Talk to My Back

by Murasaki Yamada, やまだ 紫, Ryan Holmberg (Translator)

An unearthed masterwork from one of the "three daughters of Garo," shimmering with realism and vulnerability

"Now that we've woken from the dream, what are we going to do?" Chiharu thinks to herself, rubbing her husband's head affectionately.

Set in an apartment complex on the outskirts of Tokyo, Talk to My Back explores the fraying suburban middle-class dream of the 1980s through Chiharu's relationship with her two young daughters as they mature and begin to assert their independence; and with her husband, who regularly works late and is unable to see his wife as anything more than a mother.

Despite Yamada Murasaki's honest engagement with marriage and motherhood, she is surprisingly generous with the characters that drag her protagonist down. When the husband has a brief affair, Chiharu brushes it off, feeling that she, too, has broken the marital contract by straying from the template of the happy housewife. Instead Yamada saves her harshest criticisms for society at large, particularly its false promises of eternal satisfaction within a family unit--as fears of having been thrown away inside that empty vessel called the household gnaw at Chiharu's soul.

Yamada was the first cartoonist to use the expressive freedoms of alt-manga to address domesticity and womanhood in a realistic, critical, and sustained way. A watershed work of literary manga, Talk to My Back was serialized in the influential Garo magazine during the early 1980s, and is translated by Eisner award winning Ryan Holmberg.

Genres: Manga, Graphic Novels, Comics, Japan, Feminism, Fiction, Slice Of Life

384 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1982

About the author

Murasaki Yamada (やまだ 紫, Yamada Murasaki), born Mitsuko Yamada (1948–2009) was a Japanese cartoonist, essayist and poet. She is considered a pioneer of literary comics, especially from a female perspective. Her work offered realistic portraits of women negotiating complicated family situations and social responsibilities.
With a background in design, Yamada debuted in comics in 1969 with a story published in Osamu Tezuka's magazine 'COM'. Soon after that, she became a leading voice in the avantgarde manga magazine 'Garo'. Her manga work appeared in almost every issue of Garo from 1978 to 1986.
Translations of Murasaki's books outside of Japan began to be released only many years after the author's death in 2009. Among her works available in English are Talk to My Back (1981-1984) and Second Hand Love (1986-1987).
NB: in foreign editions of her books, her pen name has been sometimes westernised as 'Murasaki Yamada' (surname first), other times as 'Yamada Murasaki' (last name first, as per Japanese convention).

Reviews

[Sam Quixote · Rating 2 out of 5]

Chiharu Yamakawa is a Japanese housewife in the 1980s, married to a typical salaryman with two young daughters and a cat. The strips in this collection, first published from 1981 to 1984, show an unromantic view of married life and parenthood through a realistic lens.

I wanted to like Yamada Murasaki’s Talk To My Back more than I did as I’m a huge fan of manga and slice-of-life comics. And kudos to her for showing an unvarnished perspective of being a housewife, particularly in a conservative culture like Japan’s - I’m sure the strips must’ve felt like a breath of fresh air when they first appeared over 40 years ago - but, for me anyway, all it comes down to is just not finding the comics themselves that interesting to read.

Chiharu feels trapped at times by her kids and husband, and even like a slave (Japanese men from an older generation tended to treat wives like servants - some still do). She feels the romance leaving her relationship. She decides upon a radical course of action by getting a part-time job (it was a different time). There’s the usual stuff around domesticity: the cat runs away, kids bully other kids so parents have to have a chat with each other; marital strife; couples arguing over who’s not doing enough parenting; unexpected moments of tenderness and happiness, and so on.

There’s a small semblance of some continuing storylines in Chiharu and her husband’s up and down relationship as she suspects he’s cheating on her, and Chiharu wanting to break up the monotony of domestic life by getting a job and pursuing different careers. It’s all believable, convincing stuff you’d expect to see in a book about home life and families - I just wasn’t that taken with any of it. There’s nothing really that compelling and a lot of it felt like lo-fi soap opera material that’s been done a thousand times before.

