Overview
Osamu Tezuka (手塚 治虫, born as 手塚 治, Tezuka Osamu) is a beloved Japanese manga writer, artist and animator. He was born November 3, 1928 in Takarazuka, Osaka Prefecture and died on February 9, 1989 at age 60.
He continued to work until just before his death from stomach cancer, and even at the time of his death, he made a motion to grab a pen, truly a "manga lover to the point of death". He was a man who continued to draw manga, risking his life, not figuratively speaking.
He is known as such titles as The God of Manga (マンガの神様, Manga no Kami-sama), The Father of Manga (マンガの父, Manga no Chichi), and The Godfather of Manga (マンガの教父, Manga no Kyōfu). He is known as the pioneer of Japanese manga.
He has written more than 1,000 research books on him, more than any other Japanese artists. His influence is so strong that almost 100% of books on the history of manga mentions his name. He introduced the concept of direction for manga, which introduced the essence of narrative with tragedy and the cut-and-paste style of movies, to conventional manga, which until then had been directed from the perspective of stage plays and had mainly consisted of comedic elements such as laughter and ridiculousness, and had a decisive impact on postwar Japanese manga.
His trademark look is a beret, black-rimmed glasses, and a dumpling nose. The name Osamu (治虫) is a reference to the ground beetle carabinae, known as Osamushi in Japanese. The first reading of the name was Osamushi (オサムシ) but when the katakana shi (シ) was added after the pen name, it became Osamshishi (オサムシシ), so it was changed to Osamu (オサム) in katakana. His real name is Osamu (治) written in kanji.
He is especially well known for his humanistic dramas such as Astro Boy (Mighty Atom), Black Jack, Phoenix (Hi no Tori), Buddha, Princess Knight (Ribon no Kishi), Kimba the White Lion (Jungle Emperor), etc.
On the other hand, he is also known for his depictions of human ugliness and karma such as MW and his grotesque works full of evil and mysterious charm such as Alabaster and Vampire. Many of his works, such as Ode to Kirihito, Birdman Anthology, and The Book of Human Insects, depict the darkness of the human heart, and are dark beyond redemption.
Although some of Tezuka's works, such as Phoenix have a tendency to be considered "stiff" or "lofty" by those who are not familiar with his work, many of his works are actually entertainment-oriented.
He has also made great efforts to establish the commercial status of TV animation, and has left his mark not only on manga but also on anime.
Biography
Upbringing
Born in Osaka Prefecture, the eldest son of a wealthy businessman, he grew up in Takarazuka, Hyōgo Prefecture, a newly developed residential area in the early Shōwa period, in a very privileged family environment.
Both of his parents were comic book enthusiasts and were very understanding of their children's taste in manga, and they had a collection of more than 200 manga books, including the Norakuro series by Suihou Tagawa. He had a projector in the house, which was rare in those days, so he could watch Chaplin's comedies and animated films by Disney and the Fleischer Studios as much as he wanted. Tezuka was also familiar with American comic works by George McManus, Milt Gross, and others, as well as the shōjo manga of Katsuji Matsumoto. In the early years of his career, Tezuka's drawings were strongly influenced by prewar shōjo manga and American comics and animation culture (especially Katsuji Matsumoto and Disney). In addition, the house where he grew up had a complete collection of world literature, which allowed him to read Goethe, Dostoevsky, and other foreign literary works.
Boyhood
As an elementary school student, Osamu was bullied as an outcast in class because he was frail, severely nearsighted, had a natural perm, and did not speak the Kansai dialect because his parents were from Tokyo. However, when he became a junior high school student, the war in the Pacific Ocean cast a shadow over his life.
Tezuka's later anti-war ideology was influenced by his experiences, such as being beaten and having his work torn down when he was discovered drawing manga while serving at a factory, and his near-death experience in an air raid in Osaka. After this experience, Tezuka stopped going to the factory and began to stay home and draw manga exclusively. He also experienced a severe case of ringworm in both arms due to the malnourished diet and unclean environment at the factory, and at one point his arms were on the verge of being amputated due to necrosis (death of cells). This experience inspired Tezuka to become a doctor later in life. Just before the end of the war, he took the high school entrance examination, but failed because he was only interested in manga.
After that, he re-studied and was accepted to the Medical College attached to Osaka University, where he became a medical student.
Debut and Becoming a Popular Author
His professional debut was the 4-koma Diary of Ma-chan, published when he was a medical student, and he soon began serializing several 4-koma works in newspapers in the Kansai region. Later, he drew a newly-written akahon, New Treasure Island, which triggered the akahon boom, and he became extremely busy as a young manga artist who appeared like a comet in the postwar Kansai region. At that time, he was mainly drawing manga for a publisher in Osaka. When he became so busy writing manga, it became difficult for him to earn university credits, so he consulted his mother, who told him, "If you love manga more than medicine, you should become a manga artist" and he decided to devote himself to becoming a manga artist (although he stayed one year in the medical school to graduate and also obtained a medical license).
Just before graduating from the same school, Tezuka shifted his focus to serialization in magazines with Kimba the White Lion (Jungle Emperor) and moved to Tokyo, where he was active in all genres of manga, including girls, young men's, and adult manga. However, in Tokyo, he suffered from fierce competition with Eiichi Fukui, a sports fanatic manga artist (Tezuka was not good at such hot-blooded and gutsy works), and he also fell into a temporary neurosis amid a succession of successful junior manga artists such as Jiro Kuwata, Tsunayoshi Takeuchi, and Mitsuteru Yokoyama.
He married in 1959 and had three children, including Makoto Tezuka (born in 1961). In 1962, he established Mushi Productions and successfully broadcast Japan's first TV animation Astro Boy (Mighty Atom).
