Are you a manga baka-a fool for manga? Of course you are. If you're like me, you've got tons of tankobon socked away on every ledge and in every crevice at home. It's no exaggeration to say my humble hovel is starting to look like the basement of Kingyo Used Books.
But how did this obsession with manga begin? When was the day we all woke up and realized that Japanese comics had taken over our lives? At some point we all stepped over the line and became unrepentant manga heads.
For David Welsh it was the discovery of Mine Yoshizaki's Sgt. Frog. "I noticed something weird as I read it," he says. "I was laughing out loud."
For Welsh, who writes about manga for The Comics Reporter and blogs at Precocious Curmudgeon, the realization that he was "giggling like a fool at amphibian invaders" was the moment he became a manga baka. "And I haven't looked back since," he confesses.
Like a lot of people, artist Christy Lijewski became a manga head by discovering Sailor Moon by Naoko Takeuchi. Now a professional mangaka herself, Lijewski walked into a comic book store one day and saw an import copy of Sailor Moon on the shelf. That was the day her world turned upside down. "I thought it was the most gorgeous artwork I had ever seen," she says. "And I felt that Sailor Moon might, in fact, be the best comic in the entire world."
Lijewski was twelve at the time and couldn't read a lick of Japanese. But it didn't matter. The Sailor Scouts worked their magic on her. Mission accomplished.
Serdar Yegulalp fell under the sway of manga in a similar way. He couldn't read Japanese but he didn't let that tiny handicap stop him. "I'd sit down with a digital dictionary and puzzle my way through titles like Steam Detectives and Urusei Yatsura," says the Genji Press blogger and author of the novel, The Four-Day Weekend. Thankfully American manga publishers came to the rescue to help language-impaired manga heads like Yegulalp. Numerous books by Kia Asamiya and Rumiko Takahashi are now in print for English-language fans.
"My Japanese is still iffy," says Yegulalp, "but now it's 2009 and graphic novels have their own New York Times best-seller list. My story has a happy ending."
Alexis Kirsch, an editor at VIZ Media, read manga when he was a little boy living in Japan. But when he moved back to the States, he only brought back a small amount of comics with him. Obviously he had yet to have his manga baka moment. That day would come later.
"When I was in college I had a eureka moment," he remembers. "I realized, ‘Hey, I can go out and buy more manga!!'" Consequently he jumped on a city bus, went to a bookstore and bought ten volumes of Dragon Ball. The next day he did the very same thing and bought ten more volumes of the Akira Toriyama classic.
"And thus my sad addiction began," says Kirsch. "I've made a handful of moves since college and every time my manga collection is the only real item that I MUST bring with me. My sickness now takes the shape of over 800 volumes and counting."
Children's Librarian and MangaCast reviewer Eva Volin was initially a fan of American comics. She read X-Men and an assortment of superhero stuff. Her affection for manga was sparked when she was asked to read (and review) all the comics in her library. Can you imagine? Reading comics and getting paid to do so? What a job!
"The first two series I read after getting this amazing assignment were Marmalade Boy by Wataru Yoshizumi and Fruits Basket by Natsuki Takaya," says the Alameda librarian. "Can you blame me for falling in love?"
Volin quickly discovered a bevy of disparate manga-everything from Hot Gimmick to Bleach. Pretty soon her X-Men-reading days were over. Manga had taken over her life. "My dreams of being ‘normal' grew and changed into dreams of a world where girls reading comics is normal. I'm lucky," she says. "My dreams are coming true."
Deb Aoki, a journalist who writes about manga for About.com, would flip through old shojo magazines as a kid visiting her relatives in Japan. At the time she couldn't read Japanese, but it didn't matter. "The visual storytelling is so strong," she remembers. "I could usually tell what was going on just by ‘reading' the pictures." One of her early favorites was Candy Candy by Kyoko Mizuki and Yumiko Igarashi.
These days Aoki's manga collection has taken over two rooms in her home. The books are double-stacked on numerous Ikea bookshelves. She even stuffs books in crates. "I've stopped buying manga in Japanese," she says, "because I can't quite keep up with the ones I have in English to read." It's a wonderful problem to have, she admits.
"I guess I am a pretty hardcore manga baka," concludes Aoki. "But hey, at least I haven't gotten to the point where I cosplay!"
I'm sure many IKKI readers have similar stories to tell. If you'd like to share your manga baka moment, please feel free to send me an e-mail. And if you'd like to snap a photo of your manga collection (a mobile phone pic is fine), that would be cool too. I'll post your comments and photos on the IKKI site. You'll be famous! Don't be embarrassed. You're a manga baka, be proud!
-Eric Searleman, Senior Editor
eric.searleman@viz.com
