Zephyr2.0010

Osamu Tezuka, 1927-1989, character of Zephyrus in Swallowing the Earth Tikyuwo Nomu. English translation by Kumar Sivasubramanian, 2009. Gardena, CA, Digital Manga Publishing. — Original serialized in Big Komikku, 1968-1969. Tezuka Osamu manga zenshū, Vol. 259-60. Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1982.

Zephyrus is part of Tezuka’s “star system” ], his troupe of characters that recur in manga from beginnings to the mid-70s when he abandons it. “Since his readers understand that Tezuka’s manga are ‘cinematic,’ most Japanese critics rarely mention this idiosyncratic way in which Tezuka conceived his characters as real actors.”[1] Zephyrus debuts in Swallowing the Earth (1968). Schodt observes in the afterword that Tezuka's compromise with gekiga led to the development of a voluptuous, mature seductress rather than the juvenile man-killer/ femme fatale that populates so many of his contemporary (and subsequent) peers' publications. Zephyrus recurs in Black Jack (as the Black Queen) 13 Jan 1975, an installment in the series, 57 “Black Queen” and also in installment 200 “the Last Train” 16 Jan 1978. [https://tezukaosamu.net/en/manga/438.html] And in Unico (as Zephyrus) 1976, “the Spirit of the West Wind” In Anime: Unico Short Story, Unico, and Unico: to the Magic Island Zephyrus recurs as Hayame in Hiro no Ito — Ho-o [1] S. Phillipps, “Patterns in the Manga of Osamu Tezuka,” 78.