Left: Late Meiji-Period girls' magazines. Center: The November 1910 issue
of Shôjo. Right: A rare comic strip found in that issue.
The July 1917 issue of Shin shôjo ("New Girl")
The January 1917 issue of Shôjo no tomo ("Girls' Friend") and
a comic strip from that issue.
A 1931 comic strip by the great MATSUMOTO Katsuji titled "Poku-chan to ekaki
no shenshe" ("Little Poku and the Artist"), from the pages of Shôjo
no tomo.
Matsumoto Katsuji's best-known character, Kurumi-chan, in a somewhat realistic
illustration, and in her popular comic strip. (Circa 1940)
Two works by the legendary NAKAHARA Jun'ichi from the mid-1930s. Nakahara
was banned during the last years of the war, because his sultry illustrations
were considered by government censors to be "unhealthy." He came back with
a vengeance, though, after the war, founding his own wildly popular girls'
and women's fashion magazines, and developing a dinstictive style of drawing
faces that had an enormous influence on later shôjo manga.
