I made a drawing based on a scene of one of my favourite episodes of Ghost in the Shell. The story contains a lot of unexpected cultural references and there were interesting challenges in the creation of the work.
Ghost in the Shell
Ghost in the Shell is a Japanese anime series about a team of cyborgs in a near-future (~2030), rather dystopian Japan. It is based on a manga by Masamuni Shirō serialised between 1989 and 1991. I can’t say I like the manga but I to like the anime very much, despite what I consider its shortcomings.
The reason why in English the series is called Ghost in the Shell is because of the concept of a “ghost” which is the remnant of the human body and brain in the shell of the cyberbody. The original title proposed by the author was “The Ghost in the Shell” but the publisher requested a change. In Japanese, the manga and anime series are called kōkaku kidōtai (攻殻機動隊) which is usually translated as “Mobile Armoured Riot Police” but a more accurate translation is “Offensive Armoured Public Security Unit”. A kidōtai is a specific unit of the police in Japan, responsible for public security and disaster response, but they are defensive rather than offensive.
Affection
There have been many incarnations of the anime. This article is about Episode 11, titled “Affection 草迷宮”, of Ghost in the Shell Stand-Alone Complex 2nd Gig, a TV series which ran from 2002 to 2005.
For the purpose of this article, it is enough to introduce three key characters: Kusanagi Motoko (草薙素子), known as the Major, and her colleague Batō (バトー). They are both working for a specialised police unit called Public Security Section 9 (公安９課, kōan kyūka). The Major is a female-looking cyborg, Batō a male-looking one. In this episode they are testing the abilities of new recruits for Section 9.
The story
A scene in the Japanese city of Newport (新浜市, niihama-shi), a city of many canals. It is summer and very hot. The Major is seen leaving a water bus, and climbing up a set of stairs between two tall buildings. A small ball bounces down the stairs and she catches it in her left hand. She disappears into a maze of small streets and the recruits whose task it is to trail her lose track of her entirely.
But when she reaches the top of the stairs, the Major herself is shifted into an alternate reality, with empty streets and recently abandoned shops and restaurants, food still on the plates, cigarettes still smoking. She suspects she’s being hacked but continues and ends up in front of a shop with the sign “Memento Shop” (牢記物店, rōkimono-ten). The shop stores items that held important memories for their depositors.
She comes across a cyberbody which seems to be that of herself as a kid, and another, that of a boy of the same age, about eight or ten years old. They have been seated in an old car. The Major meets the shopkeeper, an elderly lady, and asks her about them. The shopkeeper would like to tell her the story but there is not enough time as the shop is about to close. The Major promises to return the next day. On leaving the shop her reality is restored: a kid bumps into here; it is evening, the streets are full of life and fireworks are erupting in the sky.
The next day she returns to the shop. Batō is following her because he got intrigued by her disappearance. She goes up the stairs leading to the warren of narrow streets bouncing the ball with her left hand, and when Batō reaches the top of the stairs, she is again gone.
Back in the alternate reality, she enters the shop. The shopkeeper offers her tea and tells the sad story of the kids to whom the cyberbodies belonged. Both were the only survivors of a plane crash. The girl was transplanted into a cyberbody as it was the only way to save her life. The boy was paralysed except for his left arm but he refused a cyberbody. While the girl was in a critical condition, the boy started folding origami cranes (折り鶴, oridzuru) with only his left hand. Then one day the girl disappears, and the boy thinks she had died. In reality she is transferred to a different hospital to get her cyberbody and revalidation, but he does not know that. Pining for her, he keeps on folding cranes for the next two years. Then the girl, now in a cyberbody, reappears, but he does not recognise her. She tries to convince him to get a cyberbody too but he says “Only if you can fold origami cranes with your left hand”. The girl tries and tries but she can’t do it as her cyberbody is too crude. So in the end she leaves and they never see one another again, but after she’s gone the boy realises who she was and finally accepts to be cyberised.
