A fascinating period in Japanese history recounted by manga's most
distinguished author
*
Showa 1926-1939: A History of Japan* lays the groundwork for Eisner
award-winning author Shigeru Mizuki's historical and autobiographical
series about Japanese life in the twentieth century. Depicted against
his trademark photorealistic backdrops, Mizuki effortlessly portrays a
nation forced into a period of upheaval and brings history into the
realm of the personal. Indeed, as a child coming of age in the Showa
era, the author's earliest memories coincide with key events of the
time.
It all begins with the Great Kanto Earthquake, a natural disaster that
forces the country into a financial crisis. The period leading up to
World War II is thus a time of economic hardship and record
unemployment. Forthright descriptions of ensuing militarization reveal
Mizuki's lifelong stance as a thoughtful pacifist, critical of
domestically disputed events like the Nanjing Massacre clearly painted
here as an atrocity. This first volume in a four-part series is a
captivating historical portrait tracking the industrial and societal
developments that would come to shape Japan's foreign policy in the
interwar period.