SUEHIRO MARUO DESKTOP & IPHONE WALLPAPERS

I followed the strange instructions on Suehiro Maruo's semi-recently redesigned official website, Maruo Jigoku, and was rewarded with a link to download these rad wallpapers for desktop and iPhone. For your pleasure, here they are:

2025 Update: The underlying large files are no longer hosted on Maruo's site, which has been stripped down to just the BBS.





For the iPhone:

MORE GENPEI AKASEGAWA ART FROM 1971

Hot on the heels of the return post about Concernted Theatre Japan's special manga issue, I'm posting more images of work by Genpei Akasegawa from 1971.

These images come from the pages of 「黒い手帖 ブラックユーモア」 ("kuro no techo burakku yuumoa" - Black Memo/Black Humor), from May 1971. Doing a little digging, I found an interesting post (in Japanese) about the publication on the Komiyama Shoten bookstore blog.  Thanks for the scans go to the fantastic Will of the great 50 WATTS blog.

You can find more about Akasegawa's work and his "Hyperart" movement/experiment with found objects in this Amazon listing for his Hyperart: Thomasson book.

INCREDIBLE FIRST-EVER MANGA TRANSLATED IN 1971

(This post is part of a series I've tagged as "early manga days", chronicling rare/weird gems from the beginning of manga's now 30+ year history of publication in English. Click all images for big versions!)

A new renewal for Same Hat? I've been meaning to write for a few months now, but I found myself continuing to delay compiling all my shreds of random thoughts together until I could find time to attack it properly. I think you'll find the materials discussed in this post live up to the hype, and I'm hoping this will lead to a few more interesting posts and interviews being unearthed in the near future.

Concerned Theatre Journal (CTJ) debuted in October 1969, and was conceived of, coordinated, and translated by David. G. Goodman. In 1971, CTJ released the first issue of its second volume as a double-sized "cartoon special". The 116 page issue featured the following three stories:

• Sakura Illustrated ("Sakura Gaho") by Akasegawa Genpei   [1971]
• Red Eye ("Akame") by Shirato Sampei [1969]
• The Stopcock ("Nejishiki") by Tsuge Yoshiharu [1969]

 

As nerds who've seen our ramshackle "Early Manga Days: Chronology" post, this predates the publication of translation of Barefoot Gen by seven years, and the short story "The Bushi" (written by Satoshi Hirota and art by Masaichi Mukaide) appearing in Star*Reach #7. Between 1969 and 1973, nine issues were released by Goodman and his collaborators totaling "nearly thirteen hundred pages of translated plays, criticism, and scholarship." It's an amazing treasure trove of politically-active, internationally-minded theater criticism and translations from an exciting time in Japanese history.

From the first "Special Introductory Issue":

A great overview of the entire life of Concerned Theatre Japan can be found in Virtual CTJ, an essay which was written in early 2005. In this retrospective, Prof. Goodman explained their perspective:

The mentality was different, too. Much of what is said today about Japan’s historical amnesia, its failure to confront the legacy of the Asia-Pacific War, was not true of CTJ. Our contributors were mostly in their late twenties or very early thirties; and, like the first postwar generation in other countries, they were actively interrogating their parents’ generation and the aftermath of the war. The plays and articles in CTJ continue to be trenchant critiques of Japan’s wartime behavior.

Goodman was a senior at Yale in fall of 1968, and writing about / documenting new theatre groups visiting America at the time. He explains the genesis of an English language magazine:

I learned through our correspondence of the ambitious program the June Theatre was planning in a new alliance to be called Theatre Center 68/69. The program included a plan to publish a magazine, and I proposed that an English-language sister publication be issued as well. What was needed, I argued, was a vehicle that would allow Japanese artists, writers, and scholars to participate fully in global intellectual discourse that would empower them to engage their peers around the world and be engaged by them. Tsuno responded that it was an ambitious idea, that no one knew the first thing about publishing such a magazine, and that no money was available to support it, but if I was prepared to edit it, I was welcome to do so. I decided to go ahead.

In addition to the original essays and translations of contemporary plays (and the manga issue!), TCJ features rad graphic design and interesting ads from shops and brands eager to align to themselves with the dramatic, visual, and envelope-pushing theater productions of the time:

For (much) more on the visual culture of the theater, you must check out another book edited/curated by Prof. Goodman: "ANGURA: Posters of the Japanese Avant-Garde," a book documenting the posters by Tadanori Yokoo, Hirano Koga, Shinohara Katsuyuki, and their contemporaries. 

Writing specifically about CTJ's manga special, Prof. Goodman said: 

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Japanese popular culture was not yet a global phenomenon. No one had ever heard of manga, much less video games and animé. The graphics we published by Akasegawa Genpei, Tsuge Yoshiharu, and Shirato Sampei were, as far as I know, the first manga ever to appear in English.

I'm least familiar with Genpei Akasegawa's work, but his satirical newspaper opens up the book with a bang and firmly ties the contents that follow to the 1969 Tokyo University Protests and the aftermath of their failures and co-option. 

