(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
[manga] Before Courtney Love broke through as a rock star, she lived in Japan, where she fell in love with Japanese comics – manga. Now she has created her own manga, Princess Ai, which will be released in Norwegian translation. Just one of many examples of the ongoing Japanese popular culture invasion of the West. In the last two or three years, the University of Oslo (UiO) has experienced an explosive increase in interest in the Japanese language, history, religion and literature. When Associate Professor Tomoko Okazaki Hansen started at UiO ten years ago, there were ten registered students in Japanese basic courses. This fall it was 90.
- The generation that has grown up with manga, PlayStation and Japanese cartoon, anime, has reached student age. Children and young people learn a lot about Japanese daily life, way of thinking and attitudes, and more people become curious to learn more, Hansen believes.
In Sweden, Japanification began with the translation of Dragon Ball in 2000. Since 1984, the series has sold 200 million worldwide, and last year it came to Norway. Swedish serial expert Fredrik Strømberg compares the manga invasion with a snow avalanche.
Deleted from sales list
- It took off in 2002, and this is just the beginning. More and more publishers are starting up, we have received a number of educations in manga drawing. Several professional Swedish cartoonists use a manga-inspired line and a lot is written about the phenomenon in the press. As early as 2002, the book industry decided that the manga books should not be considered children's books, since they occupied almost all the places on the bestseller lists.
At the Series Library at Grünerløkka library in Oslo, manga such as Dragon Ball, Ranma 1/2 and Master Detective Conan sweep old trotters such as Donald and Asterix off the field among the teenagers. The monthly circulation of manga books in Norway varies from 5000 to 18.000. But even though the interest is explosive, most Norwegian booksellers and TV channels sleep by the hour. The manga books are mostly sold in kiosks and shops, while on screen it has been limited to children's series such as Pokémon, Beyblades and Digimon on TV 2 and TV3. Canal +, on the other hand, is in the process of tightening its grip on older anime fans, and broadcasts the series Kino's Journey and Samurai Champloo.
- Norway is different from Denmark and Sweden, because the largest publishers only focus on sales in kiosks. We have done the same, but since the big sale only comes when we get the bookstores with us, this is only a short-term solution. Manga are sequels, and then it is important for readers to have the opportunity to buy all volumes in a series in the same place, says Jesper Holm, CEO of the publishing house Mangismo.
Manga is a generational phenomenon in Norway, and most of the series is aimed at readers from ten years. Mangismo, on the other hand, publishes Japanese and South Korean series aimed at older teens.
- The manga interest is constantly growing, something we notice in releases such as Dragon Ball, One Piece and Shonen Jump, which are mainly aimed at a younger audience. This gives us a clue as to what we can expect in the future, says Christina Heesch, editor of Schibsted.
New trends
Before Christmas she had to dock the flagship Manga Mania for good. The magazine has been replaced by the more boy-oriented monthly magazine Shonen Jump. The mother magazine in Japan is published in three million copies on a weekly basis. Fredrik Strømberg believes the Scandinavian market will change dramatically as readers get older.
- Manga for older readers will be translated as the generation that now grows up with Dragon Ball and Pokémon gets older. The publishers of course focus on the safe cards first, and there are series for boys and girls aged 10-15. But of course there will be more, we can clearly see that in the trend in the USA and the rest of Europe.
READ MORE IN THE PAPER EDITION OF MODERN TIMES NO. 5 2006 – which you can buy at Narvesen, Meny, 7-Eleven, Shell etc.
