I wanted to write about the Manga and War Exhibition at New
Jersey City University because of the amount of visual representation to our
history of war. The Manga and War Exhibition were originally organized by the
Kyoto International Manga Museum in 2015 and its purpose is to commemorate the
70th anniversary of the after affects of World War II. Manga in
general is very popular and widely known in Japanese culture and its influence
has made it here in the west coast.
This is the first time that this exhibition
is traveling abroad I was glad to be able to experience it at my own
university. The exhibition itself features about 24 manga works by many authors
such as Fumiyo Kouo, Machiko Kyom Leiji Matsumoto, Shigeru Mizuki, Keiji
Nakazawa, Yuki Ozawa, Yoshihiro Tatsumi, and Osamu Tezuka. The main theme of
this exhibition has to do with the effects of World War II so many of the manga
illustrates characters experiencing special attacks, atomic bombs, even the
effects that took place in Manchuria, and Okinawa.
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| Keiji Nakasawa's Barefoot Gen Vol. 1 |
One of the artists I want to talk about is none other than
Keiji Nakazawa who created Barefoot Gen, which was one of the works featured in
this exhibition.
Keiji Nakazawa was born in Hiroshima in the year of 1939 and
around the time when the atomic bomb fell on his hometown he was only six years
old. He survived the attack with only minor injuries but he lost his family
during the attacks. Keiji faced many hardships while growing up in poverty but
he soon found comfort and inspiration from the manga of Osami Tezuka. Osami
Tezuka is known as the god of manga and he is well known for his works such as
Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion, Phoenix, and etc. Keiji Nakazawa’s late
father, who was an artist himself, also inspired him to pursue art.
He thus
began his career as a full time cartoonist and drew adventure and sports manga
for years. He created a visual autobiography entitled I Saw It. The story
illustrates Keiji’s experience with the atomic bomb and the after effects in
detail. Keiji Nakazawa’s editor was impressed by this work and gave him the
green light to create his own graphic novel, which lead to the creation of
Barefoot Gen.
The story of Barefoot Gen centers around the protagonist
rightfully named Gen who is a fictional model of the author himself. It takes
place during the war in Hiroshima before and after the cities destruction by
the atomic bomb. Gen and his family struggle to survive some of the horrors
caused by the bomb and it shows all the hardships that the protagonist has to
experience down the road.
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| Stan Lee's Tales of Suspense No. 39 |
I wanted to compare this exhibition to the comic works that
have illustrated a similar concept. In the west we have comics that illustrate
several war experiences that we have had in our history. For example, I wanted
to talk about the Tales of Suspense issue 39 that illustrates the first ever
appearance of Iron Man, a hero that we all know and love today. The series was
released by Marvel and was created by Stan Lee on March 1, 1963. The issue
takes place during the Vietnam War and illustrates opinions and experiences
from one side.
In the story it centers on Anthony Stark who is a weapons
specialist who works with the United States government. He is flown to Vietnam only to be
kidnapped and held as prisoner but with the help of a physicist he is able to
use the tools around him and build an armored suit that can help keep him
alive. Anthony Stark becomes Iron Man for the first time in comic history and
he is shown at the end of the issue liberating the Vietnamese village and in a
way the reader can assume that the issue is supposed to demonstrate a sense a
justice. All of that changes with the later issue of Tales of Suspense where
the protagonist does not feel as if his choices were made for justice because
of the outcome of the Vietnam War.
The two stories are different because they tell a different
timeline of history and they display different emotions for the reader. In
Barefoot Gen the reader can feel sympathy for the characters because the
characters are seen struggling to survive and interacting with burned victims.
There is plenty of death and loss occurring in the story and it reaches out to
the reader in an emotional level.
In the Tales of Suspense comic I feel as if
it illustrates a sense of social and political justice because during the time
our country was in a war and the reader wants to root for our American heroes because
again if you were living in the country at the time I assume most readers
thought of the Viet Cong strictly as our enemy. During the time period The
United States wanted to prevent Communist takeover and our mindset was very
different back then.
The way that these stories are similar is that they are both
published comics and both of them take place during war. In conclusion this
whole concept was interesting to me because the fact that manga and comics send
very strong messages and most of them talk about brief moments in history and
experiences from different ends of the globe.
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