365 Days of Manga, Day 125: The Ice Wanderer

THE ICE WANDERER AND OTHER STORIES (Tôdô no Tabibito, “The Arctic Traveler”) (凍土の旅人) • Jiro Taniguchi • Fanfare/Ponent Mon (2008) • Shogakukan (Big Comic Special, 2004) • 1 volume • Survival Drama • Unrated/13+ (language, violence)
Wilderness and environments are the subject of these richly envisioned stories by super-realistic artist Jiro Taniguchi — “man vs. nature”, using the word “man” literally, since the protagonists are exclusively male. The title story, set in the Klondike in 1897, is an imaginary story starring real-life writer Jack London, who meets an old Indian while panning for gold in the mountains. “White Wilderness,” inspired by London’s “White Fang,” follows two men on a tense journey through the arctic as their dogsled pack is picked off by wolves one by one. “Our Mountains” involves a bear-hunter in the snow-covered forests of prewar Japan, while “Return to the Sea,” the only story set in the modern day and the most consciously ecological of the stories, follows a man and a whale to the legendary “whale’s graveyard.” The book is rounded out with short nostalgia pieces about Japan in the time of the author’s youth. The common theme between these and the wilderness stories is, perhaps, “a simpler time”–distant places and times brought to life by Taniguchi’s detailed artwork and no-nonsense, no-formula plotting.

Today’s winner is Molly V. of Pennsylvania. Congrats, Molly!