THREE VERSIONS OF JAPANESE WOMANHOOD

I shall confess right off the top that the title of this post is misleading. The versions of womanhood that will be presented are by no means typical of womanhood, nor of the Japanese, though they are in fact very Japanese indeed.
The title was meant to draw you in while I indulge in my fascination with graphic novels (manga).


MANGA HEROINES

There are several different types of women who feature as main characters in graphic novels, but most of them represent not so much the praedictable fetish-femme of western light literature, but an interesting blend of character traits combined with a physical type.
The physical type need not match the character, and sometimes the contrasts between types and characters are used for comic or dramatic effect (many of the girls in Ranma ½, for instance, are both cute-as-the-dickens and super-violent).
In some manga, the physical type is not particularly significant - either the artist is simply hung up on a particular set of drawing conventions ('can't draw for sh..!'), or the editorial board decided that a certain type would attract a certain market segment (the violent chicks in Ranma ½ appeal to healthy teenage boys of all ages, the four big-eyed high-school moppets of Raki-Suta, oddly, seem only to have a following of perverts and degenerates - Konachan especially attracts the attention of the future sexfiends of America).



THREE GIRL MANGAS



SUNSHINE SKETCH ひだまりスケッチ
[Physical type: saccharine-cute.]

Sunshine Sketch (Hidamari Sukechi), is a four-panel strip about the daily lives of four girls at the Yamabuki Art High School. The characters differ in predictable ways - the rambunctious one (Miyako, 宮子) , the sensitive and mature one (Hiro, ヒロ), the talented cunning one (Sae, 沙英), and of course the main character, Yuno, (ゆの), who is altogether very nice. The illustration style takes cuteness to an almost Hello-Kitty like level of candy floss: cute round heads, cute big big eyes, cute angelic smiles, cute neat little bodies in cute neat little school uniforms in cute cute cute settings and situations.......... If cute makes you barf, you might want to avoid this one. Read Azumanga Daioh instead; far less cute, much more wit, and a sly sense of dementia.



SAMURAI CHAMPLOO サムライチャンプルー
[Physical type: simple and elegant.]

A manga derived from the anime of the same name. Champloo is actually the Okinawan word 'Chanpuru' (to mix or mess together). A period piece, a ronin epic, and a bitter comedic opera.
There are three characters - Jin, the intellectual and extremely skilled swordsman who carves up opponents with single-minded ferocity; Mugen, a brash, unwashed, eternally hungry violent young man with a sword; and Fuu, a petite teenage waitress with somewhat large bosoms, who hires both men to protect her while she goes on a quest. She has a furry pet named Momo (peach, flying squirrel) who lives inside her clothing. The events of their journey to the south are told in the episodes. There are references to western painters, and to hip hop music. It is ultra violent. And very enjoyable. Fuu is more irritating to many of the people they encounter than either of the two psychopathic swordsmen accompanying her. The illustration style is lavish - more so in the anime.

On the very first page, the ravenous Mugen eats a frog, to the distress of a little boy whose mother tells him to 'ignore the bad man'. On the next page the violence starts. This is a good wholesome read for the entire family.



FUJOSHI RUMI 妄想少女オタク系
[Physical type: stylized realistic.]

Mousou Shoujo Otaku Kei, translated into English as Fujoshi Rumi ('rotten girl Rumi'), is a sendup of the Otaku world, written for borderline otakus, by someone who is probably an otaku.
[Otaku refers to the type of young person who is socially inept and relies on manga, anime, and computer games for interactions with the world. Often they are painfully shy, incapable of speaking without frequent use of references and quotes drawn from their reading material (kind of like talmedim), and given to seeing everything in terms of their constructed meta-reality (how yeshivish!). They're also rather like the timid software engineers who roam in giant flocks between here and San Jose, as well as trekkies, lord-of-the-ringies, and others of that ilk.]
The heroine is a shy, nerdy aficionado of Yaoi - gay men love stories written for a female audience. This shades her interpretation of the interactions of two male classmates, and at first she does not realize that one of them is attracted to her, because she thinks that he and the other boy are a couple. She emotionally supports them in their beautiful romantic choice - they are totally baffled, not realizing what she thinks of them. Only when a second girl interferes does it finally become clear, and at this point, Rumi goes entirely over the top Otaku-wise when it turns out that the other girl is a kindred spirit who is also entranced by Yaoi romances.
Full-throttle geek action!

Both girls, by the way, embody several graphic fetishes at once. Rumi is short, shy, curvy, clumsy, blushes easily, has pigtails, and wears huge spectacles (mmmm, blushing, twin-tails, meganeko!). Matsui is leggy, wears short school-girl uniform skirts, and has cleavage that most teenage Japanese girls would die for - how much more so their male classmates!

The story develops as a tale of clumsy romantic intentions thwarted by misunderstanding and nerd-tendencies. Two normal boys, two innocently twisted girls. At the end of volume two, Rumi announces dramatically that she will not let a boy have Matsui's soft breasts and narrow waist, she will have them for herself!
It is clear that if a gay man wanted them, she would have approved wholeheartedly - she is, after all, not herself a lesbian, merely a lover of gay manga heroes. Two totally normal, totally heterosexual, totally clueless male specimens like Abe and Chiba, cannot possible appreciate or deserve the perfect anime-heroine ideal represented by Matsui.
If they were gay, on the other hand......

This is a very clean manga, with almost none of the fan-service that would shock or excite innocent little yeshiva boys. But because of it's subject matter, it should be hidden under your mattress.
Women readers might not get it, despite the humour - you ladies still don't quite understand the geek-nerd phenomenon, nor the thing about blushing, pigtails, spectacles, and school-girl uniforms.
Nevertheless I recommend it highly.