Showa 1953-1989: A History of Japan (Showa: A History of Japan, 3)

Manga master Shigeru Mizuki's "Showa" series exemplifies the melding of memoir, history and comics. Its vast scope, comprising four large volumes in English, encompasses the entire reign of the Emperor Hirohito, which spanned from 1926 to 1989, the longest rule of any Japanese monarch. From the Chrysanthemum throne Hirohito oversaw some of the most tumultuous years the tiny archipelago nation ever experienced. During that era Japan's government morphed from late Taisho democracy into fervent nationalism, then to proto-fascism, to an all out aggressive military state and finally to the constitutional monarchy that exists today. Though Mizuki named his magnum opus after the Emperor's era, Hirohito himself makes very few appearances within its massive bulk. The story instead integrates Japanese history with Mizuki's own personal history. Both provide fascinating parallel narratives. Drafted like so many others, Mizuki served in the Japanese Army during World War II and miraculously escaped death numerous times. This frequently horrifying story takes up much of Showa volumes two and three. Volume four, the final volume, expands on the years during and following the American Occupation and Japan's "economic miracle." By 1989 Japan had emerged from the shadow of its humiliating defeat into an inexorable economic powerhouse, though Mizuki paints a bizarre and sometimes shocking picture of Japan in the late twentieth century. Many prospered but some prospered more than others. Some suffered horribly.At the end of volume three, Mizuki catches a train to Tokyo, chasing the nascent comics boom. So far his career in Kamishibai has proved mostly fruitless. He sets out to change that. Volume four begins with a discussion of the political climate in the early 1950s. The US Occupation government initiates a military alliance that involves Japan in the "proxy wars" between the US and USSR in Korea and Vietnam. Responding to massive inflation, Communism takes hold in Japan, followed by purges and violence. NHK begins broadcasting and the influence of television slowly spreads. The Sen, once a unit of Japanese currency, falls to inflationary pressure in 1954, the same year Godzilla first appears. The LDP forms, which, despite its full name, "Liberal Democratic Party," combines the right into a single political bulwark against the socialist left-wing. Nezumi Otoko, a constant presence in the series, says that the left-wing still refocuses, purges and "works within the system" to the present day. "The socialists. The communists. The LDP. They never change," he concludes.Mizuki inadvertently insults artist Soyama, but following an apology with whiskey, he introduces Mizuki to publishers. He gets work, though low paid, and produces "Rocketman" while pawning most of his possessions. The first economic booms occur, named after Japanese Emperors, the Jinmu, Iwato, Izanagi, etc. As the Soviets under Stalin disturb the left, a new youth culture emerges complete with pop music and comics. Mizuki works so much that reality and manga merge. People become "apartment dwellers" and a series of ghastly murders begins arond 1958. Then an Imperial Wedding. Someone protesting the gratuitous show of wealth throws a rock at the royal entourage on live television. Nonetheless, sale of luxuries increase. Mizuki's parents find their almost forty year old son a wife. Mizuki describes her as "horse faced." She plays a shadowy and marginalized role throughout the book. The "Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security" pits the right versus the left. Violence breaks out and the extreme left, knows as the "Bunds," loses face. More violence and assassinations follow, including the infamous 1960 killing of Inejiro Asanuma.Mizuki's fortunes don't improve and he now lives with a pregnant wife. Finding money in the emergent manga world proves difficult. As times and finances worsen, Akuma-kun arises from Mizuki's frustrated mind. Pollution from rapid growth results in new diseases gripping the population. Some companies come under fire for poor environmental practices. Shinkasens appear in time for the Tokyo Olympics. When the Vietnam war breaks out, the US uses Japan as a supply base. Mizuki finally makes some real money drawing for magazines, possibly presaged by a flying Kanadama. Student rebellions break out. Mizuki's creativity takes further root and some of his most famous characters emerge: TV boy, Sanpei the Kappa and Graveyard Kitaro. TV adaptations follow. Money finally starts trickling in, allowing him to buy back his pawned possessions and hire a team of assistants. But, as Mizuki says himself "I found success could be as punishing as failure." Endless work and crippling deadlines soon dominate his life. Interpersonal dramas with his "strange assistants" also heats up. Protests continue to heat up, especially around 1968. "Fortress Yasuda" falls.Under enourmous pressure and amidst publishers barging into his room fulminating about deadlines, Mizuki has a breakdown. He yearns to travel back to New Guinea. Tobetoro's home. He and two friends find their way back to Takarazuka. Horror awaits them in dreams about fallen war comrades begging for proper burials. Their bones still litter the ground thirty years later. Mizuki eventually meets up with Tobetoro and his friends who helped him survive the war. They greet him as "Paul" once again. He reunites with Epupe and vows, a la MacArthur "I shall return." Back in Japan, the Expo '70 World's Fair opens. Comunists hijack Flight 351 and fly to North Korea, hoping to start a revolution. They become prisoners and apparently remain there to this day. Yukio Mishima commits seppuku. He tried to start an uprising, but, as Nezumi Otoko interjects "his audience was raised on luxury, not sacrifice." "An-An" girls" rival "Non-No" girls through fashion magazines. More riots, murders and pyramid schemes top the headlines. The US turns Okinawa over to Japan but keeps its bases in a move that still remains controversial. The Asama hostage incident pretty much ends the extreme left in Japan. Welcome to the 1970s.Even more beguiling were the soldiers who remained on duty, not knowing the war had ended and did not capitulate until the 1970s. 1972 also saw the rise of the notorious Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka, a "man of the people" who later became embroiled in one of Japan's largest government scandals: the Lockheed bribery scandal. Prior to that, inflation and embargoes impacted the Japanese economy horrendously. People even horde toilet paper. Mizuki couldn't find any one day in 1973. Then a very strange thing happens. One chapter relates a dream in which death visits Mizuki's house and offers him afterlife insurance. Soon Mizuki walks into the afterlife through the bath. While he wanders, a spirit inhabits his physical body, but it decides to leave after realizing that Mizuki has a terrible life. Japan saw hard times as well as unemployment and bankruptcy rose throughout the 1970s. Nixon invites Hirohito to the USA in 1975. The following year Mao Tsu Tung dies and the infamous "gang of four" are arrested. Japan rides out the energy crises of the late 70s thanks to its efficient management. Few other industrialized countries fare as well. According to Nezumi Otoko, many Japanese become comfortable and "...more politically conservative. People care about protecting what they have and staying inside their own little worlds." Video games. Karaoke. Stand-up comedy. Entertainment becomes a dominant force.Mizuki once again returns to New Guinea. More mysterious personal cults and murders occur, such as the grisly metal bat murders and the cannibalistic Paris human flesh case. An airline pilot deliberately crashes a plan. Greed grips harder. Mizuki escapes into more daydreams, this time as a customer of the "extra-marital affairs company." The 1980s begin and Ronald and Nancy Reagan visit Japan. Kidnappers pull Glico's president from a public bath. Then "the fiend" appears and terrorizes Japan with randomly placed cyanide-laced candy. He receives a 100 million yen ransom but escapes arrest. In 1987 an airliner explodes in mid-air and the abduction of Japanese citizens by North Korea comes to the surface. The economy tanks and housing becomes unaffordable for many. Mizuki's father passes away saying "my life was not a good one." Then the Showa period comes to an end. Mizuki's Kitaro sees a resurgence in popularity just as Hirohito undergoes medical treatment. In January 1989 the Emperor passes away. The Heisei era begins under still reigning Emperor Akihito.Mizuki muses on his own mortality and returns once again to New Guinea. This time he repays his debt to the people who helped him survive during the war. The final chapter reflects on the entire Showa era. Mizuki wonders how poverty turned to nationalism, which led to numerous sacrificial deaths. Japan's defeat by a foreign power and then, according to Nezumi Otoko, "that same foreign power forced democracy on you. What they called freedom." Mizuki wonders if slaving away in an office qualifies as happiness? Why do companies seem to matter more than individuals in modern Japan? What happened to "the brotherhood of humanity" that Mizuki experiences in New Guinea? The final pages ask people to "never forget what happens when the military rules a country" and to never make the same mistake again.A final section includes full-color pages that accompanied "Showa's" initial release. Subsequent releases removed them and Drawn & Quarterly decided to restore them at the end of their four-volume reissue of the original Japanese 8 volume series. Each page is exquisite. The final color page shows Mizuki receiving the Kodansha manga award for "Showa." Nezumi Otoko eats heartily in the foreground.Mizuki lived until late 2015 when he died at age 93. He has become one of the undisputed masters of manga. Interest in his work seems to just keep expanding. "Showa" undoubtedly stands as one of his masterpieces. It has the complexity of a medieval cathedral and the stratifications and depth of a Wagner opera. The combination of history and personal narrative works seamlessly and the work never becomes tedious or tiresome. In fact, quite the opposite. In it, Mizuki grows from a young do-nothing into an overworked manga master. He depicts fame as a blessing and a curse. He fervently excoriates the militarism that rose in Japan before World War II and the ensuing fascism that led to countless deaths. Though the series targets Japanese readers, its message won't be lost on readers from other countries or cultures. As the final generation from World War II slowly fades away, Mizuki sadly now among them, a risk emerges that people with no living memory of the horrors of that catastrophic war may meander into similar territory. We can only hope that humanity won't repeat such costly mistakes, though it often seems bizarrely condemned to do so. Excellent works such as "Showa" can provide guidance for future generations through the minefield of power politics and re-ignited tensions. Hopefully humanity will take its message to heart. We'll see.

