Graphically Speaking: Manga Versions of The Tale of Genji

Manga are now ubiquitous in Japan, used to illustrate instructions for accessing banking services, to clarify sewer estimates, or even for guidelines on nurturing child-rearing and networking strategies among young mothers. In such a milieu, one would expect to find manga versions of literary classics, and for The Tale of Genji there are no less than twenty.¹ Since its inception a millennium ago, the tale has inspired countless works of art and literature, translations into modern Japanese, films, television dramas, pictorial renderings (paintings, scrolls, screens, and prints), and for good measure, anime, a symphony, and even an opera.² As with other reworkings, manga adaptations can be straightforward, or they may digest, embellish, amplify, or rewrite the tale, highlighting specific aspects or going well beyond its original parameters.

The retelling of any story poses challenges. For the creators of manga versions of The Tale of Genji, adaptation entails not just deciding what elements of the story to include, from whose point of view to tell it, or what approach—parody, romance, or whatever—to adopt. Like earlier scroll, painting, and ukiyo-e artists, manga artists have the added task of transforming a textual literary work into images. This means putting into concrete, visual form complex emotions and inner musings, depicting characters described as beings of peerless beauty or irresistible charm, and detailing interior and exterior spaces not clearly delineated in the written text. The manga artists also have to render eleventh-century customs, traditions, and values in such a way as to be understandable by and interesting to twentieth-and twenty-first-century audiences.

Each of the twenty-odd manga versions of Genji has its own rich “take” on the tale. In this essay I discuss six:

1. 1. An elegant one-volume rendition by the veteran artist Tsuboi Koh titled The Illustrated Genji monogatari (1989)

2. 2. The three-volume Genji monogatari (1996–1997) by Hasegawa Hōsei , known for his Hakata (Kyushu)-accented work

3. 3. The award-winning, wonderfully inventive Ōzukami Genji monogatari maro, n? ?(Getting the Gist of The Tale of Genji, I/Chestnut?; 2002) by Koizumi Yoshihiro

4. 4. An unorthodox rendition by humorist Akatsuka Fujio Akatsuka Fujio no koten nyūmon: Genji monogatari (Akatsuka Fujio’s Introduction to the Classics: The Tale of Genji; 1983)

5. 5. Yamato Waki’s exquisite thirteen-volume best-seller Asaki yume mishi (Fleeting Dreams; 1980–1993)

6. 6. The ever-controversial Egawa Tatsuya’s graphic “eropop” casting of the tale: Genji monogatari (2000–2005; continuing)

Of the many strategies manga artists have adopted to “translate” into word and image the massive original,³ I focus on three: (1) what aspects of the story line have they included, deleted, and/or highlighted and how do these choices affect the length and orientation of the adaptations; (2) how do they handle one key episode, the fateful encounter between the hero, Genji, and his father’s consort Fujitsubo , and how do they portray the characters; and 3) how do they convey the Heian world—its material culture, interior and exterior spaces, conventions, and rituals.

The genre or category to which a manga belongs shapes much of its content, point of view, and method. Critics and aficionados do not completely agree on the definition of categories, but the intended audience and topical orientation are key factors. Regarding audience, age and gender are basic. The most prominent categories are shōjo (girls’) and shōnen (boys’) comics. Most readers and those in the know see redīzu (ladies’) comics as a separate genre, and they sometimes divide the older male category into seinen (youth) and seinen (adult) manga. Children’s comics form yet another group. Topical categories include romance, adventure, gag, horror, comedy, educational, sports, erotic, and the like.⁴ Often people apply both sets of descriptors: for example, Naruto, a current hit in the United States, is “shōnen action,” while another favorite, Fruits Basket, would be “shōjo romance.” Naruto can be further differentiated as “battling boys’ shōnen fantasy action” and Fruits Basket as “shōjo fantasy romantic comedy.” The Genji adaptations discussed in this...