 54.

Publishers Weekly, August 1, 2005, review of The Push Man, and Other Stories, p. 46; July 17, 2006, review of Abandon the Old in Tokyo, p. 142.

PW Comics Week, August 1, 2006, Kai-Ming Cha, "Tatsumi's Long Journey."

Time International (Asia edition), September 11, 2006, Austin Ramzy, "Drawn on the Dark Side," review of Abandon the Old in Tokyo, p. 48.

ONLINE

Animé News Network,http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/ (September 5, 2005), Carlo Santos, review of The Push Man, and Other Stories.

Las Vegas Weekly Online,http://www.lasvegasweekly.com/ (September 21, 2006), J. Caleb Mozzocco, "The Comics Scene Stretches from Old-School Asian to Letters to President Bush."

Straight.com,http://www.straight.com/ (November 10, 2005), Amanda Growe, review of The Push Man, and Other Stories; (November 30, 2006), Amanda Growe, review of Abandon the Old in Tokyo.

Village Voice Online,http://www.villagevoice.com/ (October 3, 2005), R.C. Baker, "Pushing the Limits: Cartoonist Adrian Tomine Discovers a Japanese Manga Master."