一番いいのは最後に取っておくものかなーとも思いつつ、出してしまいました。あんまりましなのが無いってのもあるんですけど。珍しくまじめなエッセイですが、確か朝日ジャーナルかなんか、英字新聞の記事「電車の中でいい大人がマンガ本を読んでいる光景は異様だ」ってような、いい加減言い古された(と私は思うが)を講師が持ってきて、これについて何か書いてくれと。彼は私の職業を知っていたので、なんというか興味があったのでしょう。

彼氏これをえらく気に入って、ディスカッションのクラスで教材に使った、という代物なのですね(間違いを直してから)。ま、文章が良いというのではなくて、内容が彼には面白かったんだろうと思いますが。


Why mature people are keen on comics in Japan?

In Japan, lots of mature people are keen on comics as well as--or more than--children. It is regarded as one of the characteristics of Japanese. Japanese is more childish than others? Comics are children’s amusement? I don’t think so. In Japan, we have a big market “Mature-comics”. There are many comics that are made for adults. They take up various themes, from a love affair to child abuse, from serious problems to comedies. The situation is very similar to Hollywood movies. Japanese case (comics) is quite handicraft-like, though. Many Americans love movies, but it doesn’t mean they are childish, even if they love “Batman”, does it? 

 

The major reason we have such kind of manga is that the pioneers of Japanese comic artists were deeply influenced by foreign movies (Especially American movies). For them, Manga should have been in the same field as movies’. They thought that it wasn’t only comical and satire, it could be more dramatic and touching. They tried to create a work which would be better than movies. If they had lots of money, they might have made a film. But they didn’t, and as you know, you can make manga with paper and a pen. They presented many great works which gave a deep impression to readers in those days. As a result, many talented youths became to Comic artists, and they created more great works again and again… incidentally, it is said that’s one of the reasons the Japanese movie world can’t get very many talented people.

 

And of course we can’t ignore the effort of the publishers. Now, not a few children prefer video games to comics, and the birthrate has been dropping. It is very important for publishers and even artists to expand the market of comics. Some people predict we’ll have a new genre “the aged comic” in the future. (“The love affair in old-aged home”, for instance.). I can’t--won’t imagine that, but it will be possible, maybe.

 

In short, I don’t think it is bad that many Japanese love comics. But I think it isn’t so good that many (some?…I hope so) Japanese don’t read novels very much. But such people will go to movies or watch TV shows, if they didn’t have any comics. Because they dislike reading. This is a social problem, but you shouldn’t blame comics for that.

 

CLOSE