The Creativity of Yoshihiro Tatsumi

Yoshihiro Tatsumi's Good-Bye seemed to be a mix of my favorite comics from the class: Crime SuspenStories and Adele Blanc-Sec. I loved the short story format of Crime SuspenStories, keeping my attention alert with its plot, and I loved the artwork of Adele Blanc-Sec, with its extremely detailed depictions of Paris. Good-Bye has both, containing beautifully crafted backgrounds of Hiroshima, and strong stories. Good-Bye does not sacrifice story for art, nor art for story.

As a creative writing major, I would like to focus on story. The short tale that struck me most was "Click Click Click" beginning on page 167. This story tells of a man with a shoe fetish, a man who makes the prostitutes he sleeps with wear a pair of boots of his choice. However, the man is unhappy with his life, and imagines his death. He wishes to die "with the utmost pleasure" (183). While for most people the idea of being trampled is nightmarish, to him being trampled is his idea of utmost pleasure. Although it is never explained that being trampled is pleasurable to him, the reader still understand the reasoning behind the wish. The man loves shoes! The reader has an "ah-hah" moment during this imagined death scene.

I just thought this wish was terribly creative. Of course a man with a shoe fetish would dream of a death caused by feet! Why hadn't I thought of that? it was in this story that I saw Tatsumi's genius. Not only can he entertain readers with the drama of his art, but he could also entertain with his storytelling.