Yamada Murasaki was undoubtedly a fine cartoonist with a masterful control of the medium but her slice-of-life manga Talk To My Back didn’t speak to me taste.

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yet another Ryan Holmberg classic manga introduction to the west, Yamada Murasaki's 1981-84 serialized story of a suburban housewife raising three kids, as her husband works and stays out all night and gets drunk and insists she also take care of him when she is home. This is a valuable and very spare and attractive slice-of-life story that sees her love and devotion to her children as she is consumed by their needs, until she pushes back on her husband and gets (successful) part time jobs.

The manga is not primarily a complaint about the husband, though Murasaki does call out men's independence, their drinking in clubs all night after work, their use of "love hotels" to have affairs as their wives stay home and are long-suffering, afraid of being dumped. The woman does confront her husband when he announces a trip for "business" to Bangkok, which she immediately knows is a sex junket, and confronts him on it; he backs out. The focus in this manga is on her strength and pushing back and getting what she needs. I thought it was a fascinating glimpse into one woman's late-twentieth century experience of suburban motherhood and marriage, set in eighties Japan.

The story proceeds less from rage (as we might see justified, and is there, with grief and sadness) but looks at the way the woman craves out her identity within these limitations. Part of this is with humor. One funny story the woman sets up as a way of appreciating her husband's little attentions to her; he takes her out for dinner for their anniversary! Though the gag line at the end is that she tells him, "Thanks! But you do realize our anniversary was a month ago?"

It's a troubling story of sexist cultural practices, but it's a well told story, bringing these characters to life.

This time I did not read all of Holmberg's biographical and comics essay, but Holmberg as usual must be recognized for lionizing artists that need to be appreciated.

[Elyse Walters · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful -- other than my ebook was defected.....making things complicated.
I'd like to get a physical copy.

[Steph · Rating 4 out of 5]

reading an early 1980s manga about a reflective and dissatisfied japanse mother and housewife is a fascinating experience. US lit is relatively saturated with this type of narrative from this period, but it hits different within the confines of japanese cultural conceptions of gender.

beyond that, the slice of life itself is funny and heartfelt. murasaki is skilled at capturing the cute lil idiosyncrasies and facial expressions of her kiddos. meanwhile, her character faces the loneliness of solo parenting, despite technically cohabitating with her unfaithful husband. he is largely absent, and demanding and cold when he is at home. the role of mother is an all-consuming identity, an endless duty, her own selfhood blending with those of her young children. she is discontent and disillusioned, trapped inside what was once a dream of marriage and nuclear family.

i really enjoyed the reflections on the generational divide between oneself and one's children, and seeing murasaki's character take joy in showing her kids old traditions and new perspectives. we're all just experiencing life as it comes. i also really loved seeing the kids get older over the course of the lil short-story pieces. i've never read a manga quite like this.

the drawn and quarterly edition also includes a lengthy essay about murasaki's life and work, which provides excellent context. i'm glad this piece is available in translation!

[Rod Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

Real Housewives of Tokyo - 1980s edition.

A lonely mother in her thirties copes with the slice of life drama of raising her two daughters and wrangling her distant husband, a salaryman with long work hours and a wandering eye. Adrift on a sea of minor day-to-day events, Chiharu Yamakawa's angst and philosophizing lead to the realization that she is capable of raising her own sails and changing tack.

It's a slow burn, but her evolution is engaging.

[Laurent De Maertelaer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zalige snedes dagelijks leven van de oermoeder van alt-manga. Het Japans patriarchaat in z’n hemd gezet.
Ook voor kattenliefhebbers, Chief is een van de innemendste getekende poezen.

[Cherlynn | cherreading · Rating 3 out of 5]

A painfully accurate and realistic portrait of marriage, motherhood and being a woman in modern society. Just like the protagonist's domestic life, this book was unfulfilling and on the drier side since it's meant to capture mundaneness of it all.

