Manga Alphabet: Q is for Quartier Lointain
Oct. 5th, 2012 10:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rainsometimesOK, OK, I know I'm cheating badly with this one. While I did first read this manga under its French title Quartier Lointain, it has since been translated to English as A Distant Neighbourhood, so I should really have covered it under D. (Especially as that's the version I actually own.) But there were plenty of other D titles, and no Q titles at all; besides, I figured that if you can't cheat when it comes to Q, when can you cheat? Also, Quartier Lointain just has a nice ring to it. (If anyone's curious, the original Japanese title is Harukana Machi E.)
Quartier Lointain/A Distant Neighborhood by Jiro Taniguchi
I wasn't able to find a good page picture in English, alas. Art runs left to right.
In 1998, 48-year-old Hiroshi Nakahara has been preocuupied with work for some time, taking his family for granted while feeling somewhat distanced from them. Intending to return home from a buines trip, he somehow gets on the wrong train and winds up in his old hometown instead - and then he's suddenly transported even further back in time, to 1963 when he was 14 years old, in his young body but with adult memories intact.
Shocked and badly unsettled at first, Hiroshi finds himself also elated by having a younger body and back in what feels a much simpler existence as a junior high school student. And he's much moved to be seeing his mother and grandmother again - his mother died prematurely, at only 48 years old. He feels more conflicted about seeing his father; while he didn't have a bad relationship with him as a child, the fact was that his father abandoned his family and vanished entirely the same year that Hiroshi's been transported back to, in some months from the point he arrives. Hiroshi's never seen him again and has no idea why he left. Can he change things this time around? Or can he at least find out why his father left? And if he makes too many changes to his past, will he even be able to come back through time to his own wife and children?
A thoughtful manga that suits Taniguchi's art well - he doesn't go for a dynamic style, but the repose and stillness (and well-observed body language) that his characters convey are excellent for this kind of pensive tale, I think. Much recommended.
Quartier Lointain/A Distant Neighborhood by Jiro Taniguchi
I wasn't able to find a good page picture in English, alas. Art runs left to right.
In 1998, 48-year-old Hiroshi Nakahara has been preocuupied with work for some time, taking his family for granted while feeling somewhat distanced from them. Intending to return home from a buines trip, he somehow gets on the wrong train and winds up in his old hometown instead - and then he's suddenly transported even further back in time, to 1963 when he was 14 years old, in his young body but with adult memories intact.
Shocked and badly unsettled at first, Hiroshi finds himself also elated by having a younger body and back in what feels a much simpler existence as a junior high school student. And he's much moved to be seeing his mother and grandmother again - his mother died prematurely, at only 48 years old. He feels more conflicted about seeing his father; while he didn't have a bad relationship with him as a child, the fact was that his father abandoned his family and vanished entirely the same year that Hiroshi's been transported back to, in some months from the point he arrives. Hiroshi's never seen him again and has no idea why he left. Can he change things this time around? Or can he at least find out why his father left? And if he makes too many changes to his past, will he even be able to come back through time to his own wife and children?
A thoughtful manga that suits Taniguchi's art well - he doesn't go for a dynamic style, but the repose and stillness (and well-observed body language) that his characters convey are excellent for this kind of pensive tale, I think. Much recommended.