While commercial successes are exported, the Japanese Ministry of Culture intends to promote more discreet artistic treasures. For the Internet user, Atsushi Yoshii and Yukari Shiina explain the motivations that led the ministry to intervene in the evangelization of manga.
For the first time in its history, the Ministry of Culture of Japan is moving to the Frankfurt Book Fair. What’s more with the desire to highlight the manga. An operation set up and overseen by two eminent officials from the Ministry of Culture: Atsushi Yoshii and Yukari Shiina. They explain to the Internet user the reasons for this involvement.
The Frankfurt Book Fair is the world’s largest publishing festival. Every year, in mid-October, the event brings together more than 7,000 exhibitors from around a hundred countries and welcomes nearly 300,000 visitors. This is an opportunity for many publishers to highlight their catalog, to establish or renew contact with foreign publishers and, if not to sign contracts, to initiate the process of purchasing licenses.
If we talk about the second golden age of the manga market in France, Japanese literature is also booming. And yet, these two jewels of Japanese culture have so far not been supported – in a visible way – by the Ministry of Culture. While gastronomy and tourism are supported by their respective ministries, and South Korea massively supports Hallyu (the wave of pop culture) via the Ministry of Finance and Culture.
For Christophe Geldron, director of naBan editions, this is an essential decision: “Until now, Japanese publishers came to all industry events in isolation. Each publisher or agent took a stand independently, in Paris as in Frankfurt . There was a lack of a landmark, mainly for buyers who are not manga or Japanese literature pros. These generalist buyers were missing a large part of the catalogs. Worse, they might not know who to turn to!”. Structuring by a “neutral” entity could help solve this type of problem. “Tohan (a very large Japanese literary rights management agency, editor’s note), with whom I work a lot, asked me what could be improved on this type of event, and I explained that in the world of comics or comics, there were always Korean and Taiwanese institutional stands, but never Japanese. Having an identified Japan space will make life easier for everyone!” For Christophe Geldron, the Ministry of Culture “comes to show another facet of manga. It proves that there is a type of manga apart from that said to be entertainment, for an adult audience”. He also specifies that the Ministry of Culture in the past had set up a system to sponsor the financing of the French dubbing of anime bought in Japan. A system that the majority of French-speaking players were unaware of.
But what do the main stakeholders think? Emmanuel Bochew collected their secrets at the end of September in Tokyo.
Linternaute.com: Can you explain your respective positions and tasks?
Atsushi Yoshii : I work at the Ministry of Culture, I am the director of “Media Geijutsu”. Which covers manga, animation, video games but also movies.
Yukari Shiina : I am one of the manga specialists within Mr. Atsushi’s team. I have held this position for two and a half years.
What are your missions ?
Atsushi Yoshii : We set up promotional projects around the aforementioned media and we supervise their implementation.
Yukari Shiina : For my part, I oversee these projects from a manga expert point of view. At the end of September, we noted with pleasure that volume 101 of One Piece was at the top of book sales in France. This proves that the manga is no longer compartmentalized.
This is the first time that the Ministry of Culture has come to Frankfurt, and moreover to support the manga. What motivated this decision?
Atsushi Yoshii : First, we are proud of manga’s place in Japanese culture. As an industry the latter is particularly powerful and respectable. We are delighted, at the Ministry of Culture, to be able to promote this Art in its own right. With this feeling, it was time for us to promote this artistic aspect of manga internationally.
Yukari Shiina : We have already participated in various events related to manga or animation such as the Annecy Festival or Manga Barcelona. But it is indeed the first time that we come to Frankfurt.
Why now ?
Yukari Shiina : We want to help and amplify the dissemination of manga culture around the world. But if we communicate and evangelize from Japan on the manga, without local relays, it would be useless. It is essential that manga be edited and published in as many countries as possible. This is the first time that we have come to an international rights fair as an ambassador of Japanese culture. We hope to succeed in convincing a large number of international publishers to take an interest in the cultural richness offered by manga.
