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Kaze to Ki No Uta (風と木の詩
?, lit. The Poem (Song) of the Wind and the
Trees) is a shōjo manga by
Keiko
Takemiya. It was first published by Shougakukan from 1976
to 1984 in the magazine Shōjo Comic. In 1979, it was awarded
the prestigious Shogakukan Manga Award for shōnen/shōjo manga.[1]
The series is widely regarded as a shōnen-ai classic, being
one of the first in the genre to combine romantic and sexual
relationships. It took nine years for Takemiya's publishers to
agree to publish it, as Takemiya refused to censor the sexual
elements of the story.[2]
Summary
Serge Battour is the son of a wealthy man and a Roma woman. Taking
place in the late 19th century, the story is a recollection of his
memories of Gilbert Cocteau at Laconblade Academy in Provene,
France. The story has themes of class prejudice, racism, homophobia, homosexuality, incest, pedophilia, rape, prostitution, and drug abuse.
Gilbert Cocteau is a promiscuous student who has a reputation
for being a boy of corrupt morality since he frequently misses
classes and engages in relations with older male students. However,
Gilbert is a tortured young man who has been treated like an object
all his life rather than a human being. The primary antagonist in the story -
Gilbert's uncle, Auguste Beau - is a respected society figure who
manipulates and sexually abuses his young nephew.
Auguste's influence is so great that Gilbert actually believes that
the two are in love, and Gilbert remains enthralled with Auguste,
even to the bitter end when he finds out that Auguste isn't quite
who he thought he was.
Golden-hearted Serge becomes fascinated with Gilbert, and tries
to win his friendship despite being threatened with ostracism and even
violence. Gilbert himself even rejects Serge's offer of friendship,
although it seems that Serge may be Gilbert's only hope to escape
this hellish life.
Serge perseveres and eventually the two boys become friends and
lovers. Faced with a violent rejection by members of the faculty
and student body, Gilbert and Serge flee to Paris and live for a short while as paupers.
Gilbert, however, cannot escape all of the demons of his past, and
finds himself dragged into a life of hard drugs and
prostitution. The story ends when Gilbert thought he saw Auguste,
under the influence of drugs, and he ran joyfully towards a fast
moving carriage.... and died under the hooves and wheels. Some of
the pair's few friends - who have recently rediscovered the couple
- take care of the traumatized Serge.
Characters
- Gilbert Cocteau
- Protagonist, 14 years old. A son of adultery between Auguste Beau and Anne Marie
who is a wife of the elder step-brother of Auguste. Rejected by
both his parents, he was raised by maids and butlers without
parental love. He became a bit of a Feral child believing his friends were wild
animals calling a rabbit his 'father' and a blanket his mother.
Auguste is the first of the Beau family to take an interest. At
first Auguste is shocked at Gilbert's underdeveloped life
skills. However Auguste believes he could benefit from this and
takes Gilbert in to train him as his personal pet/slave. Dealing
with sexual, physical and emotional abuse at a young age makes
Gilbert into a rather negative, antisocial and violent person who
believes sex is the only answer to love and payment and that
everyone has a corrupt heart. Gilbert initially rejects Serge's
overtures, even treating him as trash. However, Serge tries to
prove to Gilbert that his view of life is completely wrong. Gilbert
falls in love with him and the couple escapes to Paris. However
Gilbert has a hard time adjusting to the 'poor life' and doesn't
want to work. While Serge is absent from their house a group of men
gang
rape Gilbert and force him to take drugs. Being weak he becomes
a prostitute and is found by Serge too late..
- Serge Battour
- Protagonist, friend of Gilbert, 14 years old. A son of young viscount Battour and a
beautiful Roma woman. Successor of the house of viscount Battour.
Serge is a musical prodigy
at piano. He has a noble heart and regardless of the way Gilbert
treats him he still wants to change and help Gilbert. Dealing with
his homosexual feelings he goes to church for confession and talks
to his friend Pascal for advice. Despite negative results from
both, Serge believes that his feelings for Gilbert are not wrong.
He is unaware of Auguste's manipulation, thinking that Gilbert's
uncle want them to be friends. He finds out later that Auguste just
wants to damage their relationship. Gilbert and Serge fall in love
but they cannot be together. Auguste influences the school which
violently rejects the couple. They also face homophobic reactions from their class mates.
With the help of some of Serge's friends they manage to escape to
Paris.
- Auguste Beau
- Poet, and
Gilbert's real father, though posing as Gilbert's uncle. Auguste is
an adopted son of the house of Cocteau. He sexually abuses Gilbert
at a young age. Auguste himself had been raped by his elder
step-brother when he was young. He never saw Gilbert as a young
child but more of a 'toy' to play with, deciding he could train
Gilbert to be the 'most perfect pet'. He enjoys playing with
Gilbert feelings making him believe that he loves him and then the
next moment treating him like garbage. He even seduced Serge only
to hurt Gilbert. When Gilbert and Serge are getting closer he
orders the school to separate them. He doesn't seem to care about
Gilbert his major concern is Gilbert's looks. He shows concern in
his last moment when he realizes Gilbert is in love with
Serge.
- Jean-Pierre Bonnard
- Famous painter, pedophile. He kidnaps and rapes the child
Gilbert, who in turn attempts to commit suicide but is rescued by Auguste. Despite his
actions towards Gilbert, the manga implies that he has 'forgiven
him' and was rather saddened by Bonnard's leaving. He makes another
appearance in the last volume where both Gilbert and Serge visit
him.
