Recently, Kent State University had a book called “Anime from Akira to Howl’s Moving Castle: Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation” by Dr. Susan J. Napier added as a reading material for one of their courses. Since then, the book has seen controversy as Ohio lawmakers are now threatening to withdraw funding unless the book is removed from the curriculum. Dr. Susan J. Napier herself has responded by saying that she suspects that the offending material comes from her chapter on pornography in Japanese animation, also known as hentai, but that she thought that it was important to discuss the topic as a part of anime culture. While I confess that I’ve been uncomfortable with discussing this topic in the past, her words have given me the courage to take a look at and discuss the history of the sex-filled world of hentai.
It might be interesting to begin by explaining the word hentai itself. The word is made up of two kanji with the first, 変, meaning strange and the second, 態, meaning attitude or condition and, when combined, 変態 can mean abnormality or pervert. However, it is far more commonly associated with media that features the art-style of anime and manga, also including video games with that art-style, that depict pornography. While I have touched on the topics of fan service and sexualisation in the past, hentai goes beyond that to show graphic sexual intercourse between characters.
The earliest depictions of sexualised Japanese artwork was “Shunga“, typically ukiyo-e which depicted graphic sexual intercourse in an art-style typical for the time. One of the most famous examples would be Hokusai’s “The Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife” which depicts a woman having sexual relations with two octopuses, one of which is large and one of which is small. This work is often associated with the genre of hentai known as “Tentacle Rape” although I have my doubts since the work itself is consensual.
When it comes to hentai anime, some of the earliest works listed are “Lolita Anime”, an anthology series that was originally released from 1984 to 1985 and featured stories involving sex with underage characters, rape, bondage, yuri etc. Another work released around this time was “Cream Lemon”, another anthology series that ran from 1984 to 2006 and featured graphic sex throughout a variety of genres such as mecha, sci-fi, fantasy, horror etc. that was quite often bizarre and unrealistic.
Since then, hentai has become a large industry with hundreds of anime, manga and video games released each year. It has been noted that the word hentai is searched more on Google than many other popular phrases such as Marvel, boobs, gay porn, the New York Times etc. While this is very interesting, it is also concerning due to the large amount of extreme content and sexual violence present in some of these series and it’s important that we are able to discuss the topic, just as Dr. Susan J. Napier does in Anime from Akira to Howl’s Moving Castle: Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation.
For those interested in my own personal experience with hentai, I’m sure many of you will be disappointed to learn that my experience is incredibly limited. I’ve read two volumes of a manga series called “Crimson Spell” which turned out to feature graphic male on male sex, rape and bestiality. I ended up being quite put off by the content and curious how reviews, even from mainstream media, were positive about it. Besides that, I saw Legend of the Overfiend and Legend of the Demon Womb, both part of the Urotsukidōji franchise, many years ago. I had bought the DVD because it was incredibly cheap but as I watched the two films, I was repulsed by the content, characters, storytelling etc. Apparently the version I saw was censored but for once, I was glad of the censorship as it both reduced the amount of time I had to watch the films and, considering the repulsive content that I saw, I don’t even want to think about what the uncensored version looked like.
While I and many other people may find the topic of hentai quite unpleasant, it is a fact that hentai has become increasingly popular worldwide. Taking that into account, it’s important that we understand the history of the sex-filled world of hentai and that the topic is not simply swept under the rug as the Ohio lawmakers are attempting to do. Let me know your thoughts on the history of the sex-filled world of hentai, on hentai itself, whether you watch/read or don’t watch/read hentai, your reasons and any additional information you might have on the topic.
Hopefully you have found this article interesting and informative and, if you wish to seek any of the works I mentioned, don’t hesitate to use amazon.co.uk or amazon.com for all of your needs!