You have chosen to highlight a panel of authors. How did this choice come about?
Yukari Shiina : When I mentioned the success of One Piece a little earlier, it was not insignificant. We know very well which manga are the best exported, but they only represent a small portion of the manga universe. The mangas that meet with international success are mainly the action shonen which are also adapted into anime. The French market is a little particular, because a greater number of Seinen break through, especially if we compare to the USA.
If we look at the world scale, the Shonen crushes the sales and even in number of licenses. Above all, we wanted to highlight the richness, the diversity that exists within the manga ecosystem in Japan. Here is what led to choosing a list of authors and themes that we wanted to highlight.
Artists like Riyoko Ikeda, Moto Hagio, Rumiko Takahashi, etc. have of course marked the medium and are not to be neglected. But they are already known abroad! We have chosen to favor works and mangaka that have not yet experienced international podiums.
Is the manga now included in the Japanese “soft power”?
Yukari Shiina : Prime Minister Mr. Kishida said it himself: “Manga and anime are now part of Japanese soft power”. (Editor’s note: he even declared his love for the Demon Slayer manga, of which he particularly likes the character of Akaza).
How do you judge the evolution of these last 10 years?
Yukari Shiina : Anime in France and elsewhere in the world have reached a threshold of notoriety such that the Japanese government has taken into account the importance of this part of the culture and this industry.
We have even seen foreign artists publish manga in Japan…
Yukari Shiina : Absolutely. Cultures around the world continue to influence and feed each other. For instance, Radiant by Tony Valente was even adapted into an anime and aired on NHK. And more and more comics are coming to Japan. I think that a positive system of respective influence has been put in place.
Do you think that a “manga” style will prevail in the 9th art?
Yukari Shiina : To USA; we can see that the vertical scroll reading format has become very popular. Korean webtoons are on the rise, so much so that a Korean company has developed an English-language reading platform where you can find titles from all over the world. One of the most popular titles on this platform is written by a New Zealand author. It’s impossible to anticipate the next wave of artistic influence and that’s great. I do not think that there is a risk of having a uniformity which is essential in the 9th art. Everyone influences each other, but everyone brings their own culture, their own originality.
The big Japanese publishers like Shueisha, Kodansha, Shogakukan and others arrived by themselves in France, but today – we can even say “finally” – the government is getting involved in this industry?
Atsushi Yoshii : As a public service, we do not necessarily have the same point of view as a private company. For these large publishing houses, manga is above all a business, an economic reality. For us it is a cultural art.
Yukari Shiina : We wish to insist on this point of view. It is our mission from a cultural point of view to bring to the fore artistic works that have failed to be brought into the limelight.
Atsushi Yoshii : Our selection is not dependent on the main publishers.
What were the selection criteria for these six titles?
Yukari Shiina : In the first place titles not yet licensed abroad but which have a strong artistic value in Japan. Then we defined a theme: “The rich and profound world of female manga authors in Japan”.
How to highlight these titles?
Yukari Shiina : We will have “static” presentations, informative panels on our stand. With the main information on the works and the artists. We will also have a presentation session by title. Our goal is to transmit the heritage value of these titles.
Japanese being a difficult language to access, have you thought about a system to facilitate access to these works?
Yukari Shiina : We help with the financial costs of translations of certain novels and have also produced brochures in English which we distribute in Frankfurt. We are considering extending this feature to manga in the future.
Atsushi Yoshii : Japanese novels are not yet generally translated, which is why we intervene to support this export. If we take all the countries together, the novels exported represent a drop of water compared to the tidal wave of manga. Maybe we could support some parts of the manga world in the future.
Do you intend to push forward the promotion of historical and heritage titles not exported? Or even which have fallen into the public domain?
Atsushi Yoshii : Regarding this period, our priority is more the conservation of heritage. We are working to digitize these titles. For example, we support the Kyoto manga museum on this point. Once we have ensured the sustainability of these works, we can consider supporting their promotion abroad.