Maison Ikkoku
The Utopia of Love, for Every Man and Woman

Date：19, Feb, 2013
Investigated and Written by Misaka Youhei
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In 1980, started Maison Ikkoku written and illustrated by Takahashi Rumiko called Manga Monster. First of all, how come they call her Manga Monster? That is why she has released various manga comics and most of them have been animated on television one by one from 1980s through 2000s. Japanese manga field has been sharply contested and so most writers could seldom make a success like being animated after another.

Maison Ikkoku is her early manga. That might sound like it is outmoded and immature. Never form a wrong conclusion, please. You would oftener find the individuality of the author from early works, in manga, music or other fields. It has something in common with her later works but also includes other elements she might have been able to express only at the time, and then Maison Ikkoku could especially be recommended among her works.

Its main character, Godai Yusaku fell through applying to the university and decided to take a year out living in an apartment. He meets Otonashi Kyoko, a caretaker of the flat. Go love stories focused on the two. That was written as a youth comic and is not the so-called story set a limit holding the hand. However, Takahashi Rumiko made it refined and exceedingly homely. So readers could take it smoothly.

Although Godai Yusaku feels kind of attracted to Otonashi Kyoko; a little elder concierge of beauty, he spends his days without speaking his true mind to her. In spite of knowing his feelings, Otonashi does nothing, too. One day, Otonashi Kyoko meets a little older guy; Mitaka Shun who works as a tennis coach and teaches her. Mitaka Shun also falls in love with her, too. Thus, complex love stories run and the two guys get to know her past.

What makes us feel admiration for most is adult female manners Otonashi Kyoko has taken in the manga, it goes without saying the interestingness. That might be since a female wrote it. Her well-mannered dramaturgy looks charming enough in recent days. Man cannot reach although seems to reach. She doesn't open her heart though seems to open. But we never feel offensive or devilishness from her actions at all. To say nothing of the characters in the manga, also real readers must gracefully be fascinated by Otonashi Kyoko.

Everybody in love or sexual relations must read Maison Ikkoku. Even recent days, the importance and the interestingness of the manga is certainly before us.