A thousand cranes
The folding of one thousand origami cranes (千羽鶴, senbadzuru) is a Japanese tradition derived from ancient folklore. In Japan, the crane is considered sacred and a symbol for longevity and good health. It is said to live for a thousand years, and therefore, folding a thousand cranes would grant a wish, in particular for health and recovery from illness.
In 1950, the senbadzuru tradition was revived by Sasaki Sadako, a girl who survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima at the age of two. Ten years later she would finally die of leukaemia caused by the radiation, but she managed to fold more than a thousand cranes before she died. Garlands of origami cranes are still a very common sight in Japan, especially at Shintō shrines.
What happened to the Major
There has been much discussion about this episode as being out of character with the series and for being implausible. It is one of my favourites. In fact, my only qualm with it is the car in the shop, which has no narrative function and does not makes any sense at all to me. The only explanation is that the director liked Mini Coopers.
One can wonder, if the Major’s cyberbrain got hacked, and that of the recruits and that of Batō as well, who could have done this? It would have to be a super-hacker (超ウィザード級ハッカー, chō WIZAADO kyū HAKKAA as it is called in the series). I see only two possibilities: either the Major did this herself, but subconsciously, triggered by the ball; or Kuze Hideo (the boy) did this, to show the Major that they know one another. But Kuze only appears in the next episode of the series and even there he doesn’t come into contact with the Major. I therefore accept the first explanation. Another reason for this is that the second time, the Major is bouncing the ball herself in her left hand, meaning that she has realised that this was the trigger the first time.
If the story happened in actual reality, then the question would be why the Major would need to go to a special shop to have a total stranger tell her the story of her own childhood. But if we assume that the ball triggered a dream-like flash back which appears like a hack because of the cyberbrain functionality, it all makes sense.
The significance of the ball
The ball is a (手鞠, temari), a kind of ball traditionally made from pieces of old kimono cloth and used in a Japanese children’s handball game. In the episode, when the girl returns in her cyberbody to visit the boy, she is bouncing such a ball. She drops it and the boy catches it in his left hand.
The game is typically accompanied by a song, called temari-uta (手鞠歌), and this is relevant as well because of the Japanese title of the episode, “草迷宮 affection”. 草迷宮 (kusameikyū) here means “Kusanagi’ Labyrinth”, 草 (kusa) being the first character of her name. But the word kusa means “grass” so it is also “The Grass Labyrinth”, which is the title of a novel from 1908 by Izumi Kyōka. In that novel, a man, Hagoshi Akira, goes looking all over the country to remember a particular temari-uta that his mother, who has died, used to sing to him. He ends up at a haunted villa in Akiya (秋谷, on the Miura peninsula; the name is a pun, as akiya also means vacant house), where he finds a mysterious temari and the whispers of a childhood friend, Ayame, who he assumed to have died. It’s a story about memories and childhood friends and mysterious happenings, so the links with the episode are clear.
The part of the temari-uta which Akira recalls is the epigraph of the novel:
向うの小沢に蛇が立って、
八幡長者の、おと娘、
よくも立ったり、巧んだり。
手には二本の珠を持ち、
足には黄金の靴を穿き、
あぁよべ、こうよべと云いながら、
山くれ野くれ行ったれば…………
I found a translation in a very old book (1901), “A Japanese Miscellany …” by the famous Lafcadio Hearn. It is a song from Shinano (信濃) province, an old province of Japan that is now Nagano Prefecture. Hearn lists it in his chapter “Narrative-songs” rather than “Battledoor-songs and Ball-songs”, which makes more sense as it is clearly a story, whereas temari-uta are usually counting songs.
From the swamp beyond there rose up a serpent,
in the likeness of the youngest daughter of the wealthy Hachiman.
Well did it assume that form, skilfully standing.