Makes me not want to get married or have kids, ever. Imagine making so many sacrifices and giving up your life and identity in exchange for "a man who can only see his wife's health in relation his own convenience", for a husband who cheats on you, has to be babied all the time and can't even use the remote control on his own. Yikes. The protagonist has 3 kids, not 2. The youngest child being her husband. No thank you!

I don't know yet what life has in store for me or where I will be years down the road, but this book has let me see what I DO NOT want my life to look like.

✨ "Husbands talk down to their wives to assuage their manly egos. While wives... they compensate by trying to make daily life pleasant. What's lonely is not that their husbands don't recognize and respect them... but that they're trapped inside this flesh called the 'family', which exists simply so the man has a woman to protect his ego."

✨ "Men live in a dream. They always want to be treated like children. When they're strong, we indulge them in this fantasy simply because they're men. Women, on the other hand, have reality shoved into their faces. Useless dreams are not luxuries they can entertain for long. No matter how much they may hate the real world, they do not have the luxury of acting like children."

[disco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once I started working, it dawned on me… I am free.

[Meepelous · Rating 5 out of 5]

Content note for rubbing up against the constraints of being a housewife and loss of a pet.

Moving onto the creative mind and skill behind this manga, I am going to be drawing heavily from the 32 page essay (with two pages of endnotes) that comes at the end of the book. I did manage to read the whole thing, which is why this review is coming out a bit later then I would have liked. This is the kind of reading that is extremely hard for me to do these days, so I'm sure I missed some things. Holmberg seems to do an excellent job diving deep into the history of women in alternative manga in general, as well as Yamada's personal history with both alternative and mainstream manga. As well as all the other things that she got up to.

Because, among other things, Murasaki Yamada was a feminist poet, manga artist, and part of a folk band. She taught at Kyoto Seika University's faculty of manga and ran for a seat in Japan's house of Councilors in 1989.

Pulling from Holmberg's own words when it came to the context of Talk to My Back "Yamada was a decade ahead of her time not once but twice: in the early '70s, when she drew about family relations in a realistic and quasi-autobiographical way when few other women cartoonists did so; and again in the '80s, when she drew about marriage and motherhood at a time when "women's comics" usually signified ribald expressions of young female sexuality a la Sakurazawa Uchidda and Okazaki, all of whom were still in their twenties. Aged thirty with two children and an abusive husband when she returned to comics in 1978, Yamada was not just a veteran as an artist when the "women's comics" boom hit, but also in life, having had to struggle on the domestic frontline with the worst of Japanese patriarchy after getting married in 1971. As a single mother when she drew Talk to My Back, her most famous work, Yamada was arguably the first cartoonist to demonstrate that the expressive freedoms allowed by alt-comics could also be accessed by wives and mothers in their thirties to address issues important to their personal lives as they navigated family, husbands, and encroaching middle-age. She was also possibly the first cartoonist in Japan to be framed in the press as a mother and housewife and possibly the first to publicly embrace those roles, even if with caveats."

And she passed away in 2009 at the age of 60. This is the first of her work to be translated into English.

Keywords that came to mind reading this manga was social reproduction, mothering, absent men, boundaries, touched out, children, growing up, and the relationship with yourself.

Picking up this book about the life of a Japanese housewife back in the day, I wasn't sure what to expect... What I found was a really engrossing collection of slice of life stories that really dovetailed with some other reading and listening I've been doing on the history of Japan. Albeit, very universal, and not dependent on knowing that much about Japan and Japanese culture. I was not surprised at all to find out that Yamada also wrote poetry as it really shines through in the way she crafts such short vignettes that communicate so much. No word is wasted and many layers and facets are explored.

I also really appreciated the art. Easy to parse, but still playing with some metaphorical and emotionally expressive elements. 