Next up in the issue is "Red Eyes" by Shirato Sanpei, a powerful and intense period piece by one of the originators of gekiga. Sanpei is best known, in Japan and English-speaking readerships, for creating The Legend of Kamui. The manga "Red Eyes" was later adapted by Saitô Ren, and published in Concerned Theatre Japan.

Finally, on that last but not least tip, we have a translation of "Nejishiki" by Yoshiharu Tsuge -- named here as "The Stopcock"(!).  This would appear 32 years later as "Screw-Style" in The Comics Journal #250. It seems silly to add much commentary to such an important and pioneering work, but it is an obvious must-read for any Same Hat fan of alternative manga-- the linchpin/shared ancestor of a lot of our favorite manga!

[ --> CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE COMPLETE PDF <-- ]
PDF hosted via the University of Michigan "Center for Japanese Studies Publications" page.

Please enjoy this incredible collection of early manga. Friend of Same Hat and manga-in-America pioneer Fred Schodt sent this thoughts in response to seeing the Concerned Theatre Japan's manga issue:

It definitely predates Gen by nearly 10 years. Whether it's the first manga translated or not, I'm not sure, because it depends on how you define manga. Short manga were being translated in Tokyo Puck at the beginning of the 20th Century, and even in Maru Maru Chinbun at the end of the 19th Century. But I've never seen these pseudo story-manga done so early. And they're all great favorites of mine. In fact, it reminded me how powerful manga were in that period. More powerful than most today, I venture, simply because of the political intensity of the period, and the radical-ness of using manga to transmit such sophisticated ideas.

[Many thanks to Paul for initially tipping me off to the existence of these online archives. Professor Goodman now teaches at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I'm contacting him for an interview in the coming weeks.]

SAME HAT T-SHIRT NOW ON SALE!

 

The Same Hat t-shirt is now on sale! Wear your allegiance to indie/weirdo/horror manga loud and proud with this dorky thing celebrating our blog and community.

2025 Update: OUT OF PRINT!

It's on sale for $16 (+ shipping) to anywhere in the world, and features a design by JONNY NEGRON, and lettering by MICHAEL DEFORGE. The shirt is available in sizes XS to XXXL on that familiar high-grade American Apparel Men's tee. White ink on black shirt, printed locally in the Bay Area with assistance from our buddy SEIBEI. All orders ship within 2-3 business days, and there should be enough for folks who want one to get them without problems. I'll have some shirts at my table at Brooklyn Fest on 12/3 as well. If you have any question, leave a comment or hit me up at samehat @ gmail.

HALLOWEEN MANGA MAKE-UP 2011

Holy crap, it's time again! Halloween is upon us and like every year I wanna know... is anyone dressing up as anything horror-manga related? 

In previous years, the Same Hat community has shared some intense and rad costumes. If you bust out a manga-related costume and wanna share, please send it to SAMEHAT at GMAIL doot COM and I'll post it after the weekend! Can't wait to see what folks come up with... I wonder what the Tokyo Scum guys will bust out this year?

THE INAUGURAL SAME HAT SHIRT!

DETAILS:

(click for bigger versions)

This shirt features a design by JONNY NEGRON, and lettering by MICHAEL DEFORGE. I’m planning to sell it in sizes XS -XXXL depending on what you want, and it’s looking like it will be around $16-18 bucks depending on how many we print. I’m getting printing help from apparel wizard/buddy SEIBEI, and he says the shirts will be a supersoft print on a high-grade American Apparel Men's tee.

I am planning to have the shirts at the Brooklyn Comics & Graphics Festival on December 3 (where DeForge/Negron will be in person too) and then selling via this site right beforehand!

And yes, creating an actual t-shirt means that I plan to fully revive Same Hat with regular posting!

WHILE THIS BLOG LANGUISHED, THE TUMBLR LIVED!

I'm back on the scene, and working for you to keep Same Hat rolling and interesting. I'm happy to report that while the blog was in temporary haitus, the SAME HAT TUMBLR has continued serving up the goods!

I've continued to post at least a few times a week, and the other super contributors like Jim, Olivia, Caroline, Mis Nas, and the crew have been keeping it fresh. Here are a few highlights recently:

• Stills from the new Gyo adaptation!? - Even Junji Ito is excited about this one
  
  
  
• SleepyTezuka, the hottest new meme (also as an animated .gif)
  
  
  
• Anna Tsubaki punk scans
  
  
  
• Kaneda by Jonny Negron
  
  
  
• and much, much more!

Please follow this thing and contribute links if you aren't already!

RIP JERRY FELLOWS

[My first post back! I've been working on zines and translations and mostly my day job, but have plans to get this jam up and rolling again--- with guest posts and some long-planned essay posts. We are also just about a month away from finally releasing our first Same Hat shirt--- a joint-design by Michael DeForge and Jonny Negron that I think you will love. My goal is to get posting regularly on here again before that happens, so you and I won't be ashamed to don the shirt!]