Holding in its hands two gems,
and wearing upon its feet shoes of gold,
it traversed mountains and fields,
crying out the while:
— “Call there! — Call here!”Then did it meet a grass-cutter, and say to him:
— “Fair husband, deign to give me a girdle”
— To give you both a girdle and a hat will be easily done,> if you become my wife. Then every morning, early rising, > I will arrange your hair.”
— Wait then — patiently wait until the season of the blooming of flowers.
(“girdle” here is an obi, the belt of a kimono)
Hearn writes
This is the story of a serpent assuming the shape of a certain man’s daughter. Stories of serpent-women and dragon-women abound in Japanese literature. Probably both this song and the preceding one were inspired by the memory of some old romance or drama.
And he was right: “The youngest daughter of the wealthy Hachiman” (八幡長者乙娘, hachiman chōjia no otomusume), was a kabuki play from 1715.
I also found the full Japanese lyrics of the song, with slightly different writing, from 日本の子供の歌後編 by 小泉八雲 (Koizumi Yakumo) which is the Japanese translation of “Songs of Japanese Children” in “A Japanese Miscellany …”; Koizumi Yakumo was the Japanese name of Lafcadio Hearn:
向うの小澤に 蛇が立つて、
八幡長者の 末娘。
巧くも立つたり 企んだり。
手には二本の 珠を持ち、
足には黃金の 靴を穿き、
あ〻呼べ、かう呼べと、言ひながら、
山くれ町くれ 行つたれば、
草刈殿御に 行きあつて、
帶を下され 殿御さま！
帶も笠も 易い事、
己の女房に なるならば、
朝は起きて 髮結うて、
花の咲くまで 寢て持ちよ！
Another example of a serpent-woman story occurs in the “Legend of Hangan Oguri” (小栗判官伝説, oguri hangan no densetsu, written down in 1675 but set in 1415):
Oguri heads off to Kurama-dera “to pray for his destined bride.” Along the way he plays his flute by the edge of Mizoro pond and the music attracts a serpent living in the pond, who says:
What a handsome young man! I’d like to spend a night in the bonds of love with him.
Figuring his age, the serpent transforms herself into a beautiful girl of sixteen or seventeen. She stands on the outer stairway at Kurama looking as if she has something in mind.
When he sees her Oguri thinks, “Surely this is a blessing from Kurama.” He settles her in his palanquin and takes her back to the Second Avenue mansion.
(From an article by Susan Matisoff, “The Log Cabin Emperor: Marginality and the Legend of Oguri Hangan”. Kurama-dera, Mizoro pond (mizoro-ga-ike) and Second Avenue (nijō dōri) are all actual places in Kyōto.)
The Japanese text::
小栗殿には、ついに定まった御台所がございませんので、
ある日の雨中の退屈に、『さて私は鞍馬の申し子と承る。
鞍馬へ参り決まった妻が現われることを祈願したい』と思い、
二条の御所を出発して、市原野辺をの辺りで、漢竹の横笛を取り出し、
八つの歌口をわずかに湿らし、翁が娘を恋うる楽、とうひらてんに、
まいひらてん、ししひらてんという楽を、一時間ほど奏でた。
深泥池の大蛇は、この笛の音を聞き申し、「ああ素晴らしい笛の音ねえ。
この笛の男の子を、一目拝みたいものだ」と思い、十六丈の大蛇は、
二十丈に伸び上がり、小栗殿を拝み申し、ああ素晴らしく美しい男の子だねえ。
あの男の子と一夜の契りをこめたいものだと思い、
大蛇は、年の頃を数えると十六七の美人の姫と身を変じ、
鞍馬の初めの階段に、わけありげな顔つきで立っていた。
小栗はこの様子をご覧になって、これこそ鞍馬の利生といって、
玉の輿に取って乗せ、二条の屋敷にお下向なされ、
山海の珍物に土地の果物を調えて、たいそうお喜びになる。
しかしながら『好事門を出ず、悪事千里を走る』『錐は袋を通す』といって、
都の子供達が漏れ聞いて、二条の屋敷の小栗と、
深泥池の大蛇とが、夜な夜な通い、契りをこめているとの風聞である。
(I have digressed. But as the protagonist of Donna Tartt’s “The Secret History” says, “For if the modern mind is whimsical and discursive, the classical mind is narrow, unhesitating, relentless. It is not a quality of intelligence that one encounters frequently these days. But though I can digress with the best of them, I am nothing in my soul if not obsessive.” So let’s get back to Kusanagi Motoko.)
