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The history of manga is one that
extends far beyond the birth of anime. Before there
was any hint that animation could exist in Japan, people
were being entertained by the pictoral art that was
manga. Manga, even at its earliest closest form to today's
manga, was not much more than comic strips. But even
then, its entertainment value was high. The importance
and significance of manga is such that it holds a place
in the history of Japanese art in general. Manga is
no doubt the major source for many of the anime fans
enjoy today. How it got to be that way is an interesting
and complex story, and this class is designed to help
you learn all about it. Let's start by taking a look
at the earliest days, the "genesis" of the
art of manga.
The
term "manga" is itself a word that was not
a part of the earliest Japanese words. In fact, the
term was coined well after the first examples of what
could be called "manga". In the 6th and 7th
centuries, monks used to create scrolls which acted
as calendars to keep track of time. These scrolls would
consist of symbolic icons to represent time, and be
decorated with pictures of animals such as foxes, raccoons,
and the like, all acting as if they were humans. This
was partly done as a form of satire, as the pictures
sometimes told stories, but these were the first known
"pictoral art" that could be called manga.
 But
it wasn't until the 17th and 18th centuries that the
actual word "manga" was used to describe this
form of art. The term was coined by an artist named
Hokusai (not his real name), a person who had a very
different philosophy on the art and woodblock portrayals
that were typical of the time. A man with a somewhat
rebellious nature, Hokusai was known to talk back to
his teachers and continually challenge their methods
of doing things. He would eventually do his own art,
and it is thought that around 30,000 art pieces, some
of which are grouped into collections and books, survive
him. Hokusai did many different pieces, influenced by
things such as the art and artistic philosophies of
the French and the Dutch, but none seemed to be like
his unique style which he called "manga".
For
Hokusai, "manga" was not the art of drawing
characters in a story or paying attention to minute
detail in order to create entertaining and meaningful
art pieces. Rather, Hokusai's use of the term "manga"
(which literally means "whimsical pictures")
referred to his method of drawing a picture according
to the way his brush or drawing materials glided across
the page at random (hence the "whimsical"
side of the term). While these turned out to be mostly
landscape pictures, the Japanese recognized the free-flowing,
yet detailed nature of the art that Hokusai drew, something
which was unlike any other art that came before it,
in which artists conceptualized what they wanted to
draw before they drew it. Hokusai's free approach, though
he might not have intended it to be so, may have been
the basis for manga artists' diversity, in not sticking
to one format but drawing many different kinds of characters
and stories. We see that even the earliest "manga"
artist was very open about the kinds of things he wanted
to depict. And though Hokusai did make a small breakthrough
with this art style (one of many kinds of ways he made
his art), it wasn't until the early 20th century that
some of the earliest "manga" stories began
to be told.
>>Go
to Lesson 2 - The Birth of Manga
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