Shigeru Mizuke’ Showa 1953 to 1989 is the last of his multi volume graphic history/autobiography. In this English language edition he covers the period of Emperor Hirohito and his life in 4 volumes. Of the 4 this one is the most personal and the most introspective as he thinks upon his life and the transformation of Japan from an emerging modern society into a warring nation and now into a fully modern country.As a standalone it is better than the previous editions. He is most open about himself and his personal journey as a struggling manga artist into the struggles of commercial success. He also takes us deeper into his imagination and aspirations as he shares with us his belief in a world of yokai (Traditional Japanese Spirits monsters and spirits) and because he takes us his dreams of death and his refuge with the people who saved his life as a wounded and abandoned Japanese Soldier in World War II. The book is also better than this earlier ones because of the inclusion of about 60 pages of full color illustrations that also summarize the entire history. I had admired his art work in black and white, the color illustrations are magnificent.Looking at the entire series, a stated goal of this project was to help younger Japanese to better understand how Japan lead itself into 15 years of war. Japan’s World War II began because its civil government never had any control of its military nor any limits on it most Nationalistic elements. The results of this war was one of the most complete and systematic destructions of a nation since the Romans sowed salt into the fields of Carthage. Absent these elements, post war Japan would become one of the most modern and admired nations in the world.Too much of Mizuki’s history consists of the mentions of political leaders, major events and major scandals. Rarely is there any analysis or context for the events. His history lessons are too often of the “on this date this thing happened to this person” and no explanation as to why the reader should care or how that event fit into the larger flow of Japanese history.He is somewhat critical of America’s use of Japan as a base and provider for first the Cold War and later the Viet Nam War. He also makes it clear that Japan’s status as America’ ally, an ally without the costs of a large military, fueled much of its post war economy and therefore the Japanese economic miracle.Given:How margin his personal life was as a child and how hard life was for his parents and his communityHow badly the county was run while under the threats of the ultra-nationalistsHow terribly Japan suffered during and by the end of the war(s) initiated by the Japanese militaristsIt is hard to make sense of his nostalgia for the loss of Japanese’s traditions under the gathering forces of modernization. He has an almost morbid fondness for scandal and murder as proof of something lost in modern Japan. Yet he never made a case for why those traditions had made the older Japan any better. Indeed his earlier books also recount a number of scandals, murders and assassinations. Politics by political murder seem to be an abiding tradition in old and new Japan. Mizuki has no ink to justify either.Non Fiction Manga is a small field. It has a few counter parts in western Graphic books. Of the few I have read this is a sub category worth reading and Mizuki‘s Kodansha Manga award and the American Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards for the Showa books were very well earned.

