If you're going to die, leave your right hand behind

I was a Ribon reader when it came to shojo manga, and I especially loved Arina Tanemura-sensei. (In Ribon, we call manga artists 'sensei,' so it feels strange not to add it. I wonder how it was in other magazines.)

I often received plastic bags shaped like envelopes with strings, the kind that manga manuscripts usually come in, as a supplement (or more accurately, a 'all-applicant service,' abbreviated as 'zensha'). I think I remember them having Animal Yokocho characters on them.

At my friend's house, we would draw our favorite characters, put them in those bags, and play manga artist. While listening to the sunset chimes, I would put the envelope-style bag in my bicycle basket and ride home along the coast, imagining I was a manga artist working right up against a deadline.

Straddling my rusty Cainz children's bicycle in the sea breeze, I pushed through the fishy, humid air and swarms of mosquitoes, but just having that 'manga artist-like envelope' in my basket was enough to transport me into a shojo manga world overflowing with flowers, hearts, and stars.

When I was in elementary school, Arina Tanemura-sensei's 'Kamikaze Kaito Jeanne,' 'Time Stranger KYOKO,' and 'Full Moon o Sagashite' were incredibly popular. Especially when 'Full Moon o Sagashite' was being serialized, many girls aspired to be singers, just like Full Moon-chan, and wrote it down in their 'mental notebooks' as their future dream.

It might not be a famous work that everyone knows, but one of my favorite works is 'Ginyu Meika.' It's a short story about a boy who is chosen to play 'Canon' at a piano competition and meets a girl named 'Kanon' who claims to be a spirit.

I desperately wanted to hear the piano piece 'Canon,' and since there was no convenient thing like YouTube back then, I listened to a 20-second version of Canon over and over again on the electronic sound chip inside my mother's mobile phone (which still had a black-and-white screen).

I think shojo manga really captured the difficulties and conflicts that girls encounter as they live their lives, and carried a message of 'please grow up beautifully like this.' It pulled girls along with a much more realistic grip than the 'this is how the world works' or 'become this kind of person' advice given by teachers and parents.

I learned about a manga called 'Bara wa Shuraba de Umareru' (Roses are Born in the Shuraba) in the October 2021 special edition of BRUTUS.

(I will never let go of this special edition, no matter how many times I move in the future.)

It is a chronicle of the struggles of a shojo manga assistant in the 1970s. The author, Nami Saso, debuted in her third year of high school and experienced working as an assistant for various manga artists while drawing her own work.The manga production site, where manga artists and their assistants were chased by drawing work day and night before deadlines, was called a 'shuraba' (a scene of carnage/a desperate situation).

The ones creating the dreams of young girls were girls who had once dreamed of manga themselves. While working as manga artists in their own right, they would be 'canned' (locked away) in the homes or inns of the artists they admired, literally forgetting to eat or sleep as they immersed themselves in creating manuscripts.

There were traces of spilled ink on the sliding doors, and they only ate things they could eat with one hand. They never stopped their dominant hand. It was truly a 'shuraba.' Reading it makes my adrenaline rush.

Even in such a harsh environment, it was, as expected, a shojo manga production site. The characters were all shojo manga artists or their apprentices. They would project the cute characters from the manga onto the playful sides of the artists they admired, or feel the beautiful personality of the artist through their elegant clothing. The manga artists and their assistants were not boss and subordinate, or senior and junior, but had a relationship like older sisters and younger sisters.

The title I chose, 'If you're going to die, leave your right hand behind,' is a remark made to the protagonist during her time as an assistant by Suzue Miuchi-sensei, the author of 'Glass Mask.'

When the protagonist, Ms. Saso, first worked as an assistant for Miuchi-sensei, she didn't use a ruler for vertical lines that were supposed to be parallel, resulting in terrible lines. She couldn't look the sensei in the face out of sheer regret, and continued to miss opportunities to apologize afterward. Seven years later, on the way back from a publishing party, they happened to be walking together, and she gathered the courage to bring it up.

There can be nothing better than this kind of encouragement from a sensei you adore. Being told you are a useful force is the greatest comfort. This became my favorite scene in the manga.

The charm of 'Bara wa Shuraba de Umareru' is packed into this title, and it's the behind-the-scenes fun of how harsh the world was that produced the shojo manga that once made us girls' hearts flutter. It's also about how the protagonist, Ms. Saso, has her fresh, girlish heart flutter in front of the manga her sensei creates, no matter how much of a 'shuraba' it is. It's heavy but cute. It's delicate but strong.

Just any old 'shuraba' won't do. It's cool because it's a 'shuraba' that gives birth to roses.

The singer Seiko Oomori said in her essay, 'Cute is cooler than cool' (Seiko Oomori 2018 'Super Singer' PHP Institute). Miuchi-sensei's 'If you're going to die, leave your right hand behind' has a cuteness that is cooler than cool, belonging to an older sister who creates roses for young girls.

Before I knew it, I stopped reading shojo manga, and realized I had become an adult in my late twenties. There were many events that forced me to become strong. There were also many times I had to put on a brave face and smile. It was shojo manga that taught me how to fight. It taught me that it's not about imitating men, but about possessing the strength of a woman. The seniors in the world of women gave me a kind of cuteness that is cooler than just being cool. Thank you for guiding me.

It might not be in the form of manga, but I hope that one day I, too, can leave something behind for the girls who will live in the future. There is a saying that a woman's enemy is another woman, but older sisters are always weak for their younger sisters. For the sake of the roses of my younger sisters, this older sister can overcome any crisis.

2022/7/26 Update
Nami Saso, the author of "Roses Are Born in the Crisis," read this note!

The official note account featured this note!

In the official note account's July celebrations, they celebrated the fact that the author, Nami Saso, read my note!