A Drifting Life
Encyclopedia
is a Japanese manga
written and illustrated by Yoshihiro Tatsumi
. It was released in Japan as two bound volumes
on November 20, 2008. It is licensed in North America by Drawn and Quarterly
and was released as a wide-ban volume in April 2009. The work has been adapted into an animated feature film, Tatsumi
, directed by Eric Khoo
and set to be released in 2011.
: Best Reality-Based Work, Best U.S. Edition of International Material - Asia and Best Lettering for comics creator Adrian Tomine. It won two Eisner Awards in 2010: Best U.S. Edition of International Material - Asia category and Best Reality-Based Work of the year. In a spate of About.com
online user polls in 2009, it was voted 7th most recommended manga for grown, ups. 11th most anticipated manga, 6th best new seinen/josei manga, 3rd best one-shot manga and best new edition of classic manga. Shaenon K. Garrity
votes A Drifting Life as the 10th best defining manga.
Anime News Network
's Casey Brienza commends the manga for "a magnificent presentation, well told and wonderfully illustrated, of an important historical document" but criticises it for "the specialized subject matter may not appeal to readers who do not share similar, specialized interests". New York Times's Dwight Garner commends Tatsumi's art saying "is more sophisticated, retaining the form’s strange sparkle even at gloomy moments; he definitely does write manga that isn’t quite manga. The genre can be a difficult one in which to portray aging. Mr. Tatsumi looks just about the same here at ages 10 and 25". he further comments "a book like A Drifting Life is fairly easy to pick apart on a drawing-by-drawing or line-by-line basis. Don’t make that mistake. Its pleasures are cumulative; the book has a rolling, rumbling grandeur. It’s as if someone had taken a Haruki Murakami novel and drawn, beautifully and comprehensively, in its margins". Manga Worth Reading's Johanna Draper Carlson criticises the manga saying, "I was also sometimes uncertain as to the depth of the emotion the lead character was feeling. The obvious reactions were there — determination, for example, to finish a work for a publisher — but the more subtler feelings were missing". Comics212's Christopher Butcher comments "At its heart A Drifting Life is a memoir, filled with a density of details to give it a setting and place that will be immediately familiar to Japanese readers of the last generation but that will largely evade North American ones. This is not a bad thing, if anything the unfamiliarity of the time and place of this story will add to the experience of the lead drifting through his life, tied only to the comic that I hope you’ll be holding in your hands". Comic Book Resources
's Chris Mautner commends the manga for its "basic bildungsroman
qualities. At its heart, A Drifting Life is the simple story of a young man discovering his talent and by extension his place in the world. It’s told in as direct and plain a manner as possible, but still full of energy and passion".
Manga
Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...
written and illustrated by Yoshihiro Tatsumi
Yoshihiro Tatsumi
is a Japanese manga artist who is widely credited with starting the gekiga style of alternative comics in Japan, having allegedly coined the term in 1957....
. It was released in Japan as two bound volumes
Tankobon
, with a literal meaning close to "independently appearing book", is the Japanese term for a book that is complete in itself and is not part of a series , though the manga industry uses it for volumes which may be in a series...
on November 20, 2008. It is licensed in North America by Drawn and Quarterly
Drawn and Quarterly
Drawn and Quarterly is a Canadian comic book publishing company, headed by Chris Oliveros, and based in Montreal, Quebec. Its focus is on graphic novels and underground or alternative comics. Drawn and Quarterly was also the title of the company's flagship quarterly anthology during the 1990s...
and was released as a wide-ban volume in April 2009. The work has been adapted into an animated feature film, Tatsumi
Tatsumi (film)
Tatsumi is a 2011 Singaporean animated drama film directed by Eric Khoo. It is based on the manga memoir A Drifting Life and five earlier short stories by the Japanese manga artist Yoshihiro Tatsumi...
