WATANABE Masako, born in 1929, is the oldest of 12 cartoonists featured in the shojo manga exhibit curated by Professor Masami Toku (Art and Art History Department, California State University at Chico), that will be coming to Ohio State’s Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum next spring: March 28 – July 5, 2015.

Since there are 12 mangaka in the exhibit, I decided to blog about one of them each month starting now. In addition, a small exhibit on the 3rd Floor of Thompson Library will highlight selected works by these mangaka in a rotating exhibit.

Image: Garasu no shiro ガラスの城 (Glass Castle) in November 2, 1969 issue of Shūkan Magaretto 週間マーガレット1969年11月2日号 の画像

As for Watanabe Masako わたなべまさこ, her manga fall into two broad categories. Works from the 50s through the mid-70s are shōjo manga (少女漫画), while after that she moved increasingly into the “ladies comics” (レヂィーコミ) category. Watanabe has been a prolific mangaka, publishing over 100 volumes of manga in her lifetime. She has won a number of prestigious awards and in 2006 was the first female managaka to be decorated with the Order of the Rising Sun. At Ohio State University Libraries we have several representative works, including:

  • Aoi sora shiroto wa tobu!青い空 白鳩はとぶ!- originally published in Shūkan Māgaretto = Margaret 週刊マーガレット in 1968, but this copy was reprinted in 1992 with some other works from that period.
  • Garasu no shiro ガラスの城 (Glass Castle) (8 volumes), which won the 16th (1971) Shogakukan Manga Award 小学館漫画賞, was originally published in Shūkan Māgaretto = Margaret during 1969-71. Ohio State has some issues of that magazine, but — at this time — none from the time when this manga was being published.
  • Ayamashi no densetsu あやかしの伝說 – originally published in Hana to Yume in 1976, but this copy was reprinted in 1992 together with some other works from that period.
  • Hyakutō : Zavtra no shishi tachi 百塔 : Завтра の獅子たち (1992) – originally published in Bessatsu Hana to Yume during 1977-79, but this copy is published by Hōmusha in 1992
  • Kinpeibai 金瓶梅 (The Plum in the Golden Vase), based on the Chinese novel Jin Ping Mei, written in the late Ming dynasty. Watanabe’s manga version was published in 13 volumes by Futabasha 双葉社 in their Action Comics アクションコミックス series during 1995-2007.
  • Manga to ikite まんがと生きて, her autobiography, was published by Futabasha 双葉社 in 2008.