A true cornerstone of the Japanese underground scene of the 1960s
Seiichi Hayashi produced Red Colored Elegy between 1970 and 197... read full description
Seiichi Hayashi produced Red Colored Elegy between 1970 and 197... read full description
reviews
Dec 27, 2009
Troy
rated it: 
This deserves both 5 stars and 2 stars.
I just finished Nate Powell's Swallow Me Whole which was a fantastic combination of comics experimentation and narrative, but Seiichi Hayashi's Red Colored Elegy takes experimentation in comics to another level. As such, the narrative is nearly completely lost, and the reader is forced to put far more work into filling the gaps and crafting a story. This is comics as mood and not as story; comics as odd juxtapositions and dramatic sh More...
I just finished Nate Powell's Swallow Me Whole which was a fantastic combination of comics experimentation and narrative, but Seiichi Hayashi's Red Colored Elegy takes experimentation in comics to another level. As such, the narrative is nearly completely lost, and the reader is forced to put far more work into filling the gaps and crafting a story. This is comics as mood and not as story; comics as odd juxtapositions and dramatic sh More...
Dec 03, 2008
Anina
rated it: 
I liked this but I don't really know why as it was incredibly confusing.
0 comments
like
(1 person liked it)
Aug 30, 2011
Bryce
rated it: 
There are illustrations inside here that are stop-you-in-your-tracks phenomenal. You just stumble upon them the same way you observe a piece by Dali or Brancusi that's tucked in some forgettable corner of an art gallery. It's a pretty awesome moment when that happens.
Then there is the rest of the story which is a struggle to get through. Anyone who has been...oh, say...15 years old, have had the angst-riddled relationship that persists throughout this book. The difference is More...
Then there is the rest of the story which is a struggle to get through. Anyone who has been...oh, say...15 years old, have had the angst-riddled relationship that persists throughout this book. The difference is More...
Dec 08, 2009
Trane
rated it:
Seiichi Hayashi's Red Colored Elegy is one of the saddest and most beautiful comics I've read in a long time. The story is so simple that there's almost no story at all — in fact, the book is almost anti-narrative in form — but the basic 'plot' involves a young comic artist and his girlfriend, who is an animator. They're broke, living together, and trying to think about their future (as individuals, together), a future that's stuck through-and-through with the knives of family obligation, econ
More...
2 comments
like
(1 person liked it)
May 21, 2009
Kira
rated it:
didn't like it, even though Seiichi Hayashi is one of my favorite illustrators. but I gave it one more star for at least trying to do something different. I think it was a little outdated in its stylistic
experimentation.. like it was trying to do early modernism all over
again, but from the 1970s. I think that the piecemeal (parts looking silkscreened, some futurist-looking experiments) borrowing kept it from being aesthetically convincing. I wasn't moved by the story and I also
More...
experimentation.. like it was trying to do early modernism all over
again, but from the 1970s. I think that the piecemeal (parts looking silkscreened, some futurist-looking experiments) borrowing kept it from being aesthetically convincing. I wasn't moved by the story and I also
More...
0 comments
like
(2 people liked it)
Jan 26, 2009
M.
rated it:
There is a sense of disillusionment here that I really like; recalls the despair that I think is inherent in a lot of the Japanese New Wave, a la Oshima and Wakamatsu. But the story lacks cohesiveness, and while I do like the aesthetic experimentation throughout the book, a lot of it falls flat.
Jul 27, 2011
Penelope
rated it:
I was underwhelmed by this book. I think I was expecting something a little more profound but really it's just the story of an artist and his girlfriend and the ups and downs of their relationship and careers (with a little death thrown in for good measure...er...I mean, tragedy). Stylistically I thought it was pretty interesting and I liked the variety of illustration styles. The portions of mostly visual story-telling are well drawn and nuanced; I felt like those portions held a lot more em
More...
Oct 16, 2010
Kaarin
rated it: 
A beautiful graphic novel. Be willing to just go along with the flow, though. If you come in wanting to understand everything that is going on you will easily be frustrated. The narrative comes in and floats out. The reader can get a basic idea of what is going on, but must be flexible to where the story is going. It was written in the early seventies in Japan and makes a number of pop culture references that I didn't quite catch. But, the underlying story about love, loss, and trying to find a
More...
Dec 08, 2010
Abraham
rated it:
Does the world really need another beautifully written graphic novel about a mildly privileged graphic novelist who is crippled by self-pity and depressive inaction to the point of alienating all those around him? WTF? It seems like every other graphic novel you find is like this - completely unsympathetic self-pitying protagonists who appear to be foils for the author himself. It's not a story I'm particularly interested in, and I wonder if it is a massive reaction to the history of comics bein
More...
0 comments
like
(1 person liked it)
Sep 17, 2009
Maré
rated it:
Really, it was okay. But there were some beautiful pages. Like the spread on 124/125. I love that wood. This guy's obviously really talented but all the characters looked the same and I could only kind of figure out who was whom (I'm using that right, right?) based on the context.
Overall, though, the characters really resonated with me. 20-something Asian wanna-be cartoonists whose lives are simultaneously falling apart and coming together. Okay. Anyway. It wasn't mind-blowing or any More...
