Abandon the Old in Tokyo
Posted: December 14, 2006 Filed under: Abandon the Old in Tokyo 2 Comments »Yoshihiro Tatsumi – Drawn & Quarterly – 2006 – 1 volume
I love these graphic novels from Drawn and Quarterly. I wish they came out more than once a year, but that’s how long it takes to wrap my brain around these volumes. I do sincerely hope they keep putting out many more year’s worth of the work of Yoshihiro Tatsumi.
So this one was a little less graphic than the last one as far as… gross stuff goes. The last one had a lot to do with unwanted pregnancy and/or children. This one not so much. A lot of the stories in the last one were also about the poorest of the poor, and while that theme is maintained here, I felt like the people in this one were slightly better off. Some of the stories here were a little more heartbreaking, too. The one that got to me the most was the one about the guy who finally found himself a girlfriend and lived with his monkey. Though it has the ironic twist of fate like all Tatsumi’s stories, this one was particularly sad because there were many facets to his life that were shattered… plus it showed how well-off he was at the beginning, too, which isn’t a typical move.
This really is a depressing read, though. It’s extremely good in that it… I don’t want to say it’s true to life, but yes, it’s good at portraying the normal everyday and what goes wrong with it. Though it’s less prevalent here, I still really like the mute main character too. Kind of puts you in their shoes a bit more since you’re forced to imagine what they’re thinking instead of being explicitly told.
There’s a bit more of a variety of story in this volume, too. One of them even goes outside the city, though it was definitely my least favorite. These are also much more developed, it seems, than the stories in the first volume. Maybe I’m just imagining things, but it does seem like there’s more of them.
Love Abandon the Old. Great stories, even if a few don’t seem to belong. The subtexts and themes in Tatsumi’s stuff are incredible. As much as I adore this edition, the stories in Push Man are a lot more succinct (although some are of questionable quality). I was more than a little disappointed with autobiographical Drifting Life, as it barely touched on many aspects of his life and occasionally teased us with his romantic relationships. I still wonder who he ended up with, as I can’t find a ton of info on the author.
I was pretty happy with a Drifting Life, but I was approaching it more as a history of the early development of modern manga, gekiga, and Tatsumi’s role in it rather than an overarching autobiography. I was pretty disappointed when it cut off without any resolution, though, and I agree that it would have been wonderful to see more about his life. I wonder if the abrupt ending means he’s thinking of doing a followup? That would be wonderful.
I also agree with you that the stories in Push Man hit their themes a little better in a more subtle way. I have yet to read Good-Bye, unfortunately, but I’m hoping it’s more of the same type of thing. It would be interesting if volumes kept coming out, just because it would be wonderful to see if the stories got darker or more pleasant as the years went on.