A thousand giddy manga bloggers just raced to their keyboards in rapturous joy. Why? Because Dirk Deppey has announced officially in his blog that “Fantagraphics has signed an agreement with Shogakukan to launch a full manga line edited and curated by Matt Thorn.”
What does this mean? MOTO HAGIO, that is what it means. The first item being listed by Amazon is A Drunken Dream and Other Stories. I, for one, am counting the days until September when I can own this volume for myself. So little of Hagio’s work has been available in English up to this point, exactly none of which remains in print. This is truly a crime.
For more background and further understanding of why this is so significant for fans of shojo manga, take a look at this brilliant 2005 interview with Hagio, conducted by Matt Thorn for The Comics Journal and posted now in its entirety in his blog. For a small taste of Hagio’s work, see my review of They Were Eleven at CBR’s Comics Should Be Good. Mostly, though? Read Matt Thorn. Always read Matt Thorn.
Many thanks to Gia Manry for Amazon sleuthing and to David Welsh for spreading the word!
ETA: More from Fantagraphics, including details about A Drunken Dream and their second (equally exciting) release, Shimura Takako’s multi-volume story of transgender childhood friends, Wandering Son. Also a word from Matt Thorn, who lists which stories will be included in the Hagio collection.
Panel portion from “The Willow Tree,” ©2010 Moto Hagio/Shogakukan.
Wow.
Words fail to express how this makes me feel.
I completely understand. I attempted words, but honestly they do not do my feelings justice.
Can I just point out that you can still order for a reasonable sum the Comics Journal issue which has that interview AND loads of beautiful colour artwork by Moto Hagio, as well as a full short story of hers. I imported it to Germany and it’s well worth the price, because the whole issue is dedicated to manga.
Actually the beautifully produced cover with silver letters is worth the price alone.
The Comics Journal #269
Thank you very much for pointing that out!
Grab it, while they still have copies, Melinda, you won’t rue it.
I ought to have added that it’s dedicated only to SHOUJO manga, which for that time frame – 2005 – was pretty unusual.
More tempting from your friendly book pusher:
That artwork they picked for the cover of the new collection is in full colour below the beginning of the article in the Journal – across two pages.
The pages are US legal letter size, I’d say. A bit larger than European DIN A4 – and there are 200 of them in all.
Truly value for money. There are also various other colour pages, not just of Hagio’s artwork.
You might want to buy two copies, if you decide to cut the full-page colour reproductions out of one of them and frame them ^^.
Haaaa you really are a temptress, aren’t you? :D
Tit for tat, considering I read your manga and manhwa recommendations ^^
Good point. :D