Osamu Tezuka Apollo

O. Tezuka, Apollo's Song (1970/2007)

Osamu Tezuka adapts the myth of Daphne and Apollo within his manga Apollo's Song (1970). While the whole story's narrative arc is reminiscent of Orpheus and Eurydice, Apollo and Athena are acknowledged overtly but Orpheus is not. The protagonist twice receives oracular instructions from Athena at the story's beginning and end; and Apollo is referenced at two key moments in Shogo's salvation narrative. 

       Tezuka was one of the most creative and most instrumental practitioners of Japanese manga. Topics and narrative modes applied in his graphic novels manifest astonishing diversity throughout the 20th Century, from the rise of Hitler until the artist's death in 1989. Originally serialized in Japanese as Aporo No Uta in Shukan Shonen Kingu, Shonen Gahosha, Apollo's Song was translated into English in 2007. 

       It's hard to surmise from reading Apollo's Song that the artist is not aware of the Orpheus myth. The protagonist is fated to cyclical love and loss, ever closer to attaining real love. The cover art suggests the famous moment in Camus' Orfeo Negro (1960) when Orpheus ascends to the favelas with the limp corpse of Eurydice in his arms. Shogo grapples with his love for Hiromi throughout and ultimately achieves unity with her only in experiencing a hellish death to be with her. Shogo and the Hiromi surrogates perish recurrently and experience resurrection in new stories. Themes of joint suicide, questions about why violence so often interferes with love, lovers who lose their beloved, and human search for the meaning of true love crisscross Tezuka's tale.

O. Tezuka, Apollo's Song (1970/2007)

        Athena is never clearly identified by name in Apollo's Song. Her identity is, however, unmistakable. Phidias' classical masterpiece of Athena Parthenos, ensconced in the naos of the Parthenon (the iconic sculpture portrayed in mirror image in English translation) — speaks an oracle to Shogo in Chapter 1 (of 5). Her utterance is as the Divine would speak: "Thou shalt love one woman again and again, but before the two are united in love, one shall perish. Even in death, thou shalt be reborn, to undergo yet another trial of love." (1.41) Then, the manga's final scene, its epilogue centers on Shogo's return to the unnamed Parthenos to learn that "Thou shalt see [Hiromi] again soon. In every era, in every world, she shall await thee." As Hiromi rises naked from behind Athena's panoply and exits the Parthenon into the light where Shogo has gone, Tezuka's omniscient narrator instructs that "Nature divides us into male and female... We come together and create offspring for posterity..." (2.254-57) Athena, the virginal goddess, therefore directs both Shogo's fate and the eternal prospects of human procreation. In her management of a hero's sexual destiny, Tezuka's mythmaking has contrived a remarkable new role for Athena Parthenos.

Pursuit in water, Apollo's Song 2.205

traditional Apollo's Song 2.203

       Apollo's treatment in Apollo's Song is more overt and at first glance less novel. Late in the final chapter, Hiromi confides in her doctoral advisor, Dr. Enoki (2.199), that she is beginning to have feelings for Shogo and that she is aware of his infatuation with her. The Doctor advises her to "become a laurel tree." Hiromi fails to see the connection. The Doctor then helps her to learn "the Greek myth about the girl Daphne." He explains the myth of Daphne and Apollo along the lines of Ovid's Metamorphoses 1, the western classic ending in a Bernini visual; but, subtle divergences from Ovid are intriguing. Much of the pursuit occurs in water, for instance, recalling the manga's recurrent instruction on reproductive biology, sperm swimming upstream. Tezuka's adaptation explains how the god Apollo pursued and came to hold the object of his lust, how the daughter of Peneus lost her identity at the end of a frightened flight. Dr. Enoki summarizes, "Miss Watari, I'm telling you to become a laurel tree because if you continue to allow Shogo's feelings for you to intensify, he will eventually fall into despair." (209)

Shogo as fallen Icarus, Apollo's Song 1.239

       Apollo is first acknowledged mid-way through the manga. The first acknowledgement in a novel titled for him is rather obscure. "Apollo" is the only word in the principle frame that fills 1.239. Shogo has collapsed, exhausted by Hiromi's sternly regimented training him for a marathon. In an bout of training that one expects will likely result in sexual intercourse, the fleet Hiromi eludes Shogo for many laps around a small lake. As Shogo's physical fatigue darkens his mind, Tezuka in nearly every frame includes a glimpse of Hiromi's running legs and backside clothed explicitly in Shogo's underwear. (1.227-38) Hubris brings Shogo down in the end. He falls flat on his face on the strand. Icarus. And his only utterance rises to the top of the frame — "Apollo..."  Next frames find Hiromi now willingly removing her clothing over the collapsed boy, now that he poses "no threat" to her safety.  Hiromi is his coach. For now, Hiromi is fully in control. Over 200 pages later Dr. Enoki coaches her to play Daphne and relinquish control.

Lefty Athena, Apollo's Song 1.23; the
Japanese original mirrors this, with
Nike extended in the right hand.

       Tezuka's broader narrative in this manga treats the development of Shogo from sociopath to lover. Much is at work in Tezuka's highly original narrative, the whole stands very interestingly as a reception of Orpheus, with Shogo's love and loss of Hiromi never further than arm's reach from the plight of Eurydice and Orpheus. Yet, it is never closer than arm's reach, either. Tezuka's work is hardly a pastiche of the Eurydice narrative, nor is it a mindless pastiche of any classical myth.  The overt acknowledgements of the roles of Athena and Apollo secure Tezuka's manga as a worthwhile narrative for exploring adaptation of classical mythology. The most fruitful analysis will approach the reason why Tezuka names the narrative framed by rumination on "the endless drama" of human procreation "Apollo's Song".

Osamu Tezuka, story of Daphne and Apollo told within Apollo's Song, manga, graphic novel 1970 and 2007 — originally serialized in Japanese as Aporo No Uta in Shukan Shonen Kingu, Shonen Gahosha, and translated by Camillia Nieh — New York, Vertical. 

Hiromi is advised by the Doctor on 2.199 that the only way to avoid Shogo's infatuation with her — "Then become a laurel tree.... Do[n't] you know the Greek myth about the girl Daphne?" The narrative then unfolds along the lines of Ovid's telling, but with subtle divergences worth exploring. 

  Tezuka's greater narrative in this manga treats the development of Shogo from sociopath to lover. The whole stands very interestingly as an adaptation or reception of the myth of Orpheus, with Shogo's love and loss of Hiromi never further than arm's reach from the plight of Eurydice and Orpheus. Yet, Tezuka's work is hardly a pastiche of the Eurydice narrative. 

#ogcma.byu.edu   Athena Apollo Orpheus Eurydice
http://ogcma.byu.edu/Daphne2.0003_Tezuka.htm