Where are they now
Author of Kaiketsu Kuroshukin [The Black Hood]
Hitomi Takagaki (82)
At 82 years old, The Black Hood is still alive and well. He wrote the Space Battleship Yamato Hot-blood novel, for the first time in 18 years.
The mysterious Black Hood, an ally of justice, suddenly appeared in the middle of the bustling Edo area. This nostalgic novel was first published in Shonen Club in 1935. It was enthusiastically accepted by boys, and I wondered what the author, one of the most popular writers of the time, is doing now.
The first edition sold out, earning him 4.7 million yen
Anime can be absurd, but I used astrophysics to write this theoretically.
Eight serials a month. The Black Hood sold 2 million copies…
The year before last, Mr. Takagaki wrote a novel for the first time in 18 years: the Space Battleship Yamato “Hot-blood novel,” a novelization of the hit anime.
“Only an old man from the countryside could turn that anime into a book, so I was given the job. But anime has some absurd parts, so how could I write about it theoretically? I pulled out some astrophysics. I spent a whole year groaning while watching videos and reading the scripts. It runs 340 pages in all. It turned out to be very interesting.”
The novel is priced at 1,600 yen. Unfortunately, it was not sold in bookstores, but only at theaters where the film was shown. The first printing of 20,000 copies sold out.
“The manuscript fee I received for this was 1.7 million yen. Once I remembered the pleasure of writing, I immediately wanted to write again. After this, it took me another year to write 333 pages of Burning Earth Jewel.”
This is a story about the threat of Earth’s destruction, while intertwining a romance between a genius Japanese scientist and a French primadonna. The manuscript has been sent to Shochiku, so it will probably be made into a movie or an anime.
The Eye of the Leopard and The Black Hood are two works that come to mind when I think of Mr. Takagaki. The Eye of the Leopard is an adventure story about the hero Mori, born to the last queen of the Inca Empire and a Japanese patriot, who is extremely active in all areas. Tenmeido, a poor easy-going man, and the Black Hood are actually the same person. The Black Hoo is set in the last days of the Tokugawa shogunate. It follows a lone warrior who struggles to find the Edo Region Attack Record left behind by Yamaga Soko.
Just hearing about them together like this, those who spent their boyhood in the pre-war period must be filled with nostalgia. Even if you’ve never read the novel, it is reminiscent of the Chanbara swordfighting movie Goshojiki Kaiketsu starring Ryutaro Otomo.
“I didn’t want to write children’s literature that would simply please children, but novels that would stir up an adult’s curiosity and imagination. The manuscript fee was 2.5 yen per page. Apparently Kikuchi Kan was paid 20 yen per page, but I didn’t care about the low rates at all. I don’t know when it was, but at one point I was doing eight serials a month,” he said.
Each one was 30 pages, so there were 240 pages in total. Compared to today’s popular writers, that’s not a lot of pages. But at any rate, it was necessary to include an adventure story in each of the eight serials.
“I couldn’t use the same scene twice, so it was a lot of work. Of course, most of the serialized novels were published in book form. I heard that The Black Hood sold 2 million copies.”
Mr. Takagaki is currently married to his third wife Kikue, 65, in their home in Katsutatsu City, Chiba Prefecture.
“Anyway,” he says, ”I wrote Yamato and Burning Earth Jewel. I’ve been in my study for two years without once putting on my shoes. My legs were completely destroyed by this. In addition, I have glaucoma in my right eye. Thanks to this, my Black Hood is currently in a pitiful state. I listen to music. That’s the way it is now.”