Early Meiji Manga: The Political Cartoons of Kanagaki Robun and Kawanabe Kyôsai

Abstract

The origins of manga are intimately linked to non-sanctioned narratives of contemporary political and cultural history. Shimizu Isao has called Kanagaki Robun's and Kawanabe Kyôsai's Eshinbun nipponchi (1874, 絵新聞日本地 Illustrated Japan News) the ``first'' manga magazine (Shimizu 2006). Shimizu defines early or ``first'' manga as demarcated by a combination of graphic and textual elements, and distinguished by their connection to current events and politics. Manga of the Meiji period (1868--1912) thus shares an intertwined history with the development of newspapers and periodicals in late nineteenth-century Japan. Theorizing the major difference between what he terms ``Edo manga'' and modern manga, Shimizu claims that the defining difference arises from the use of contemporary issues as modern manga's subject matter (Shimizu 1986:1). It is precisely its engagement with history that defines Meiji manga.