Matsuge-chan

Frontispiece featuring Matsuge and Mimi-tan

**Matsuge-chan** (まつげちゃん) is a shojo manga series by Fujio Akatsuka. It was serialized from October 1958 to April 1961 in *Hitomi* magazine (published by Akita Shoten), followed by a brief revival in *Ribon* (Shueisha) that ran from July to December 1961.

It is a slice-of-life style series, with some elements that would carry over to Akatsuka's better-known gag genre.

## Overview

The series revolves around the life of Matsuge-chan (Her name deriving from the word meaning "Eyelashes"), her parents, and her little brother Mimi-tan.

Many chapters revolve around the situations that Matsuge deals with involving her little brother's antics, and other daily happenings with her family and friends.

## Characters

In addition to this main cast, the protagonist of Happy-chan shows up once in cameo during the series in "Big Sister Typhoon, Mama Typhoon", marking usage of Akatsuka's Star System.

The design of Kantaro from Nama-chan is also re-used for "Ken-chan" in the student tutor chapter.

### Matsuge Kawai

(河井まつげ)

The protagonist, a typical cheerful elementary school fifth grader living her life.

When it comes to reprints' lack of proper order, a visual indicator to tell chapters' placement would be to look at Matsuge's hair style; the early Hitomi run gave her much longer, straighter hair which gradually shortened, while the last few chapters of the Hitomi run and the entirety of the Ribon run depict her with shorter, wilder hair.

### Mimio, aka "Mimi-tan"

(ミミオ, ミミたん)

The younger, kindergarten-aged brother of the family. He is full of energy and mischief.

### Mama

The gentle, typical housewife who looks after the kids.

### Papa

A kind and gentle father who often must work hard.

His design later pops up in other similar father characters in late 1950s-early 1960s Akatsuka shojo works, last appearing as Mimiko's father in *Akko-chan's Got a Secret!*.

### Gobou-kun

(ゴボウ)

A slightly older friend of Mimi-tan, who's a friendly boy but also much tougher and mischievous. He often refers to Mimi as "Chibi".

Gobou often pops up as part of the extended cast and gets along well with Matsuge and her family, often stopping over to visit.

### "Yo-chan"

(ヨッちゃん)

Matsuge's best friend, a tomboyish nerdy girl who wears thick glasses and her hair in braids. She can get jealous and angry easily, but is laid-back enough to reconcile just as quickly. She notably appears in some stories of the 1960 portion of the Hitomi run, before last appearing in the 1961 story "Instance" with some degree of redesign.

Her full name is given as "**Yoshiko**" (ヨシ子) in the chapter "The Money of Kanemoto-san", though her mother refers to her as "**Kayoko**" (カヨ子) in "What is "Ta" of "Mi"?"

### Mr. Policeman

A helpful middle-aged policeman of the neighborhood, who often assists Matsuge and Mimi when they are in need.

## Serialization

*See also: List of chapters in Matsuge-chan*

The second run finished off prematurely with only 6 chapters, in part due to the fact that Akatsuka was also publishing Sunset Angel in *Ribon* and had become busy with focusing on that series since its launch in the previous month. *Sunset Angel* would run until April 1962, finishing off before the serial of Akko-chan's Got a Secret! would succeed it.

In all, between both its runs, there are at least 42 chapters. Because of the lack of proper reprint for many older Akatsuka works, there is not a way to be able to read the entire run in a way close to what was originally published. In addition, Fujio Pro retains little to no original manuscripts for the series due to them being lost or misplaced by the publishers, which lead to traced copies of chapters primarily having to be used for reprints.

## Reprints

* Kinran: 2 volume kashihon edition (1962). This edition starts with a later Hitomi run chapter from 1960 for whatever reasons, a change that carries over to the Akebono volumes.
* Akebono: 2 volumes published as part of the "Fujio Akatsuka Complete Works" imprint in 1970. 26 chapters are reprinted, with 11 in the first and 15 across the second, but it does not cover the entirety of the series and many chapters are out of order. "When the Sun Sets in the Wilderness", "Mimi and Iko-chan" and "Papa and Mami-chan" are included as extra content in the second volume.
* Shogakukan: The 2 Akebono volumes were digitized for the "Fujio Akatsuka Complete Works DVD-ROM set in 2002.

Currently, there is no eBook release or plans to reprint the entire series.

## Gallery

### Covers to Reprints

Cover to the first Kinran kashihon.Cover to the first Akebono Comics volume.

## External Links

* Matsuge-chan write-up at Akatsuka Preservation Society (Japanese)