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Manga
The Legend of Kamui: Volume One by Shirato Sanpei, published by Drawn and Quarterly, is the first in a collection that helped change the face of manga forever. The legacy of The Legend of Kamui almost dwarfs its own epic story. The manga magazine Garo, which would be a champion of the Gekiga age and lead to the careers of artists like Yoshiharu Tsuge and Yamada Murasaki, was founded in 1964 specifically to serialize The Legend of Kamui.
Sanpei’s assistant on the project was a young Kojima Goseki, who would go on to do his own samurai epic, Lone Wolf and Cub. Another of Sanpei’s stories would lead to the anime Kaze no Fujimaru with newcomer Hayao Miyazaki in charge of the original drawings. The artists inspired by The Legend of Kamui are simply too many to list.
As impressive as the inheritance that The Legend of Kamui brings to the real world, its own narrative world is just as larger-than-life. The story is set in 17th-century Japan, which had a rigid feudal system of rules and honor so complex it can often seem chaotic despite its proclaimed attachment to law and order.
The ruling class is kept in power by the samurai, while the farmers produce crops, and outcasts serve at the very bottom. Even within these classes, there are subdivisions, such as the lowly genin farmers who do much the same labor as the other farmers but have no land. Each station has its own rules; for example, genin are not allowed to learn to read or write, and only the outcasts conduct business such as disposing of dead animals or guarding regular prisons.
Sanpei hints at how some of the odd customs come into being, such as the local government needing to scrape together tax money for a bridge project assigned by the emperor. They raise taxes and enforce frugal living for the farmers by outlawing silk collars. Later, a prisoner is marched away telling another that he has been arrested for using an umbrella, now forbidden to his class as extravagant despite the rain.
Kamui’s World
While Kamui is the titular character who ties together the 10 volumes, Sanpei first introduces the world into which Kamui is born. He paints a picture of nature that shows how classes exist even among the animals, although even these can be thrown into question by an aberration like an albino wolf cub.
From there, Sanpei explores all the reaches of human society, focusing mainly on the farmers who work to keep up with the demands of the ruling class for the rice harvest. His thoughts on class structure and organized oppression are clear in short commentaries giving the history of feudal Japan.
Like a Russian novel or a modern fantasy epic, The Legend of Kamui is packed with interacting characters. Their lives are seemingly distinct from each other, and yet they all impact each other. Young genin Shosuke learns to read and aspires to own land.
Omine is a farmer’s daughter, but she carries on a forbidden romance with the samurai Ryunoshin until plots against him order her to Kyoto. The white wolf comes to live with the outcasts, where a boy named Kamui refuses to adhere to the laws of society. Through them all, Sanpei weaves a rich tapestry of action, well shown in his dynamic art filled with swordplay and leaps, which is only the beginning.