I bought the series of these and went through them all in just a couple weeks. I didn't know much about Japan's history and found this to be an accessible and fascinating introduction. It gives a great story with lots of historical information. I found myself doing outside research because I wanted to know more about the items mentioned.

My son likes this book and the others in the series. Very good.

I lived in Japan as a boy. I love the way that Mizuki san informs us while showing the life of a starving manga artist. I wish he had more like this in English.

Great storyline , average artwork.

Good for interest not for academic!

The best retelling of 20th Century Japanese history - personal, painful, and totally relevant.

I couldn't put it down. I really enjoyed the combination of pure historical facts mixed with autobiographical parts. Great drawings!

Shigeru Mizuki è uno dei più famosi mangaka giapponesi, specializzato nelle storie del folklore nipponico. In questo caso di focalizza sulla storia del Giappone dell'era Showa (1939-1944) e ci narra parte della sua vita. E' un manga molto interessante, pesante sotto alcuni aspetti, ma adatto soprattutto agli appassionati di storia o della cultura/storia del Giappone.Nel volume, Mizuki, utlizza tecniche artistiche differenti: da semplici disegni a schizzi molto realistici degli eventi di quegli anni. Nel quarto volume della quadrilogia ci narra gli eventi successivi alla Seconda Guerra Mondiale, la crescita economica del Giappone e la situazione politica nipponica e mondiale. Non risparmia critiche sulla società giapponese, illustra eventi secondari come gli omicidi seriali o scandali. In questo volume si apprendono tutte le difficoltà incontrate de Mizuki come mangaka, la sua infelicità e la ricerca di una pace interiore. L'autore conclude augurandosi che il Mondo non debba più conoscere le sofferenze dell'era Showa e che grazie allo studio della storia non accadano più eventi così tragici.In questo volume, nelle ultime 50/60 pagine vi sono le illustrazioni a colori del primo tankobon "Showa" in ordine originale come nella prima pubblicazione di fine anni Ottanta!

Beginning to end the Showa series is a testament to how manga can be literature. Mizuki's history of the postwar recovery and boom is as unique and contrarian as the first three volumes in the series. And it reveals the poverty no one really knows about that preceded the boom times the world remembers.This series is some of the most compelling history you'll read.

Beautiful Book, great way of presenting history. It's just like the other books in the series. These are well renowned for good reason

Die vier Bände der Showa Serie sind eine perfekte Einführung in die Geschichte Japans von 1926 bis 1989. Shigeru Mizuki gelingt es auf unkonventionelle Art diese wichtigste Periode der neueren Geschichte zu illustrieren. Humorvolle Beschreibung einerseits, unpathetische Analyse der Widersprüche und besonders wichtig : Ehrliche Auseinandersetzung mit der negationistischen Geschichtsschreibungdie bis dato in Japan immer noch vorherrscht.