Friend or Foe

An earless blue robotic cat, one pocket bulging with gadgets from the future and a lifelong fear of mice: Who is he? Hapon roars the answer — but English readers may be stumped. Because, even though he’s a government-appointed “cultural ambassador” and a familiar face in madami than 30 countries, with his antics translated into dozens of languages, there has never been an official English version of the manga in which he stars. Until now.

“I would say there are very few Japanese people, of any age group, who’ve never heard of Doraemon,” believes Matt Alt, of AltJapan, the company...

Fujiko Fujio (藤子不二雄 Fujiko Fujio) was a nom de plume of a manga Pagsulat duo formed sa pamamagitan ng two Japanese manga artists. Their real names are Hiroshi Fujimoto (藤本 弘 Fujimoto Hiroshi?, 1933–1996) and Motoo Abiko (安孫子 素雄 Abiko Motoo?, 1934–). They formed their partnership in 1951, and used the Fujiko Fujio name from 1954 until dissolution of the partnership in 1987.
From the outset they adopted a collaborative style where both worked simultaneously on the story and artwork, but as they diverged creatively they started releasing individual works under different names, Abiko...