The tenure of new Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso has been dealt its first political casualty: his comics-reading time.
The self-professed otaku, elected last month after the surprise resignation of Yasuo Fukuda, complained Sunday in a stump speech that, “It’s hard to read comic books as my time is now restricted.”
“This is already Sunday this week,” Aso told a crowd in Tokyo’s famed Akihabara district. “I’ve read Sunday and Magazine of the last week but haven’t got to Jump and Morning.” (He was referring to three major manga anthologies for boys, and one for men.)
It’s no coincidence that Aso chose the pop-culture paradise as the backdrop for his first street speech since taking office on Sept. 24. He used it as a platform from which to hail manga and anime as key exports.
“Japan’s subculture of animation has been overwhelmingly accepted in the world,” he said. “Japan’s culture is not only kabuki or no play. Comic books, our subculture power, have been widely read in not only Asia but Europe, the United States, Latin America.”
October 27th, 2008 at 11:01 am
I thought I had a good excuse for not reading enough comics.