, directed by Eric Khoo
Eric Khoo
Eric Khoo is a film director from Singapore. He was introduced to the world of cinema at a very early age. He was educated at United World College of South East Asia before attending City Art Institute in Sydney, Australia where he pursued cinematography...
and set to be released in 2011.
Reception
A Drifting Life has won the 13th Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize in 2009. It was nominated for three categories for the Eisner AwardEisner Award
The Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, commonly shortened to the Eisner Awards, and sometimes referred to as the Oscar Awards of the Comics Industry, are prizes given for creative achievement in American comic books. The Eisner Awards were first conferred in 1988, created in response to the...
: Best Reality-Based Work, Best U.S. Edition of International Material - Asia and Best Lettering for comics creator Adrian Tomine. It won two Eisner Awards in 2010: Best U.S. Edition of International Material - Asia category and Best Reality-Based Work of the year. In a spate of About.com
About.com
About.com is an online source for original information and advice. It is written in English, and is aimed primarily at North Americans. It is owned by The New York Times Company....
online user polls in 2009, it was voted 7th most recommended manga for grown, ups. 11th most anticipated manga, 6th best new seinen/josei manga, 3rd best one-shot manga and best new edition of classic manga. Shaenon K. Garrity
Shaenon K. Garrity
Shaenon K. Garrity is a webcomics writer and artist, best known as the creator of Narbonic. She is one of the most prominent cartoonists in the Modern Tales network of commercial webcomic sites, and became the site's editor on August 1, 2006...
votes A Drifting Life as the 10th best defining manga.
Anime News Network
Anime News Network
Anime News Network is an anime industry news website that reports on the status of anime, manga, Japanese popular music and other otaku-related culture within North America, Australia and Japan. Additionally, it sometimes features similar happenings throughout the Anglosphere and elsewhere in the...
's Casey Brienza commends the manga for "a magnificent presentation, well told and wonderfully illustrated, of an important historical document" but criticises it for "the specialized subject matter may not appeal to readers who do not share similar, specialized interests". New York Times's Dwight Garner commends Tatsumi's art saying "is more sophisticated, retaining the form’s strange sparkle even at gloomy moments; he definitely does write manga that isn’t quite manga. The genre can be a difficult one in which to portray aging. Mr. Tatsumi looks just about the same here at ages 10 and 25". he further comments "a book like A Drifting Life is fairly easy to pick apart on a drawing-by-drawing or line-by-line basis. Don’t make that mistake. Its pleasures are cumulative; the book has a rolling, rumbling grandeur. It’s as if someone had taken a Haruki Murakami novel and drawn, beautifully and comprehensively, in its margins". Manga Worth Reading's Johanna Draper Carlson criticises the manga saying, "I was also sometimes uncertain as to the depth of the emotion the lead character was feeling. The obvious reactions were there — determination, for example, to finish a work for a publisher — but the more subtler feelings were missing". Comics212's Christopher Butcher comments "At its heart A Drifting Life is a memoir, filled with a density of details to give it a setting and place that will be immediately familiar to Japanese readers of the last generation but that will largely evade North American ones. This is not a bad thing, if anything the unfamiliarity of the time and place of this story will add to the experience of the lead drifting through his life, tied only to the comic that I hope you’ll be holding in your hands". Comic Book Resources
Comic Book Resources
Comic Book Resources, also known as CBR is a website dedicated to the coverage of comic book-related news and discussion.-History:Comic Book Resources was founded by Jonah Weiland in 1996 as a development of the Kingdom Come Message Board, a message forum that Weiland had created to discuss DC...
's Chris Mautner commends the manga for its "basic bildungsroman
Bildungsroman
In literary criticism, bildungsroman or coming-of-age story is a literary genre which focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood , and in which character change is thus extremely important...
qualities. At its heart, A Drifting Life is the simple story of a young man discovering his talent and by extension his place in the world. It’s told in as direct and plain a manner as possible, but still full of energy and passion".