is the Japanese term for a narrative story that contains a very high proportion of

illustrations An illustration is a decoration, interpretation, or visual explanation of a text, concept, or process, designed for integration in print and digitally published media, such as posters, flyers, magazines, books, teaching materials, animations, vi ...

. Alternatively, it could be said to be a

picture book A picture book combines visual and verbal narratives in a book format, most often aimed at young children. With the narrative told primarily through text, they are distinct from comics, which do so primarily through sequential images. The ima ...

with a larger amount of text or a

manga are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long history in earlier Japanese art. The term is used in Japan to refer to both comics ...

where the pictures and text have been separated. The boundaries between these genres are extremely vague, and it is not uncommon for the same work to change from an ''emonogatari'' to a manga, or vice versa, during its serialization. The term can be seen in works such as Ippei Okamoto's ''Chinsuke Emonogatari'' (Ryoyu, 1917) and ''Manga Emonogatari'' (Collection of Elementary School Students, Bungeishunju, 1929). However, during the war, there were also examples of the use of instead of ''manga'' to improve the impression made by censors. It was especially popular around and after the time of World War II. In most cases, the illustrations and text are both written by the same artist, and some works even have

speech bubbles Speech balloons (also speech bubbles, dialogue balloons, or word balloons) are a graphic convention used most commonly in comic books, comics, and cartoons to allow words (and much less often, pictures) to be understood as representing a charac ...

in the illustrations, so the work is sometimes considered a type of manga. Its origins date back to an editor at the magazine

Shōnen Club ''Shōnen Club'' (''Shōnen Kurabu'' / 少年倶楽部, later 少年クラブ in 1946) was a monthly boys' magazine begun by Kodansha in November 1914. The magazine initially featured articles, poetry and serialized novels, but it began to focus ...

who proposed a form of reading material called a "magazine ", to writer Sōji Yamakawa, and Yamakawa wrote the rough outline of the story as a to be read by oneself. The first clearly identifiable work dates from the 1930s ("Shonen Club" magazine, July 1939 issue, ''Senbu no yuchi'' (宣撫の勇士;"The Warrior of Pacification"). The magazine ''

Manga Shōnen was a pioneering Japanese manga magazine founded in 1947 by Ken’ichi Katō and published monthly until 1955. Emerging in the immediate aftermath of World War II during a time of cultural reconstruction and political upheaval, the magazine pl ...

'', published between 1947 and 1955, played a pivotal role in the development and popularization of ''emonogatari''. While the magazine upheld the moral and literary values of prewar children’s publications, it also embraced this new hybrid form as a way to engage postwar youth with emotionally resonant, visually dynamic storytelling. Among the most influential contributors was Sōji Yamakawa, whose serialized works such as ''Silver Star'' (1948–49) and ''Knockout Q'' (1949–51) brought cinematic pacing and narrative ambition to the page. These stories were widely popular and commercially successful, with Yamakawa briefly surpassing even

Osamu Tezuka Osamu Tezuka (, born , ''Tezuka Osamu'', – 9 February 1989) was a Japanese manga artist, cartoonist and animator. Considered to be among the greatest and most influential cartoonists of all time, his prolific output, pioneering techniques an ...

in income and recognition. ''Emonogatari'' writers are often also ''kamishibai'' artists, illustrators, animators and manga artists. Representative authors include Sōji Yamakawa and

Shigeru Komatsuzaki Shigeru (written: , , , in hiragana or in katakana) is a masculine Japanese given name. Notable people with the name include: *, a Japanese architect *, a Japanese voice actor *, Japanese karateka *, Japanese sport wrestler *, Japanese socialist ...

. Osamu Tezuka, who created the foundations of Japanese manga expression, and anime creator

Hayao Miyazaki is a Japanese animator, filmmaker, and manga artist. He co-founded Studio Ghibli and serves as honorary chairman. Throughout his career, Miyazaki has attained international acclaim as a masterful storyteller and creator of Anime, Japanese ani ...

also left behind works in the form of emonogatari. Although the golden age of ''emonogatari'' was a short period in the 1950s and 60s, it is said to have influenced the "

gekiga is a style of Japanese comics aimed at adult audiences and marked by a more cinematic art style and more mature themes. ''Gekiga'' was the predominant style of adult comics in Japan in the 1960s and 1970s. It is aesthetically defined by sharp ...

" (dramatic comics) that appeared in the 1960s and 70s.

Major artists and works

* Tetsuji Fukushima - ''Sabaku no Maoh'' (沙漠の魔王; ''Devil King of the Desert'') * Takeo Nagamatsu - ''Golden Bat'' * Sōji Yamakawa - ''Shonen Kenya'' (少年ケニヤ, ''Kenya Boy'') , ''Shonen Ōja (''少年王者; ''Boy Champion'') * Shigeru Komatsuzaki - ''Chikyū SOS'' (地球SOS; ''SOS Earth'') and ''Taihei Genji'' (大平原児;''The Great Plains Child'') * Shichima Sakai - ''Kurama Kotengu'' (鞍馬小天狗) * Motoichiro Takebe - ''Shonen Tarzan'' (少年ターザン) * Hikozo Ito - ''Asura Tengu (''阿修羅天狗'')'' * Keizō Shimada - ''Bōken Dankichi'' *

Tatsuo Yoshida was a Japanese manga artist, illustrator, as well as anime pioneer who founded the animation studio Tatsunoko Production as a businessman and the original author of many anime works. As the first president of Tatsunoko Production, Yoshida supp ...

- ''Shonen Puroresu Ō Tetsuwan Rikiya'' (少年プリキヤ;''Young Pro Wrestling King: Iron Arm Rikiya'') (illustration) * Tomohiko Oka - ''Byakko Kamen'' (白虎仮面; ''White Tiger Mask)'' * Ueki Kin'ya - ''The Secrets of Fuun Kurama (Fuun Kurama hijō''; 風雲鞍馬秘帖'')'' *

Ikki Kajiwara , known by the pen names and , was a Japanese author, manga writer, and film producer. He is known for the work about sports and martial arts, with images of heroic young men with the occasional fine details as he moves from one topic to anoth ...

- ''Shonen Puroresu Ō Tetsuwan Rikiya''"(uncredited original author), ''New Battleship Yamato'' (''Shinsenkan Yamato''; 新戦艦大和 (original author) *

- ''Hato yo Ten made'' (ハトよ天まで; ''Pigeons to the Sky'' ) *

- ''Shuna's Journey''

References

{{reflist Manga Picture books