Kaiji Kawaguchi
He has received the Kodansha Manga Award three times, for "Actor" in 1987, "The Silent Service" in 1990, and "Zipang" in 2002. He has also received the Shogakukan Manga Award twice, for "A Spirit of the Sun" in 2005 and "Kūbo Ibuki" in 2017. "A Spirit of the Sun" also won the 2006 manga award at the Japan Media Arts Festival. Early life and career. In elementary school, Kaiji and his younger identical twin brother Kyōji became engrossed in "shōnen manga". Kyōji took over running the Kawaguchi family business, but was also a manga artist before dying in  2013. Kaiji's daughter Nirako is an illustrator, while his eldest son Kōhei is a Kanze noh actor. In 1968, Kaiji made his professional debut with "Yoru ga Aketara" in "Young Comic" at age 21, while still attending Meiji University. Influences and style. Kawaguchi was influenced by Shinji Nagashima, Tatsuhiko Yamagami's "Hikaru Kaze", and Tadao Tsuge. He also said that if it were not for the freedom and more adult material seen in "gekiga", he probably would not have become a manga artist. In seventh grade he became interested in cinematography after seeing Akira Kurosawa's "Yojimbo". This early  influence from film is still seen in his manga "names", which are largely text and more like film screenplays, which he read for fun in high school, than the usual storyboards. In the middle of serializing "Hard & Loose" (1983–87), Kawaguchi started drawing the eyes of his characters bigger. This was a suggestion by his editor, who told him that emotion is conveyed through the eyes. Before he made this switch, Kawaguchi said he never would have thought he would be able to draw Westerners and set his manga overseas. The artist cited his work in "Actor" (1984–88) as the basis  for his current style. Kawaguchi was a heavy smoker who insisted a cigarette was "indispensable" when drawing. However, after being treated for esophageal cancer in 2019, he quit smoking.