Looking at the gender aspects of the story, Talk to My Back felt like it was filling in a bit of a hole in my manga reading. Providing a nice contrast to the more male centered work of Jiro Taniguchi. Who I also appreciate. It's also frankly been a minute since I've read a serious critique of the expectations of mid 1900s middle class housewives in so called america.

Obviously queer people have existed in Japan for forever, just like they have in the rest of the world, but I was unsurprised that none of them appeared here honestly.

It was balanced out a bit by the way in which our protagonist finds hersmangaelf pushing back against the patriarchal structures that she's so entwined with. That said, for better or for worse, the portrayal of men in Talk to my Back is fairly low key. More the banality of evil then anything even more like her personal experience. I wonder if Yamada thought that this would make a more universal critique, as it might be easier for people to pretend this critique doesn't apply to their relationships if the husband was more verbally and physically just outright abusive. 

Race and ability vs disability were not touched on as far as I could tell.

Class is another aspect of the scenario that got quite a bit of focus, and in a fairly unique way. Because the shortcomings of the middle class is not generally the focus of comics that I read, and I appreciated watching Chiharu's relationship with work morph and change throughout the collection.

Which takes us to the end of this review... five out of five stars. I wasn't quite sure if I was that into it when I started writing this review, but there's no getting around how impressed I was by this book.

[Fraser Simons · Rating 4 out of 5]

This alt manga, published in the 80s, follows a housewife raising her children, with societal norms being forefront in the depiction of home life. She is very stark in what she is content with and what she isn’t, and her observations of inequality between sexes are starkly drawn. I think it’s fairly subversive of current manga too, let alone back then. Each set, serialized, is a short vignette, basically a musing on a specific thing. Most are relatable and I think her interiority is very well rendered.

The art style is quite sparse, but works very well. It’s a nice contrast between male dominated art style too, which is thematically appropriate. The only reason this doesn’t get 5 stars from me, is that it ends really abruptly. Partly this is because an essay of the importance of the work starts from the left and you read from the right, so you think you have a few stories left to go, but you don’t. But also, there is no “arc” or plot, and so the last story mostly feels like another one. And towards the end there emerges a thematic through line that cooould be addressed, but isn’t really. I imagine they just didn’t know it was going to end and then it does. The essay at the back (front) is really interesting reading, though. Very edifying and helps situate a lot more context for western readers, such as myself.

[Pauline]

Wow.

[Przemysław Skoczyński · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jak na jeden z najważniejszych feministycznych głosów swego pokolenia, a jednocześnie kobietę, której udało się wydawać swoje prace w bardzo zmaskulinizowanym otoczeniu magazynu „Garo”, najsłynniejszy komiks Yamady Murasaki wydaje się w swojej wymowie wręcz łagodny i zmysłowy. Feminizm bohaterki jest delikatny. Opiera się głównie na wewnętrznych rozterkach gospodyni domowej, borykającej się z niezrozumieniem jej potrzeb przez wiecznie nieobecnego partnera, który krótkie pobyty w domu traktuje jak wizytę w hotelu, a żonę jak służącą. Nawet reakcja na zdradę nie jest tu jakimś przełomem czy tąpnięciem, a szczytem walki o niezależność staje się podjęcie pracy na pół etatu. To ciekawe także z psychologicznego punktu widzenia, bo obraz bardzo łagodnie dążącej do niepodległości bohaterki stoi w sprzeczności z życiem prywatnym autorki, w którym mąż był tyranem nieporównywalnie gorszym niż jego komiksowy odpowiednik. Podobnie zmysłowa wydaje się kreska, jaką operuje Yamada. Również tu na pierwszym planie jest raczej delikatność i zwiewność.

Ważny komiks, jeśli ktoś chce mieć szersze spojrzenie na zmiany, jakie zachodziły w bardzo konserwatywnym społeczeństwie japońskim i ich odzwierciedlenie w sztuce. Poza tym całość się po prostu bardzo dobrze czyta.

