Have you read any manga adaptations of literary classics? By "classics" of literature, I mean those hallmark books that are held up as examples of entire decades of a culture...

The classics can be Western or Japanese in origin, or even belonging to another culture. And not only manga adaptations, but also manhua, manhwa or Western comics are okay. Even anime or animated series are okay, to be honest. I'm just looking for comic- and cartoon-adaptations of literary classics.

Examples: Anne of Green Gables (manga and anime adaptations available), Fin de Siècle Detective Club (yaoi manga adapted from Sherlock Holmes), The Trapp Family Story (anime adaptation of the same book that produced The Sound of Music) and Asaki Yumemishi (an unfortunately non-scanlated manga adaptation of the Japanese classic, The Tale of Genji).

Actually, the whole World Masterpiece Theater series qualifies, when it comes to anime.

But the manga arena still seems to be lacking...

Please help!

ETA: It doesn't have to be a straightforward adaptation; it can be a slightly altered version of the original, as long as it's obvious that it was based on a particular literary classic.

Dante Shinkyoku
Kokoro has an adaptation, but I'd have to look up the name.
Gankutsuou (though it isn't accurate and the anime is better)

There was also an adaptation of Mein Kampf of all things that came out last year.



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WHOA. Thanks, Crenshinibon! I knew about the Dante one, and I'd heard about the Monte Cristo one, but had simply forgotten about it... Thanks for the reminder! Will look those up.

And Mein Kampf? Seriously? Any links for that? Not that I like to think of it as a "classic" or anything, but it's definitely one of those history-altering books (unfortunately), and the idea of a modern adaptation makes me wonder what the adaptation's like, and just how the heck they got away with it. O_O

Yeah, bizarre isn't it?

Here's a couple links confirming it.

I have the same opinion, really. There are a couple of others based on stories that exemplify radical political ideologies... I think they may be part of some sort of series, but I'm not certain. My bet is just freedom of speech laws and money that will be sponged up from controversy on the behalf of the publisher.

I'll probably think of some more and post them later. I'm positive they're there, I just can't think of them at the moment. Mostly Japanese literature though, for obvious reasons.

edit: Evidently the same collection include Das Kapital and War and Peace. Odd choices.

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Reviews of my Work:
You are kind of boring - Blackorion
Congratulations! Ur an asshole! - tokyo_homi
Your awesome!!! - Cherelle_Ashley
NightSwan also said that she wanted to peg me, once, but I'm not sure whether to take that as a compliment or a threat...

Dear My Girls
There's only like 5 chapters out at the moment yet for some reason it reminds of Little Women... So I'm not 100% if this manga really is an adaptation or something based upon Little Women.

Dear My Girls it's indeed a manhwa adaptation of "Little women" by L.M.Alcott.
Same characters and setting, but the story is very different, it revolves around Elisabeth March who is here portrayed with a totally different character than in the book.

There is an anime adaptation of Little Women.

Probably some of this are hazardous (I too don't think of some of them as classic) but I'll point them out anyway. Sorry if this wasted your time.

Anime
Manga Aesop Monogatari
Wakakusa Monogatari (this is actually running in Italy, lol, I don't know how detailed it is though). Edit: already pointed out.
Jean Valjean Monogatari
Other ones:
Les Miserables - Shoujo Cossette
My Patrasche
Dog of Flanders
Ginga Tetsudo no Yoru (there are a good amount of Kenji Miyazawa's works made into anime)
Sherlock Hound this is quite famous in Italy because it was a co-production with the RAI (Italian public television) and six episodes were directed by Miyazaki.

Manga
Vagabond/Musashi they're very loose adaptations.
Sekai no Chuushin de, Ai wo Sakebu it's the most selling book in Japan so I included it, but I don't think of it as a classic (I don't particularly like it).




Last edited by reid1 at 5:09 am, Sep 12 2009

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What I like in Trivial Pursuit style. Pick your category:

The Ravages of Time (manhua) - derived from historical records and the Romance of Three Kingdoms, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, but from a different viewing angle of the records and the novel.

The Change! - Torikoebaya Monogatari
Evyione - Little Mermaid
Heart no Kuni no Alice - Alice in Wonderland
Ludwig Kakumei - Grimm's fairytales
One Thousand and One Nights - Arabian Nights
Please, Jeeves - Jeeves series

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Avatar by tassyn.livejournal.com

Reading: Kingdom, Sangokushi, Historie

Homg there's a JEEVES manga?



Is anybody scanlating this? ANYBODY? Jesus, if I could find a translator for this I'd do all the rest... *_*

Oh. My. God.

Sorry, massive Wodehouse fan, here! I've even got the complete television series, so that I can rejoice in the rampant Fry/Laurie subtext. I just.

THANK YOU. I had NO IDEA this existed.

/fangirl

Uh, okay. Down with capslocking! Up with... er, sensible replies.

Thank you to everyone for their recommendations! I didn't know there was such a wealth of manga out there for me to read on this topic!

@reid1, your list is fantastic and thorough. Thanks so much.

Same goes to Odette, harbinger of wonderful things (as per usual).

Allez, base_coat, hum87, ceres21 and (again) the awesome Crenshinibon... Thank you!

Osamu Tezuka put out an adaptation of Crime and Punishment early in his career. Kodansha published a billingual version many years ago that included an English translation, but its currently one of the rarest English-language manga in existence. And even if you do locate a copy, don't expect it to be easy on the wallet!

Katsuhiro Otomo drew short comedic takes on classic fairytales too, and those were collected in the Japanese-only Hansel and Gretel.
Another of his anthologies collected his 'That's Amazing World!' series; again comedic takes on classic literature, such as 'The Old Man and the Sea' and 'The Magic Pot of Aladdin'.

Jiro Taniguchi's The Ice Wanderer and other stories contains two short 20+ page adaptations of Jack London works, notably an unfinished story named 'The Ice Wanderer', and 'White Wilderness'.

That's all I can think of at the moment!

@tartufo
I'm hoping that the Jeeves manga gets scanlated, too!

Here is another adaptation:
Asakiyumemishi - Tale of Genji

Last edited by Odette at 6:46 pm, Sep 14 2009

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Avatar by tassyn.livejournal.com

Reading: Kingdom, Sangokushi, Historie

@Highway-STAR, you are as awesome as usual. I'd never heard of these before... Thank you so much!

@Odette, I've just sent you a PM. I think you'll like it.

@tartufo: wonderful thread *__*. I'm always on the hunt for adaptations of literary classics myself , be it onscreen (BBC television series and Shakespearian adaptation addicted ) or other media.

Asaki Yumemishi is wonderful, I've read the available Italian scanlations of it ** made by the SMO forum (if your nick is any indication, you might be able to read in Italian ) . The project page is here: http://smoproject.altervista.org/attivi.htm

The Jeeves manga? A RL and forum friend of mine has been celebrating Wodehouse's books for a while . Must check ^^ *adds to list*

Aside from the titles already mentioned by other posters, the one I know is Gekka no Kimi. It's loosely inspired by Genji Monogatari - highschool boy is the reincarnation of Genji - . The plot, sadly enough, does not tap into the potential of the concept (Genji's past and present lives and his love for Murasaki first are shown on parallel and separated, then starts to overlap each other) and turns into a mess . But some of the Heian sequences are so pretty .
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Off-topic-yet-not XD:
Kaoru Mori's Emma reads and feels like a Victorian novel . Try it out if you haven't already *_* . Beautiful seinen manga about a maid and gentleman, a joy to the eyes , especially from 3rd volume onwards. Check the Emma Bangaihen sequel too

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