Spinning Laughter from Beyond the Stars: Eiko Mizuno and the Youth of Tokiwaso (Late 1950s)

Spinning Laughter from Beyond the Stars: Eiko Mizuno and the Youth of Tokiwaso (Late 1950s)

At the end of the 1950s, Japan was moving from reconstruction to rapid economic growth. Young manga artists who admired Osamu Tezuka gathered at Tokiwa-so in Shiinamachi, Tokyo, and lived with faith in the future. Eiko Mizuno was one of them. She infused romance and love into girls' manga, opening the door to the genre, and spent many passionate days collaborating with Shotaro Ishimori and Fujio Akatsuka.

Tokiwasou was small and poor, but freer than anyone else. Hurtsome topics were exchanged, and the laughter of the young people who were opening a hole in the old morality pushed the times forward. Shotaro Ishimori, the king of innocence, played tricks on his friends with ping-pong dashes, manuscript swapping, fake editor phone calls, and numerous other pranks. But these were no mere pranks. In the midst of stagnation and tension, laughter was a weapon for survival.

Eventually, they pushed Japanese manga, anime, and entertainment culture to a new level. The laughter and struggle of Tokiwaso was a quiet revolution of young people weaving a future from beyond the stars.