[Ona · Rating 4 out of 5]

Idea muy bien ejecutada, literalmente representa la vida de una ama de casa de maner muy realista. Tanto lo bueno como lo malo, eso me ha encantado. No ha adornado la realidad. Por otra parte le pongo 4 estrellas en vez de 5 porque los capítulos son un tanto inconexos, o sea si que tienen relación entre ellos porque obviamente lo que sucede en uno afecta al siguiente pero siento que no sigue un hilo argumental como esperarías en en manga de muchos tomos.

[marcia · Rating 5 out of 5]

A short comic collection about Japanese housewife Chiharu, chronicling the joys and frustrations of her daily life. The writing is fantastic: Chiharu is such a complex and fascinating character. Despite how much she enjoys motherhood, she still finds it isolating and desperately yearns for more. Knowing how common her feelings is makes it all the more devastating. One of my favorite reads of the year.

[Miss Akacia . · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 estrellas.

Lectura para el #MarzoAsiático.

Qué bien lo tienen los hombres: pueden rebajarse a ser niños pequeños cuando les apetece. Cuando son fuertes, se les da alas para hablar de sueños, ilusiones y aventuras. Las mujeres, en cambio, sufrimos constantemente baños de realidad; no podemos permitirnos el lujo de soñar despiertas ni rebajarnos al nivel de criaturas solo porque el mundo nos incomode, y eso me podía de muy mal humor.

No voy a negar que esperaba un poquitín más de este manga, creo que tenía las expectativas muy altas, pero aun así me ha gustado bastante. Aparte de que el dibujo me ha parecido precioso, sencillo e intimista, perfecto para la manera en la que se narra la historia, para mí Una mujer de espaldas destaca por la ambivalencia con la que se trata el matrimonio, la maternidad y la vida doméstica. Ni los romantiza ni los demoniza, sino que los expone con franqueza y una buena dosis de realidad, sin dejar atrás su parte de crítica feminista y social.

El manga es un slice of life que, a través de fragmentos sueltos, narra una parte de la vida de Chiharu, madre y esposa, que está dándose cuenta de que el ideal doméstico es solo un ideal. El desencanto, el hastío y la falta de libertad dentro de un espacio al que se supone que debe llamar hogar la están ahogando sin que se dé cuenta. Esa represión de la identidad es tan sutil, tan progresiva, está tan metida dentro de cada detalle cotidiano y nimio, que es muy fácil pasarla por alto hasta que empiezas a sentir una furia que ni sabes de dónde viene ni sabes cómo llamarla. Incluso te lleva a pensar que serán cosas tuyas, que no es para tanto. Y sí, Chiharu es una mujer de clase media-alta a la que no le faltan comodidades, su marido no le pega y sus hijas la quieren, pero ¿eso es suficiente para que una mujer tenga que sentirse satisfecha y contenta?

Chiharu se pregunta si su marido la conoce, pero antes debería pensar en si ella misma se conoce. Sus hijas empiezan a reclamar su espacio en el mundo y ya no la necesitan tanto, y su impecable papel como esposa cae en saco roto porque, aun así, tiene sospechas de que su marido le es infiel. Además, teme la llegada de los domingos porque tiene que ocuparse de que sus hijas se diviertan y su marido descanse, a costa de perder ella su también merecida tranquilidad. ¿No es normal sentir odio, envidia e indiferencia? ¿No es normal que te la suden los comentarios de "mala madre" y querer hacer lo que te salga del jigo?

Los retazos de historia son pura cotidianeidad, rutina y más rutina, presentados con una lentitud que, si los capítulos no fueran tan cortos, se me habría hecho un mundo leerlo. Pero precisamente eso creo que hace que todo sea más implacable. Ves a Chiharu cocinando todo el rato, planchando, tendiendo, educando a las niñas, casi siempre en la cocina o en el salón, y si no está con su familia, casi siempre sola, porque no tiene nada más. No es que no encuentre sus momentos de descanso y alegría en la vida en familia. No parece arrepentirse de ser madre y te dice que se casó por amor, no porque su familia la vendiese a la familia de un hombre. Aun así, tal y como dice ella:

Ha resultado que ese deseo… el de un matrimonio que brinde tranquilidad y estabilidad durante largo tiempo… no era algo tan sencillo ni tan modesto. He descubierto que no hay sueño más intenso que ese. Y ahora que hemos despertado del sueño… ¿qué hacemos?