I read last month that early fandom contributor and zinester Jerry Fellows passed away -- my condolences go out to his friends and family. I never had the chance to meet Jerry, but he sounds like a dude after our own hearts and the kind of person I'd like to highlight here on Same Hat.



Jerry came to my attention a few years back, when I was reading Fred Patten's personal history of the development of Anime/Manga fandom in America, "Watching Anime, Reading Manga: 25 Years of Essays and Reviews". In Patten's timeline of anime fandom, he noted the following about February 1983 (the same month that Nakazawa's I Saw It was published in English by Educomics):

Space Fanzine Yamato is published by Steve Harrison, Ardith Carlton, and Jerry Fellows in Michigan as "the ultimate information source" on Space Battleship Yamato/Star Blazers. This is the first American fan effort to produce a "Roman Album"-style complete information guide to a particular anime title.

Manga fandom is a strange and fascinating thing to me, and treads somewhere between the two (formerly-overlapping) worlds of early SF fandom and comic book fandom. Manga (and more specifically, Anime) fandom developed along similar timeframes as the SF scene, but remained the realm of very devoted enthusiasts for a long time; the scene was, perhaps happily, kept small initially by the double-whammy limitations of 1) a physical barrier to getting your hands on the actual media you wanted to consume-- first 16mm films, then later more easily VHS tapes-- and 2) a language barrier to understanding the anime/manga, in a time before the "boom" in Japanese Language programs at US universities that happened alongside the Japanese economic bubble of the mid-to-late 80s.

Interestingly enough, a "collector" market of manga/anime (as distinct from toys, models, vinyl) remains mostly non-existent to this day; you can find old VHS tapes and 1st editions of early Viz floppies for under a buck easily at used book shops. The fan translations, early dubs, and fanzines at the start of the scene were simply labors of love, currency of in-group identification between folks "in the know" but mostly invisible and valueless to folks outside of fandom--- and now mostly forgotten to all but the hardest core/weirdest of current anime/manga fans.



In the context of typewriters and expensive/early Xerox technology (and no access to things like InDesign or um, the internet), the gleeful and thorough devotion of fans like Steve, Ardith and Jerry impresses me and inspires the little zine projects I want to work on. Steve wrote a detailed and very personal recounting of the experience creating Space Fanzine Yamato on his blog, Let's Anime!, and it details the dorky/poignant way in which friendships blossom and wither over the course of a long project. Please take a second to read it!

This excerpt from my interview with Fred Schodt in 2007 gives a little more context to the scene that Jerry was a part of, the pioneers of fandom from which all weeaboos are descended:

ANT: There’s some stuff written about other early fandoms – whether it’s science fiction fandom or American comic book fandom – that thing when a sub-culture scene later turns into a big business. I’m always curious about how that gets started. The people you knew in the US who read your first book were probably part of a sort of vanguard of manga or anime fans. Who were those people? Were they science fiction fans? Dungeons and Dragons people? Or Japanophiles?

FRED: I knew a lot of those people in the very beginning, the people from the really enthusiastic manga and anime fans were very unusual people. Jared and I were actually working and interpreting for Tezuka on an early trip – I think ’79 or 1980, I don’t remember the exact date, but I know that we went to see the C/FO folks (Cartoon Fantasy Organization) and I had never met people like that in my life. It was almost frightening. [LAUGHS] I had never met people who were so dedicated to something which was so obscure in the United States at the time, and it was a very small group. But they were people who became quite big in fandom, such as Fred Patton in particular, he was a real central figure in American fandom, and still is.
They were people who were obsessed with anime – more anime than manga, very few people could read it because there weren’t any English manga available. So their entry point had been actually the early 60s anime that was shown in the United States, such as Astro Boy and Kimba the White Lion. Fred Patten's good friend Robin Leyden from the C/FO was a huge Astro Boy fan, the likes of which you’d rarely see. He later on became a special effects animator. Robyn actually made a model of Astro Boy and presented it to Tezuka...

ANT: What was Tezuka’s reaction to that, to these strange American anime fans?

FRED: Oh, he was overwhelmed. [Tezuka] had been in contact with some of them even before Jared and I met him. But they were the first Anime fans in the US, to such a serious degree. Almost scary. These were not people who were interested in Japanese business or technology or anything like that. They were just focused on anime, the characters and the stories, they just loved it. So it was actually very touching.

ANT: It seems like a lot of those people in the early 80s were the ones that eventually drummed up interest in anime, and a lot of them were the people who first ones that did fan subtitles.

FRED: That’s right. And organized the first conventions.

Here are a few more images from Steve's post, I gotta take a minute and track down a PDF/scans of this great piece of fandom history sometime soon.


RIP, Jerry Fellows... and hats off to all the early fandom pioneers!

(The staff of Space Fanzine Yamato)

[More soon: Gyo manga, tons of Vertical releases, my dumb projects, Umezz Carnival 2011, etc!]