As manga continues to grow in popularity, finding in-depth and realiable information on the subject may be quite challening. Frederik Schodt, author of the famous manga information books Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics and Dreamland Japan has provided English-speaking fans with valuable information concerning manga, Japanese culture, and langauge. Akadot had the opportunity to conduct an exclusive interview with Schodt and find out more about his titles and opinions about the popular manga industry.

Akadot: At one point you recommend reading manga as practice for those who are learning Japanese. Is that how you became so fluent?

Frederik Schodt: I highly recommend reading manga for those studying the language. Along with watching television and videos, it's essential, I think. Manga helped me a great deal in language study. When you're beginning to learn written Japanese, one of the big difficulties is that it's hard to read kanji characters. Manga for young children come with pronunciation keys, however, so that anyone can read the kanji, or at least figure out how to look them up in a dictionary. It was an enormous help for me in the beginning, not only in learning how to read and write, but in learning to understand popular thinking in Japan. You may have heard of a magazine called Mangajin, which is unfortunately out of business now. It was published in Atlanta, Georgia, by a friend of mine, and used manga to try to teach Japanese. It was a wonderful concept, and it's truly unfortunate that the magazine is no longer with us.

Akadot: In the first part of your book "Dreamland Japan", you said, "Reading manga is like peering into the unvarnished, unretouched reality of the Japanese mind." How much of that raw thought is being expressed in manga?

FS: A great deal. Manga are far less filtered than most media, such as novels (which require considerable education and connections to get published) and films (which require a production team and lots of money). Until recently manga have also been regarded as more of a fringe media than TV or film or novels, and as a result artists have been left alone to create whatever they wanted.

Akadot: Do you still enjoy manga? How did you feel about manga before doing your books, and then afterward? Was there a big difference it how you enjoyed manga?

FS: I still enjoy manga a great deal, although I don't have a great deal of time to read them. I am currently translating the Astro Boy (Mighty Atom) series for Dark Horse, as well as Masamune Shirow's Man Machine Interface (the sequel to Ghost in the Shell). Although I'm translating them, I'm also greatly enjoying the stories. Astro Boy, in particular, is a great favorite of mine.

Akadot: What difference is there in the manga culture in America and Japan? Seeing both sides so clearly, what differences are there in the way America and Japan approach manga and receive it?

FS: The biggest difference is that manga are a mass medium in Japan, with popularity equivalent to television and novels, etc. In the United States, translated manga is only a tiny subset of the larger comics culture, and the larger comics culture is an infinitesimally small part of mainstream entertainment culture. There also are huge differences in content, and in readership, as American readers of comics, and even of manga, still is heavily weighted to young males and collector-oriented adults.

Akadot: Manga has been incredibly popular in America, influencing artists and writers here. Have you seen any signs of that influence flow back into Japan by the way of Americans being published in manga magazines?

FS: Spawn is one of the few recent success stories, of American comics entering Japan. Generally speaking, U.S. comics and U.S. artists have not had much direct influence on the Japanese market, as few are translated and few Japanese read them. It's important to note, however, that even if not many Japanese read American comics, Japanese artists often study what their American counterparts do, and are influenced by them.

Akadot: You spoke of manga having its own "vocabulary" and "grammar". Is it safe to say the style of manga is more similar to a visual language much like kanji, than an artistic feel or set of trends?

FS: I think that manga are a visual language of a sort, but I think it's important not to overemphasize the connection to kanji. The basic grammar of manga is the same as the basic grammar for American-style comics (panels, word balloons, etc., etc). The difference is in the way the grammar has been implemented and is being used in Japan.

Akadot: Where do you see manga going in the future? Will it peak as an overused trend in comic art or has it become a mainstream piece in our pop culture landscape?

FS: In terms of an industry, the Japanese manga market is now quite mature, and on the verge of saturation. The only potential growth areas are senior citizens and overseas markets. In the United States the manga market is only now becoming viable. I suspect that it will grow larger and larger, but eventually most American readers will not even think of many of their comics as being Japanese "manga." An analogy here, I guess, would be the success of Sony and Honda, both of which are so accepted in American society that many young people do not even think of them as Japanese companies.

Don't forget to check out Part I of Akadot's interview with Frederik Schodt.