UNCOVERED: Decades before the graphic novel became trendy, a few Japanese cartoonists were turning out gekiga (dramatic pictures), darkly realistic comic strips that appeared in lowbrow magazines in 1960s Japan. It was a prosperous time for the nation, but viewed through the gimlet eye of gekiga pioneer Yoshihiro Tatsumi, industrialization brought not wealth but alienation and cultural confusion. Nearly 40 years after initial publication, Tatsumi's bizarre, tabloid-inspired manga remains relevantand this fall, non-Japanese readers will be able to sample the best of it when Abandon the Old in Tokyo, a collection of Tatsumi's work, is...
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