Overall, though, the characters really resonated with me. 20-something Asian wanna-be cartoonists whose lives are simultaneously falling apart and coming together. Okay. Anyway. It wasn't mind-blowing or any More...
Oct 23, 2008
Chadwick
rated it:
Holy motherfucking shit. This is amazing.
So, it's just a story about a Japanese hipster couple in the 70s, being broke, fucking, fighting, breaking up and getting back together. Sometimes it's touching. Sometimes it makes me feel shitty about all of the awful things I've ever done in a relationship.
And then I turn the page, and I just can't do anything but bug out my eyes at how damned good Hayashi is. He moves in and out of different styles with a bewildering fluen More...
So, it's just a story about a Japanese hipster couple in the 70s, being broke, fucking, fighting, breaking up and getting back together. Sometimes it's touching. Sometimes it makes me feel shitty about all of the awful things I've ever done in a relationship.
And then I turn the page, and I just can't do anything but bug out my eyes at how damned good Hayashi is. He moves in and out of different styles with a bewildering fluen More...
0 comments
like
(1 person liked it)
Jun 11, 2009
Adam
rated it: 
tale of disturbed early stage adults. the expression of suffering is severely hampered by the poor quality of art and extreme lack of cohesive narrative. in some panels the art is quite good and makes it all the more confusing that the rest is treated w/ such utter nonchalance. on a whole the art comes across as not so much stylistic, but lazy. The narrative which i'm sure is meant to represent tumult leaves the reader w/ very little to go on and also very little reason to want to figure things
More...
Jan 23, 2009
Alexander
rated it:
Inscrutable... I think I liked it, though. Maybe I'm missing something because of a mistranslation or a lack of cultural context. Some of the artwork is wonderful: a seabird falling into the waves, a crying moon.
I probably need to read this a few more times to appreciate it. Not a book that lends itself to a casual skim-through.
I probably need to read this a few more times to appreciate it. Not a book that lends itself to a casual skim-through.
0 comments
like
(1 person liked it)
Jun 21, 2009
Kobeest
rated it:
an interesting look back to the early underground scene in Japan. not much of a story here but if one of the goals of comics is to allow for closure within the individual reader this works. of course that opens things up for a huge continuum of criticism...read it slowly with thoughts of working out a relationship early in life.
Sep 03, 2009
Karen
rated it:
Red Colored Elegy is a beautifully drawn comic exploring the personal lives (work, family, love) of a young Japanese couple. The story is not plot driven and leaves much unsaid, leaving the reader to fill in the blanks. But the images are great at evoking the feeling of the story.
Jan 11, 2010
Jeff
rated it:
***1/2. Totally worthwhile for Hayashi's style, which is both disjointed and expressive, hermetic one moment and bursting into pop lyricism the next. It's a cool evocation of 60s Japanese youth culture that recalls New Wave films by Wakamatsu and Hani. But beneath all the fabulous formalism, the teen angst romance feels stale.
May 05, 2010
George
rated it:
OK it gets 2 stars for the art which is truly outstanding, but I don't think it is acceptable (especially in a very narrative medium like comics) to produce a story line so confusing and empty. This book could have been outstanding if it actually tried to say anything.
Jul 31, 2009
Jenn
rated it:
Another book that I decided to check out after looking at Rachel's list. I'm a huge fan of graphic novels. It was an interesting story and gripping, however, for me, I'm partial to Tomine's more literal approach.
Feb 02, 2012
Roman
rated it:
Brilliant. The story is not important, it's the way he captures frustration, melancholy and hopelessness with black & white drawings. Great pacing too, often jumpy and surreal, at times almost frozen.
Jan 19, 2010
Steve
rated it:
The art was much much too sparse for me, so much so that sometimes I couldn't tell who characters were or what was going on in a scene. It was a very disjointed read to me.
Nov 20, 2010
Mike
rated it:
Beautiful but at many time too disjointed to follow. It was like hearing someone describe a dream: sometimes fantastic, sometimes really dull.
Jun 14, 2009
Sounds like a very interesting perspective on catastrophic events. Earth 2100--if you watched, should this be a required read?
Feb 05, 2009
Holly
rated it:
Not the easiest to follow (though not a whole lot happens), but I was absolutely enthralled by the art.
Aug 23, 2011
Felipe
rated it:
Rostos sem face, corpos chapados, camas no vazio e memórias de um amor estilhaçado.
Oct 14, 2008
Emilia
rated it:
I wanted to like you so hard little book.
I would give the cover 5 stars, but the story was stilted (I think that was the point?) and the art was stilted (also, maybe the point) and the dialogue was stilted (translation issues?) and I had no idea what was going on--was something going on?
I bet it was going for a mood with all of this, but I really do need to have one of those things be smooth. Sorry, this book.
The little emo picture of the author right after the last page More...
I would give the cover 5 stars, but the story was stilted (I think that was the point?) and the art was stilted (also, maybe the point) and the dialogue was stilted (translation issues?) and I had no idea what was going on--was something going on?
I bet it was going for a mood with all of this, but I really do need to have one of those things be smooth. Sorry, this book.
The little emo picture of the author right after the last page More...
Oct 02, 2009
Jennie
rated it:
the artwork really fits the story...2 people completely unable to communicate their feelings...very stark, lonely images.
