From: bliss@mouse-potato.com   
      
   Any readers left, Ahoy   
      
      You may well have read this earlier. It is famous and really   
   a great manga and only the first couple of volumes have chapters been   
   turned into anime.  One of the bright spots of the anti-war,   
   anti-nuclear bomb movements.  This was translated long ago for the use   
   of the propaganda against all wars.  It gives a glimpse of how the war   
   destroyed traditional Japan.  Eventually in the printed manga (12   
   volumes) it goes into post-war survival and eventual artistic   
   apotheosis.   If somehow I ever get space and money this is one manga   
   that I would buy.  Oh and the anime was online but I dunno if this is   
   still the case.  I downloaded it long ago and in view of recent problems   
   wonder if I still have it.   
      
         Hadashi no Gen Ongoing  aka Barefoot Gen   
      
   Author: NAKAZAWA Keiji   
      
   Genres: Comedy Shounen Tragedy Slice of Life Mature Historical   
      
   Barefoot Gen recounts the bombing of Hiroshima from the perspective of a   
   young boy, Gen, and his family. But the book’s themes (the physical and   
   psychological damage ordinary people suffer from war’s realities) ring   
   chillingly true today. Gen and his family have long been struggling   
   without much food, money or medicine, but despite hardships, they try to   
   maintain a semblance of normal life. The adults are exhausted and near   
   despair; the children take air raids and starvation more or less in   
   stride. Nakazawa, a Hiroshima survivor, effectively portrays the strain   
   of living in this environment and shows how efforts to stay upbeat in   
   dire circumstances sometimes manifest as manic, irrational humor. The   
   story offers some optimism: characters perform acts of self-sacrifice   
   for the sake of neighbors and loved ones (e.g., when Gen’s pregnant   
   mother becomes ill from malnutrition, he and his brother pose as orphans   
   and perform in the streets, throwing the money over the walls of their   
   home so they won’t get caught). Underneath this can-do attitude are the   
   parents’ deep guilt and sense of helplessness. When the children clamor   
   ecstatically over a scrap of food, the parents dissolve in shame and   
   grief. The art is sharply drawn and expressive, and the narrative has   
   such a natural rhythm, it’s easy to get pulled into the family’s life,   
   making the cataclysm readers know awaits them all the more real,   
   intimate and difficult to take. Despite its harrowing nature, this work   
   is invaluable for the lessons it offers in history, humanity and compassion.   
           
      
   bliss - had given up on rec.arts.manga but at least some stuff gets   
   posted occasionally.   
      
   --   
   bliss dash SF 4 ever at dslextreme dot com   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)