Hanawa Kazuichi Shoki Sakuhinshu

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If you are looking for vintage guro, this is a good place to start. If it's ero-guro you are looking for, the presented eroticism will likely seem alien to you, for the artists radical aesthetics and the time frame it was created from, can make the ero parts appear too far away from what you are used to.

The distinct art style appears without a doubt as the most relevant part about this work, simply because partially the guro and mainly the story elements seem not be in the strength of Mr. Hanawa. Like mentioned before, the radicality of the art prevails through as it's visibly ... influenced from Japanese historical art, among other things and is put together with visibly great fervour. Even the detailed fabric and folding of the clothing occurs in a seemingly sophisticated manner.

Wouldn't be there all compensating disgusting shock moments, that constantly build up panel by panel, but that's after all what you signed up for reading this. Gore, blood and pain, the usual is expected as coming in, with wounds and blood being drawn in a typical 70s style manner, but the reader won't be save from scat, and hints of cannibalism or bestiality either, with the shock value often weighting heavily on the cruel and especially nastiness aspect, rather than any brutal aspect of it. All that while the gore and horror elements being only sparsely part of the eroticism itself, but maybe that's also just part of being a 70s manga after all, as "hentai" wasn't really established back then.

So with all the art and guro material, the stories get wrapped into heavily theatrical drama sets with main characters being forced into their demise and impending doom, which truly reminds you of going to the theatre as the figures seem deliberately written in one dimensional personalities to achieve this drama-play feel. The stories themselves do have punchlines, as it sometimes reminds you of child book moral stories, just with a disgusting horror spin to it, but here is exactly where the negatives begin to arise.
Not all stories have punchlines, which make them appear pointless upon finishing, others often seem shallow in payoff, and the few chapters that do have a decent story also tend be preachy on the moral aspects. Which is quite ironic given the heavily nihilistic and sadomasochistic undertone of what is actually happening. I personally don't think Mr. Hanawas writing is nihilistic in any way, quite the opposite I get the feeling of heroism with a deeply rooted masochistic nature to it, since not only are the sadists portrayed as cynical and immoral, but masochists often being presented as heroes, patriots, being sacrificing and loving. Nevertheless they meet all a similar end.

It not easy to recommend this manga to anyone, to like it you need to love it. If you like 70s gore and nastiness go ahead and give it a try, but chances are high you are not the target audience for this, simply because of how specific it is. Regardless am I glad to have experienced the uniqueness of this artist.

(Original French review below)

Quite honestly, I sometimes struggle a little, personally, to understand the fascination of a certain public for raw horror: incestuous, morbid, scatophile ... Everything happens, often mixed, in this collection of short stories of the years 1970. The author explains in the preface, but well a posteriori, this taste for absolute sordid, without any glimmer of hope, by a traumatic childhood between a deceased father and a deadly atmosphere at home; like a form of self-psychoanalysis spat out directly on the boards. Yes, but still it is necessary to see an interest for the reader, which was not very much my case, ... seeing in it above all a kind of permanent one-upmanship, without tail or end, and even ending quite quickly by giving me nausea (not helped by the free jazz that I was listening to at the same time, I admit). Unhealthy love turning into serial murder, sadistic zoophilic pervert, haggard infanticides, no need to put on Doctor Freud's glasses to get the truth that Hanawa must have had some grievances with the home of his childhood ... - even listen to these horrors spouting in front of the couch, there is a step.



Très honnêtement, je peine parfois un peu, à titre personnel, à comprendre la fascination d'un certain public pour l'horreur crue : incestueuse, morbide, scatophile... Tout y passe, souvent malaxée, dans ce recueil de nouvelles des années 1970. L'auteur explique en préface, mais bien à postériori, ce goût du sordide absolu, sans aucune lueur d'espoir, par une enfance traumatique entre père décédé et ambiance mortifère à la maison ; comme une forme d'auto-psychanalyse recrachée à même les planches. Soit, mais encore faut-il y voir un intérêt pour le lecteur, ce qui fût assez peu mon cas, y voyant surtout une sorte de surenchère permanente, sans queue ni fin, et finissant même assez vite par me filer la nausée (pas aidé par le free jazz que j'écoutais alors en même temps, j'avoue). Amour malsain virant au meurtre en série, pervers sadique zoophile, infanticides hagards, pas besoin de chausser les lunettes de docteur Freud pour piger qu'effectivement, Hanawa devait alors avoir quelques griefs avec le foyer de son enfance... De là à vouloir soi-même écouter débiter ces horreurs face au divan, il y a un pas.