The sixth volume of "Lovecraft's Masterpieces", a new manga adaptation of a book by the British novelist, master of the fantastic, has been released in bookstores.
Since 2018, the first five volumes have sold 250,000 copies.
Awarded at the Angoulême festival, the series shines with its gripping narration and chilling drawings.
It has been many years since France has become "the other country of manga" with Japan.
In addition to their country of origin, it is here that Japanese comics in black and white and in the reverse direction of reading are sold the most.
And if we mainly know
shonen
, adventure manga, like
Dragon Ball Z
,
One Piece
and
Naruto
, many other genres are represented.
And some make their hole, like the C
hefs d'oeuvre de Lovecraft
, by Gou Tanabe, a series which adapts the fantastic short stories of HP Lovecraft.
The first five volumes, published in France since 2018 by Ki-oon editions, have sold a total of 250,000 copies, and the sixth has just been released.
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Unexpected encounter between the fantastic classic and the manga
Lovecraft's encounter with the manga was by no means obvious on paper.
It took place in 2005 when the manga artist Gou Tanabe discovered, through his editor, the news of Howard Phillips Lovecraft.
An early 20th century novelist, the latter rose to prominence posthumously for his myriad of fantastic short stories, originally published in magazines.
Different stories but located in a shared universe, in which monstrous creatures who dominated the Earth millions of years before Man, resurface and upset the physical, and especially mental, balance of the heroes.
© Ki-oon Publishing
Gou Tanabe immediately fell in love with this very descriptive work and the nightmarish bestiary presented throughout the pages.
After
The Outsider
, an adaptation of Lovecraft's short story
I am elsewhere
, published in 2007, the mangaka, who works alone, decides to explore more in depth the writings of the English novelist.
In 2015, he launched
The Masterpieces of Lovecraft
, a series of adaptations of more or less known novels.
At the rate of one volume per year, he published
The Color Fallen From the Sky
,
The Call of Cthulhu
,
The Hallucinated Mountains
(2 volumes),
In the Abyss of Time
and the last,
The One who haunted the darkness
.
A dark and pessimistic work
Let's be clear: these are not about happy manga.
Gou Tanabe applies meticulously to transcribe the progressively suffocating atmosphere of Lovecraft's books.
“There is always a moment when the characters understand that monstrous entities ruled the Earth in the past, long before the advent of their own world or the appearance of their God. They then lose all hope and appetite for life. C 'it is this common point in Lovecraft's stories that particularly marked me, ”the mangaka explained to
CNews
in 2020.
© Ki-oon Publishing
In fact, each volume of the collection follows the same progression.
First, a scientific expedition or a supernatural discovery upsets established beliefs about the history of the Earth.
Then, when violent phenomena occur, excitement gives way to worry.
Finally, by pushing forward, the protagonists bring to light a reality hitherto ignored, very often monstrous, which must remain hidden under penalty of tipping the world into chaos.
This rise in tension, unrolled slowly like a ball of wool, takes guts and gives consistency to Tanabe's series.
Very detailed drawings to show the unspeakable
Coherence is also born from the drawings.
The mangaka perfectly captures the unspeakable horror of Lovecraft's work with a fine line and extremely detailed pages.
He multiplies the close-ups of the faces of the characters, blissful mouths and eyes wide with incomprehension.
"Gou Tanabe is very inspired by the engravings of Gustave Doré. We therefore find a lot of details and, at the same time, in the most terrifying moments, part of the plates are plunged in the shade", underlines Ahmed Agne, editorial director of Ki-oon editions.
"This mixture leaves a lot of room for the reader's imagination."
As such, black and white is anything but a frustration.
© Ki-oon Publishing
In splendid double pages that take on the appearance of paintings, we come face to face with terrifying creatures.
The best known is Cthulhu, a gigantic winged octopus, one sketch of which is enough to make your blood run cold.
"In these moments, we do not always distinguish what is happening or we are overwhelmed by the abundance of details, in a completely voluntary way on the part of the author", enthuses Ahmed Agne.
In fact,
Lovecraft's masterpieces
are manga that can be seen as much as they are read.
A French edition in the form of a beautiful book
The series is all the more pleasant to read as the French edition benefits from remarkable work.
Far from the traditional manga, flexible and with plastic cover, Ki-oon has opted for a larger format and a leather-effect cover of the most beautiful effect.
Each volume has its color and the whole looks great in a library.
"The container had to be adapted to the content. The idea was also to appeal to an audience larger than that of manga readers. The pseudo-leather cover is a nod to the
Necronomicon
, a cursed fictional work that runs through the books. of Lovecraft, ”says Ahmed Agne, the editorial director.
© Clément Lesaffre / Europe 1
And this first edition, which could almost be described as a "beautiful book" has succeeded.
With 250,000 copies sold in two years, the series stands out as one of the biggest boxes of the genre "seinen", manga intended for an adult audience.
Especially since each volume costs 17 euros, twice the price of a traditional manga.
"
Lovecraft's
masterpieces
are adapted all over the world, but it is in France that they are most successful", rejoices Ahmed Agne.
Ultimate proof of France's love for the saga, Gou Tanabe was awarded the prize for best series at the Angoulême Festival 2020.