The Manga Revolution

I grew up wanting to be an artist. There was an art school
down my road, and I would go and see the exhibitions with my dad, then I’d go
home feeling inspired to draw, and announce ‘When I grow up, I want to go to Art
School!’. I also loved to read stories and (in a lesser way) aspired to write
them, but for the small me, stories and writing had nothing more than an
incidental connection. Sure, I read The Beano, I knew who Spiderman was, but
those weren’t stories to me… stories were the books I loved, and art was simply
related

As I grew up, I continued to draw all sorts of things: I
drew Greeks and Dinosaurs, Egyptians and Super Heroes, I drew Games Workshop
characters, I doodled in class, I did my art assignments with enthusiasm and I
drew the things I saw around me. At the same time, inspired by the likes of Tolkien
and Ursula Le Guin, I was composing my own Fantasy Epic in words; a beautifully
clichéd trilogy about magic and power and technology… but beyond drawing
pictures of my characters there was still no real link between the two worlds

When I was about 13 or 14, a friend of mine leant me Akira
on tape, and I was blown away! From that point onwards, each week he would lend
me another anime or manga. I didn’t love them all, but my horizons were well
and truly expanded: here was art, telling stories that made me
excited, or made me think, or moved me, and my aspirations slowly shifted. By
the time I went to college I was well and truly hooked on manga, not because it
was manga, but because it told stories that interested me in a way I’d
never imagined before. In college I met Kate (kandinsky-prince), and found
out that she also loved manga… I remember her drawings making me a strange mix
of envious, excited and companionable. She introduced me to the world of the
internet, and the idea of online comics, and finally my wealth of enthusiasms
fell neatly into place. I wanted to draw comics!

And here I am now, I’ve been to Art School(s), I’ve studied
animation, and learnt (albeit in an indirect way) about comics, and I’m a
published comic book artist… no wait, I’m a mangaka… no, wait, a graphic
novelist… what am I? Like I said, I grew up on art and novels, and later
anime and manga so surely that makes me a mangaka? But manga are from Japan so
I must be a comic book artist… but I didn’t read comics until a few
years ago (when I realised that not all of them were about superheroes). But
then, comics with complex and mature stories are called graphic novels. Where
do I stand?

The question I really want to ask is, aren’t we going about
this categorisation all wrong? Comics, manga and graphic novels all do a very similar
thing in slightly different ways, or from different countries: they’re all
examples of “Sequential Art”. Now, the “what is manga?” debate has been raging
for years, and I’ve even joined in, trying to throw my weight and knowledge on
the subject around, but no-one ever reaches a satisfactory conclusion. The
question is too loaded with context and semantics. The only satisfactionary
conclusion is: the word manga means different things to different people,
companies and countries.

However, I’ve finally come to my own senses on the issue…
there should be no division other than quality and personal preference! The one
thing we can be sure of is that manga falls under the heading ‘Sequential Art’,
(along with all other forms of comics), which is what I love doing!

I now move towards a day when all comics, manga and graphic
novels inhabit the same, undivided shelf space, picked out only because
readers like the look of the art or the sound of the story… inspiring people
only by virtue of quality, not by nationality or associated “life-style”
(thanks very much Stu Levy). I’m growing to think that the label “manga” is no
longer an inspirational factor in Sequential Art, it’s a retarding factor.
Companies like Tokyopop and Viz have done their thing, opened people’s eyes to
a certain sub-set of comics from Japan, but now they’re going nowhere. These
companies (and others jumping on the band-wagon and forming ‘manga’ imprints)
are holding manga back, fencing it off from its western equivalents and
cultivating a fandom who “read manga, not comics”, as if they’re not
both iterations of the same form of story-telling. The marketing reps know what
sells, they’ve established a demographic, and they’re becoming too comfortable
with their profit margin; too timid to truly get behind innovative creators or dip
into the vast pool of comics from Japan that sell to non-teens. Here’s the
truth though:

The “Manga Revolution” is over.

It was over the moment manga became a recognisable and
marketable product in the west. Manga now inhabits its very own – and currently
very desirable - establishment that we have to be wary of, lest it become
stagnant and die the death of a trend. If it does, it will take with it all the
potential that it has. The full realisation of manga’s journey from the east
should not just be fat wallets for a few CEOs, a wide selection in the shops
and a good fan-base (we’ve got all that now), but a new wave of comics and
creators that take international inspiration, have world-wide appeal,
don’t limit themselves to genre, format or style, and can take pride of place
for quality and diversity alongside any novel in any shop. Japan
has shown us the way, but only we as creators and consumers can take next step.

Please note that all work in these galleries is ©Paul Duffield unless stated otherwise. If you wish to use my work, then please contact me first.

© Paul Duffield 2011
     
www.paulduffield.co.uk