- Pascal Biquet
- Friend of Serge. A classmate of Serge and Gilbert. He wants
more science classes in school, instead of reading about classical
literature. He shares his views with Serge and makes comments about
sex and one's goal in life. He dislikes Latin, calling it a 'dead
language'. He himself is secretly a bit attracted to Gilbert.
- Aryon (Arion) Rosemarine (Rosmarineay, Rosmariné)
- Student superintendent general in
the school. Rosemarine was raped by Auguste, while he was 15 years
old (3 years before the story begins). He loves his classmate Jules
de Ferrier, but he can not have sex with him because of the trauma
due to being raped. He hates both Auguste Beau and Gilbert, but
befriends Serge. In his last scenes he helps both Gilbert and Serge
to escape together to Paris.
The
Vision
It is said that the author, Keiko Takemiya, got an inspiration of
this grand story and designed the total plot one night. She then,
next day, told her imagination and construction of the story to her
friend Norie Masuyama. The finished manga was half of her first
vision. The second part of story was written in form of a novel,
Kami no Kohitsuji (神の子羊
?, lit. Agnus Dei or the Lamb of
the God), by Noris Haaze, which is a pen name of
Masuyama.
Media
There is one anime adaptation of this manga, about 1 hour story
version, made in VHS tape and LD, and five music albums (LP
records). Two of the records are image albums, that is, LP records,
named 1) /Kaze to Ki no Uta/, Part 1, and 2) Part 2, /Requiem for
Gilbert/. Two more are 3) synthesizer version of 1) and 4) Music
collection LP of the OVA /Kaze to Ki no Uta/. 5) The last one is
coupling album. Its Side 1 is the Side 1 of 1) and Side 2 is a
selected music collection from the other image album of Takemiya,
/Natsu e no Tobira (The Door to Summer) /.
OVA
- 1. Kaze to Ki no Uta - SANCTUS - , OVA, 6 Nov., 1987 (VHS/Beta
tape) / 21 Nov., 1987 (LD)
-
- Herald Enterprise Inc. and Shougakukan
- Total time: 60 minutes
- Staff
- Director : Yasuhiko Yoshikazu
- Producer : Utagawa Touju, Asami Isamu et al.
- Pictures by : Takemiya Keiko, Sugino Sachiko, Futagi
Makiko and others.
- Music : Nakamura Nobuyuki
- Cast (Voice actors)
- Sasaki Yuuko (Gilbert)
- Ohara Noriko (Serge)
- Sakakibara Yoshiko (Rosmarinay)
- Shiozawa Kaneto (Auguste)
- Takemura Taku (Pascal)
Music
albums
- 1) Kaze to Ki no Uta (The Poem of Wind and Trees). image album,
1 July, 1980
-
- Nihon Columbia (Columbia Music Entertainment, Inc.).
- Side 1
- 1. Main Theme
- 2. Theme of Gilbert
- 3. Theme of Serge
- 4. Dialogue
- 5. The Poem of the Wind and the Trees
- Side 2
- 1. Piano Cocerto, Kaze to Ki no Uta
- 2) The World of Takemiya Keiko - Aesthetics of Love. combined
album, 25 Oct. 1981
-
- Nihon Columbia (Columbia Music Entertainment, Inc.).
- Note: Side 1 is same as that of LP /Kaze to Kino Uta/, and Side
2 is music collection selected from the LP /Natsu e no Tobira (The
Door to Summer) /, which is the album of music collection from the
OVA /Natsu e no Tobira (夏への扉) /.
- Side 1 (from the Poem of Wind and Trees)
- 1. Main Theme
- 2. Theme of Gilbert
- 3. Theme of Serge
- 4. Dialogue
- 5. The Poem of the Wind and the Trees
- Side 2 (from the Door to Summer)
- 1. Theme of Marion
- 2. Theme of Ledania
- 3. Theme of Love
- 4. The Burning Summer
- 5. Main Theme
- 3) Kaze to Ki no Uta, Jiruberu no Rekuiemu (Requiem for
Gilbert), image album, 21 July, 1984,
-
- Nihon Columbia (Columbia Music Entertainment, Inc.).
- Side 1
- 1. Ave Maria
- 2. In the Course of Waking from Dreams
- 3. A Bird is Made of Snow
- 4. Invitation to Travel
- Side 2
- 1. Now, Just into the Dreams
- 2. The Dream
- 3. Plaited Strings of Love
- 4. My Angel, I Pray...
- 5. Ave Maria
- 4) Kaze to Ki no Uta - the Digital Trip, synthesizer fantasy,
21 May, 1985
-
- Nihon Columbia (Columbia Music Entertainment, Inc.).
- Note: Entries are same as /Requiem for Gilbert/. This is the
synthesizer version.
- 5) Kaze to Ki no Uta - SANCTUS -, OVA soundtrack LP, 6 Nov.,
1987
-
- Pony Canyon (Pony Canyon Inc.)
- Note: This is the music collection from the OVA /Kaze to Ki no
Uta - SANCTUS - /. This album was published in the form of CD and
cassette tape at the same time.
References
- ^ "小学館漫画賞：歴代受賞者" (in
Japanese). Shogakukan. http://comics.shogakukan.co.jp/mangasho/rist.html. Retrieved
2007-08-19.
- ^ Thorn, Matthew (2004) Girls And Women Getting Out Of
Hand: The Pleasure And Politics Of Japan's Amateur Comics
Community in Fanning the Flames: Fans and Consumer Culture in
Contemporary Japan William W. Kelly, ed., State University of New
York Press
External
links
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