A las mujeres se nos vende la moto desde que somos pequeñas y luego nos toca tragarnos las lágrimas cuando el cuento se desmonta, asentir sonriendo y calladas. La maternidad es solo nuestra, el marido es niño y dueño al mismo tiempo, y todavía tenemos que acordarnos de airear las sábanas cada día.

También me ha gustado mucho la representación de las condiciones laborales para la mujer, que son asquerosamente injustas, sexistas y casi que ilegales. No he tenido presente en ningún momento que estaba leyendo un manga de los años 80, porque podría haber sido perfectamente una historia actual en España.

Pero aunque me he sentido orgullosísima de Chiharu por su salto a la emancipación, no me ha gustado la idea de que las mujeres casadas que no buscan su independencia económica y no se “adaptan a las nuevas circunstancias” sean ellas mismas las culpables de sus vidas de mierda tanto dentro como fuera de la casa. No todas tienen las mismas oportunidades, y a veces ser valiente es un privilegio. Chiharu no tiene un marido violento, su familia no vive en condiciones infrahumanas, ni se ha criado en un ambiente hostil. Por supuesto, eso no invalida ninguno de sus sentimientos ni hace menos injusto su papel de mujer en la sociedad (y encima la sociedad japonesa), pero no todas las mujeres pueden o quieren seguir los mismos pasos. Es un punto que entiendo dentro del contexto de la obra, pero que no termino de comprar.

En resumen, Una mujer de espaldas es una lectura breve pero intensa, que refleja con crudeza la represión de la identidad femenina dentro del matrimonio y la vida doméstica. Aunque su ritmo pausado y su enfoque minimalista no va a ser plato para todo el mundo, sigue siendo una obra importante, especialmente por su contexto histórico. Quizá se quede un poco corta para nosotros ahora, pero no deja de ser una obra de su tiempo, y el Japón de los 80...poca broma.
Y encima, se lee en dos tardes como mucho.

Qué pena que no tuviera tanto éxito en su momento, pero me alegro de que haya vuelto y que encima lo podamos tener traducido al español.

[Celia Burn · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

Murasaki's inner thoughts torn between her individual self and housewife life are engaging, but the stories themselves and her family life surroundings are plain mundane (albeit fighting against the very cookie cutter Japanese wife life). Although, from the time period these short comics were initially written, they were trailblazing comics breaking through a staunchly patriarchal Japanese society.

[Méli · Rating 5 out of 5]

arc provided by DQ

[Matthew Alvarez]

"A family is like a stew, of children, and cats, and whatever ... it clings to me like my own flesh. And yet, for some reason, the husband feels like an outsider ... why is that?"

[Lata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yamada Murasaki tells the story of a woman who has subsumed her identity for years after marrying, having two children, running a household, and also catering to her mostly absent husband in the scant time he is home. She is tired, and wondering who she is, just a housewife in service to everyone else, or someone with needs and wants of her own.

The story is told simply and movingly, with spare artwork, and shows the frustration of women who in a misogynistic society.

[doowopapocalypse · Rating 3 out of 5]

A series of set pieces reflecting the author’s questions of identity. I didn’t love the art; there’s not much to it, multiple instances of characters depicted with one eye.

[LD · Rating 5 out of 5]

stunning

[emmy chen · Rating 4 out of 5]

“MEN LIVE IN A DREAM. THEY ALWAYS WANT TO BE TREATED LIKE CHILDREN. WHEN THEY'RE STRONG, WE INDULGE THEM IN THIS FANTASY SIMPLY BECAUSE THEY'RE MEN.

