君たちはどう生きるか (Kimitachi wa Dou Ikiruka?) by Genzaburo Yoshino, manga by Shoichi Haga (Magazine House) Japanese text only

The latest Studio Ghibli animation film borrows its Japanese title from a 1938 novel of the same name by Genzaburo Yoshino. However, the film is totally unrelated to the story. I read an updated version of the book in manga form in its original language. The title 君たちはどう生きるか (Kimitachi wa Dou Ikiruka) translates to ”How Will You Live”. The manga was drawn by Shoichi Haga and was published by Magazine House in 2017.

Although it is written in the manga format, about a third of the book is text only with no pictures. The story is set in 1937 in Tokyo. The main character is a fifteen-year old junior high school boy named Shoichi Honda, whom everybody calls Koper (short for Copernicus in Japanese). 

The story opens with Shoichi lying in bed with a fever. He wishes his fever would get worse. He can’t forgive himself for his cowardly action. He tells his uncle, a former editor who has recently moved into his neighborhood, everything that happened and is wondering why he is suffering so much.

Shoichi tells his uncle that he saw his friends being bullied by upperclassmen but he did nothing to help. He feels he betrayed his friends. The following day, his uncle hands him a single notebook. 

Shoichi’s uncle explained to him in the notebook the reason for his suffering is because Shoichi is trying to follow the right path. Shoichi knows what he did was wrong and believes his friends would be unforgiving and yet he knows he must do something to make things right with them. This is just a prelude to what his uncle writes to him in the notebook. 

The story then goes back to the beginning when Shoichi’s uncle moved into town. After helping his uncle move, they take a tram and go to the roof of a department building. Shoichi looks down on all the people and says to his uncle that they all look like molecules. After they get back home and part ways, his uncle says his great discovery today that people are like molecules was similar to Copernicus and thus he was given the nickname Koper. 

The book is mostly a coming of age story as Shoichi, or Coperu, makes new discoveries and learns more about human nature. His uncle continues to write him messages in the notebook about each and every discovery that Shoichi makes. Shoichi tries his best to understand what his uncle is trying to convey and in the end he writes his own response to his uncle’s words. He made a resolution as to how he will live his life in the future.

After reading the book, the thought that crossed my mind the most was what would I do if one of my uncles gave me a notebook with philosophical meanderings that are more than two pages long. I think I would set the notebook aside and not read it. I even asked one of my junior high students if they read the book in its entirety. The response - “Only the manga parts”. 

The manga form does make it a lot easier to understand and the book itself asks the readers at the end, “How will you live?” It is only up to you to decide.~Ernie Hoyt