Worn-out Passport |
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@ economy and business (13 stories)
A episodes which dealt with political topics(10 stories)
B informations about France and Europe(15 stories)
C arguments about the differences between Japanese culture
and Europian (7 stories)
D about human relationship and human life(10 stories)
Those themes naturally cross and combine mutually. The autor makes devices to make the stories interesting , too. But each episode which reaches 55 all completes in itself. If a total theme is requested, will it be a story that a hero, Ramo Gosuke who is thought to be another self of the author raises human love from an encounter with a French girl, Marrete, who was a prostitute in the forest of "Boulogne". Then, let's explain briefly these two persons, hero and heroin of this work. On graduating from a junior high school in a hometown in Nagasaki, Gosuke alone crosses the sea to France by ship. It was when Japan was shaking by the problem of "Security Treaty between Japan and U.S." (1960). He is a so-called "lone wolf" that has been wandering Europe and living by the means of many kinds of jobs for 15 years since then. For example, he works as a guide for tourists who visit Paris and as a free writer who sells manuscripts to a News Agency. He works also as a skiing instructor in the winter season, because he has a license of national authorization instructor of skiing. He has ever been a person like a member of an Italian mafia 10 years before. But it led him to a person who has a sufficient knowledge of every circumstances of Europe. He could acquire an certain viewpoint to see the human beings, the community and the culture. On the other hand, when Maretta crossed across Gosuke for the first time, she was still 13 years old. Therefore the relation between them looks like that of a daughter and a father. He leads her to a school as a protector of her. In the first place in starting this work, the existence of Maretta is not in author's ideas, I think. Because it was not until 1 year later when Maretta had appeared in this comic for the first time. It seems that the author himself did not expect that the serialization of this work would continue over 3 years. It is thought that the author makes Maretta appear as one of the main characters in this comic, as the serialization was likely to need a long term. And the appearance of Maretta was so successful. Thickness, depth and coloring were added to comparatively simple stories. What does it mean that human beings lives independently? What is essence of love? What is it to understand foreign cultures? This work leads us to these questions, which is one of the factors that make this work a masterpiece of good quality. What I think the climax of this comic is "Tatamize(^^~[) and the yellow peril"(2nd story in 7th volume), where the author describes arguments about differences between Japanese and French culture, and where he draws the scene of an embrace of Gosuke and Maretta, which symbolizes a harmony of two countries. I heard that the author, Mikuriya Satomi, disappeared from the world of comics. I wants to know some current news of him, and what became out of them afterwards, at same time.