WOMEN, ON THE OTHER HAND, HAVE REALITY SHOVED INTO THEIR FACES. USELESS DREAMS ARE NOT LUXURIES THEY CAN ENTERTAIN FOR LONG.
NO MATTER HOW MUCH THEY MAY HATE THE REAL WORLD, THEY DO NOT HAVE THE LUXURY OF ACTING LIKE CHILDREN.

THAT'S WHAT I WAS UPSET ABOUT.”

[Brunella · Rating 2 out of 5]

La protagonista si racconta una bugia (che vivere costretta nel ruolo di madre e moglie sia ok) e poi i crede pure.

[Emilia P · Rating 5 out of 5]

Subtle skewering of the condition of housewifery, thoughtfully translated, artfully, elegantly, sparingly illustrated, breathtakingly captures the evolving and deceptively simple relationship between mother and growing children. Really liked it. Hard to explain but it captured how much and how little has changed (honestly for worse *and* for better) in Japanese society over the course of ... the decades before and since this was written. I definitely saw some of my own experiences reflected in it. Always new rewards to reading manga in good translation! Maybe someday I'll brave some shogakko manga in Japanese. *someday*

[Xosé M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tremendo tebeo. Hay una forma concreta y nunca del todo desvelada para nosotros en la que el manga y solamente el manga es capaz de expresar una poética cotidiana, cruel y cruda de la cual aquí nos encontramos con uno de los mayores sino el mayor ejemplo. No exagero.

Al hablarle a los que me vieron leyendo esto de lo que estaba leyendo les dije que aquí uno puede ver qué es lo que le pasa a Misae Noara cuando nadie piensa en ni ve a Misae Noara. Es un ejemplo a todas luces escaso que solo sirve para dar un contexto aproximado acerca del papel de la madre de familia japonesa, mujer esclava.

El extenso y muy interesante artículo incluido al final da una pista: Tsuge publicará muy poco después El hombre sin talento. Tenemos que poner estas dos cosas una al lado de la otra y si fuésemos capaces ver qué pasa.

Pero nada de lo dicho hasta ahora puede hacer justicia a un manga con una capacidad arrolladora para llevarnos al dolor y a un modo, suave pero intenso, de la tristeza por donde quiere. También al amor y especialmente al odio. Porque odiar es aquí y en todas partes lo que nos separa de lo que no se puede soportar, de lo que no puede ser. Y al mismo tiempo lo que nos acerca a lo que sí puede ser y es siempre otra cosa. El odio es al hombre, al marido. El amor es para la protagonista y autora a las hijas y a sí misma. Pero, esto sería lo único que importa: ¿qué/quién es sí misma?

El dibujo es de una exactitud y sencillez que uno no acaba nunca de creérsela. Cómo puede ser así una ausencia de rostro y un rostro, un mechón de pelo, un solo pelo. Una mano en el aire. Una mano en el hombro, un gesto sobre el marido amado/odiado. Un abrazo, dos abrazos.

A veces, pocas, cuando leo un libro así no me queda más remedio que venir aquí y decirlo. Pero sólo soy capaz de venir aquí y decir todo esto (nada) cuando lo único que quisiera decir es: leedlo.

[Jack M · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was as close to a cigarette that I could come to, I imagine. When the stench of diapers, the caked on tomato sauce surrounding the oven burners, the fourteenth trip to the garbage bin, the moldy shower walls, the constant watching over, the infinite to do list, the hundredth ask of could I do this, when it all became overwhelming I would lock myself in the quietest part of my house, frequently the the bathroom, a dirty one at that, and let out a massive sigh of relief as I read or looked at rather, a short chapter or two of this wonderful magna book. Because it dealt with exactly this same thing I’m going through, as well as thousands of others, and unequivocally more so for females. Sure, being a salaryman sucks ass too, but I’ve experienced first hand how draining around the clock domestic duties and child rearing can be.

