Manga mania: how Japanese comics conquered the world

“The Japanese are thrilled by the growing appreciation for manga around the world – that it’s now read from Saudi Arabia to France to the US – and all at the same time,” enthuses Nicole Rousmaniere, founder of the UK’s Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures at the University of East Anglia. “Manga is becoming a universal language.” Certainly the distinctive imagery of the Japanese graphic novel tradition is increasingly finding its way from page to museum wall. Rousmaniere is also the curator behind the Brooklyn Museum’s forthcoming “Art of Manga” exhibition (running October 3 to January 31, 2027) – previously a hit at the de Young Fine Art Museum in San Francisco – while manga is a part of “Myths and Monsters: The Art of Fantasy in Asia” at Hong Kong’s M+ museum from October 17 to April 4, 2027. Indeed, move over, Marvel Cinematic Universe: manga – together with anime, the Japanese style of animation that often uses manga as its source material – has over recent years spawned global, multibillion-dollar entertainment properties, from Dragon Ball to Naruto, One Piece and Jujutsu Kaisen. And therein also lies a problem. Not only has manga, which translates roughly as “whimsical pictures”, traditionally been printed in black and white on recycled paper – “which has given people the impression that it’s ephemera and not worth much serious consideration”, says Rousmaniere, even as Japanese art has historically been ephemeral in nature. But also, the limited range of manga that has been translated, especially into English, and made available outside Japan, has long been aimed squarely at teenage boys, if only in the belief that that is what would sell. “They haven’t taken the risk to publish some of the truly exquisite work [around],” says Rousmaniere. And that is despite the fact that, just like written novels, there’s a manga for everyone, on any type of topic. Varieties of manga run the gamut from, yes, lots of boy-friendly battling robots, but also drama, romance, history, sport, politics and pornography. One recent hit has been on the mundane joys of solo camping. Today around half of manga’s readership is female, with the same going for its leading artists too. Relative to Western comic books, manga’s narratives are more mature as well: less stories of superheroic individuals and their inevitable victories, more a celebration of relatable characters who might not win, but at least stuck to the course. “It’s not about flashy shows of force,” says Rousmaniere. “Manga typically has more of an interior world for the reader to have a dialogue with.” Perceptions are changing though. Technology has played a huge part in manga’s spread over recent years, argues Helen McCarthy, author of new book The Manga Bible (Ilex Press), with digital editions making much more manga accessible worldwide. “So in most people’s eyes it’s suddenly leapt from being a very niche interest to seemingly being everywhere,” she says. Also of influence is the fact that manga now makes a lot of money: it is predicted that the manga/anime market will be half the size of the global movie market by 2033. Piracy has even become a major problem for manga publishers. “It wasn’t long ago that you’d hear about a kid maybe being the only fan of manga in their school – and being considered a weirdo for it. But now manga has been liberated, in its reach and its appeal,” enthuses McCarthy. “Manga first took off outside Japan in countries with their own established comic cultures – France, Spain and Italy, for example – not because theirs weren’t very good but because Japan’s offered something very different. And people today are seeing in manga different things about their own culture, seen through different eyes.” That is proving a template for other cultures too, with the rise of Indian and African manga. All the same, size doesn’t mean quality. Should manga really be considered an art form? Absolutely, argues Rousmaniere. Not only does manga “tell really fantastic stories through this distinctive visual language – and we’re all moving towards a more visual culture”, she stresses, but its imagery – typically drawn freehand, in black ink with nib pens, by a single artist, often over dozens and sometimes hundreds of volumes – is part of a much longer artistic tradition that, as Rousmaniere puts it, “is all in the line”. Manga, as a comic format, may be roughly a century old, but can trace its foundational roots back to the 12th century. The Japanese have been combining words and pictures in illustrated novels since the 1700s, and see the medium less as “Japanese cartoon strips” – as they’re often dismissed – as a means of cultural expression. Hokusai? Kyosai? These great names – as pertinent to the story of Japanese art as are Dürer or Monet to the Western tradition – practised a form of manga. “If people doubtful of manga being art went to see it, they’d come away thinking very differently,” says Rousmaniere. “Look at the quality and the storytelling and the impact [of some works] I don’t see how anyone could not call it art. There’s good reason why in Japan it’s considered a very developed art form.” Not for nothing has Weekly Shōnen Jump, Japan’s bestselling anthology – a phone book-sized weekly publication – sold some 7.5 billion copies since its launch in 1968. “That manga sometimes isn’t considered to be art [outside Japan] is just snobbery, and in the art world in particular,” says McCarthy, adding that comic books – privileging the visual image over the written word – have long been denigrated round the world as a working-class interest. It’s a viewpoint Rousmaniere echoes. When the subject was first proposed for the De Young exhibition, the museum was accused of “selling out”, she recalls. And when she devised a pioneering exhibition for the British Museum in London in 2019, “some people really thought manga should not have been in there too”. But, as Monkey D Luffy, the main protagonist in One Piece, puts it, “If you don’t take risks, you can’t create a future.” Manga may go back much further than many realise, but there’s little question that it’s also going to shape the visual world of tomorrow.

Manga mania: how Japanese comics conquered the world

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}From museum walls to blockbuster screens, Japan’s graphic storytelling is expanding its cultural reach, commercial power and international fan base

From museum walls to blockbuster screens, Japan’s graphic storytelling is expanding its cultural reach, commercial power and international fan base