<
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/anime-confronts-a-new-apocalypse>
"The death of the manga artist and animator Leiji Matsumoto in February, at the
age of eighty-five, marked a sad moment for his fans around the world. His
œuvre ran the gamut from teen romances and erotic comedies to the iconic
space-opera series “Space Pirate Captain Harlock,” “Queen Millennia,” and
“Galaxy Express 999.” Outside of Japan, he is better known for his
collaborative projects: “Interstella 5555,” which is a linked series of music
videos that he designed for Daft Punk, and, even more popular, the long-running
epic “Space Battleship Yamato,” which débuted on Japanese television in 1974
and appeared in the United States, as “Star Blazers,” in 1979. Co-created with
the producer Yoshinobu Nishizaki, that series recast the Imperial Japanese
flagship Yamato as a spacecraft on a daring mission to save humanity from the
aftermath of an alien attack. “Yamato” was a major hit, integral in raising the
first generation of serious anime fans.
Born Akira Matsumoto in Fukuoka in 1938, he came of age during a pivotal time
for manga as an art form. Matsumoto had his work published for the first time
in 1954, at just fifteen. After graduating from high school, he purchased a
one-way ticket from his home town, in southwestern Japan, to Tokyo, where he
fell in with a talented group of like-minded peers. These included such
established stars as Osamu Tezuka, the creator of “Astro Boy,” along with
up-and-comers such as Shotaro Ishinomori, who would, decades later, create the
framework for the shows that became “Power Rangers.” At this point in the
fifties, Japanese society at large considered manga a medium fit only for the
young. Matsumoto toiled for years in penury and obscurity, penning romance
comics and making ends meet by assisting more successful manga artists with
their work. In the mid-nineteen-sixties, he adopted the pen name that he would
use for the remainder of his career: Leiji, written with the ideographs for
“zero” and “warrior.” “Akira is a common name that did not have sufficient
impact,” Matsumoto told
Le Monde. “Since my mother comes from a line of
samurai, I chose to be called Leiji, which means ‘fighter of infinity.’”
It wouldn’t be until 1971 that he created the series that put him on the map:
“I Am a Man.” Written in the midst of Japan’s high-growth period, after the
nation successfully emerged from postwar poverty, Matsumoto’s manga starred a
young man struggling to eke out a living in a big city. The protagonist,
Nobotta Oyama, who is clad for much of the narrative in nothing but boxer
shorts and a tank top, lives in a shabby one-room apartment without heat or
running water, and subsists on a diet of ramen and white rice, supplemented by
mushrooms harvested from the sodden laundry moldering in his closet. His
tribulations resonated with young Tokyoites, many of whom had arrived from
afar, like Matsumoto, and lived in similarly squalid conditions."
Via
Garbage Day: “You’re welcome namaste 🙏”
https://www.garbageday.email/p/youre-welcome-namaste
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