I also enjoyed the essay detailing the author's life who by all accounts seemed like a wonderfully strong and talented woman, which quotes the below, to which I raise a glass and imaginary cigarette:

“Yamada saves her harshest criticism instead for society at large, particularly its false promises of eternal satisfaction within a monogamous gender-imbalanced, nuclear family.”

[Meens · Rating 4 out of 5]

a really raw and sensitive depiction of the struggles and loneliness attached to housewives - yamada focuses on a character that people often forget and overlook, women who are mums and wives. yamada portrays the ways in which women can have their humanity and dreams taken away from them, because even their own family forget that they're more than a servant to their needs - culturally a role that's still very relevant in my own community. it's really refreshed to see a graphic novel focused on the daily life and thoughts of a housewife, in this, yamada depicts the beauty and philosophy on mundane regular life. she also shows the hardships of being a wife and the feelings of alienation between women and men because of factors like patriarchy and the fact that a woman's role here is sole family-orientated, without help from her husband in raising their children.

a graphic novel that still feels fresh and pertinent - so happy i found out about it from a friend as yamada is a really inspiring and interesting storyteller.

[Will]

Interesting as an historical work. I haven't read much manga--and the manga I've read has been almost exclusively horror manga. "Talk to My Back," in contrast, reads as social critique manga. Yamada Murasaki showcases 1980s Japan as experienced by homemaker (the author), and in so doing criticizes social expectations of women in marriage and generally.

It's tough, and perhaps unfair, to evaluate "Talk to My Back" as anything other than an historical work. Nonetheless, taking it as a present work: I really liked how Murasaki presents an appreciation for her life as a parent, while still forcefully criticizing her husband and marriage. Stories showcasing cute incidents with her daughters are interspersed with those lamenting her husband's shitty behavior. "I hate Sundays . . . His days off . . . are my days on . . .to help him do nothing but lay around" (124); "In front of me sits a man who can only see his wife’s health in relation to his own convenience." 219. Its message of second-wave feminism seems dated; but, in personalizing it, Murasaki makes it feel more relatable and relevant.

Murasaki's art is spare, but effective--I particularly like how she drew cats and used blank space. Reading the "Afterword," by the work's translator Ryan Holmberg, interestingly notes that Murasaki began her career trying to be a writer, and only turned to manga as an easier way to break into a writing field.

[pearl · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this one. Loved especially Yamada's linework and minimalist facial expressions (the eyes!), the loose gesture, the hair styling of the main character, the framing, and gentle loveliness. Most of the stories--all slice of life moments--are snapshots of little joys, frustrations, triumphs, and reflections. The 80s were not so long ago but it's still wild how it SEEMS that "we've come so far" from those days (we haven't). The struggles of the main character and of Yamada Murasaki herself in unfulfilling bad marriages bore a lot of similarities to my own mother and her first marriage to my father, with differences. I wonder about the impact of stories like this on people who haven't seen or experienced a dysfunctional, culturally embedded archetype of a marriage before, who haven't grown up knowing that your dad was awful to your mom and that those sorts of things were ordinary "back then"? I sense that some readers would be bored with this story, particularly its leisurely pace and journey of internal growth. But I got a lot out of it, even if I wasn't crying or wringing my hands. It was a cool story with cool art and a hopeful ending, and it had something to say.

[Ana Granados · Rating 4 out of 5]

(4.5⭐)

Me gustan mucho los slice me life y este, vida de un típico matrimonio de clase media en los años 80 en Japón, me ha resultado particularmente interesante.

Podía ver en muchas situaciones a las amas de casa españolas de los 70-80 que empezaban a buscar cambios, sus deseos y frustraciones. Como fondo de viñeta leemos muchas reflexiones sobre el significado de familia, de amor, de ser mujer-madre-esposa…que dan mucha profundidad al relato.

Este tomo incluye una pequeña historia del manga escrito por mujeres, una mini-bio de la autora y una descripción de algunas obras. ¡estupendo plus!