The depiction of Kusanagi Motoko
What I don’t like about the Ghost in the Shell anime, and even less about the manga, is the overly sexualised way in which the character of Kusanagi Motoko is depicted, with overly large breasts and – especially in the earlier series – needlessly revealing clothing which draws attention to her breasts and hips. In fact, what I do like about the character is everything but her visual appearance: her voice, her behaviour, her back story, the fact that she is very capable both as a leader and a hacker. Of course the Major is a strong, independent and powerful female cyborg, so this look might be her personal statement, a bit like the look which Naomi Wu chose for herself. But based on the imagery in the manga, I don’t think that is the case. I therefore much prefer her depiction in the latest instalment, ARISE.
The issue of mukokuseki
Characters in manga and anime often don’t look particularly Japanese. The style is called mukokuseki (無国籍) meaning “of no specific nationality” and works in the manga context but it raises the question of how to portray the Major in a more realistic style because representing her as a white person is not right, even though in the series she has fair skin and blue eyes. The article ‘Geist’ in the Shell: The Erasure of Japanese Identity in select Hollywood Films discusses this issue in the context of the 2017 Hollywood adaptation of Ghost in the Shell, where the role of the Major was played by Scarlett Johansson.
I have based my depiction of Kusanagi Motoko on a Japanese stage play from 2015, “攻殻機動隊 ARISE : GHOST is ALIVE”, where the actress Aono Kaede (青野楓) plays the role of the Major. Based on pictures from that performance, the live actors are very close to their anime counterparts.
Making the drawing
The scene I used as the starting point for the drawing is when the Major is having tea with the shopkeeper, sitting at a little table next to the car in which the cyberbodies of the kids have been seated. Next to them is a large bookcase filled with closely stacked video tapes.
I wanted to make a very detailed drawing, especially in terms of the information on the spines. I wanted to include parts of the temari-uta, parts of the lyrics of the songs used in the Ghost in the Shell movies (the “Puppet Song” and “Making of Cyborg”), references to other movies, etc.
Studies
First, I made some studies for the characters. These are on A3 paper of rather poor quality, drawn in pencil, then inked with a “Large” Kurotake Bimoji Fude pen which is a calligraphy brush pen. The ink is water resistant, so you can paint on top of it. I applied water colour from my collection of very old half pans of various brands. I used KUM memory point brushes for this and I like them a lot.
I based the shopkeeper on the actress Kiki Kirin (樹木希林) who plays in many movies by Kore-eda Hirokazu (是枝裕和). In this study the likeness is not very close as I merged her features with those of the shopkeeper in the anime.
As mentioned above, I based the Major on pictures of the actress Aono Kaede in her role as Kusanagi Motoko in the 2015 stage play “Ghost is Alive”, which was based on the ARISE series.
Based on those studies, I thought it would be better to use Chinese ink with a brush. But I also wanted to experiment with a slightly different style. And I had just bought some new watercolour paint (Kuretake Gansai Tambi) and paper (Hahnemühle Agave 290 g/m²), so I wanted to try it out. The result is the second study of the Major.
The drawing process
The final drawing combines the two characters in the scene. As I don’t like the car, I removed it. I also removed the kids because they don’t fit stylistically – I think a pair of realistic children would look rather odd here – but also it would draw the focus away from the main characters. Instead I have the characters look at the viewer. I wanted the teacups on the table, but also the temari and an origami crane, because of their significance in the story.
I used the rough watercolour paper I like (Fabriano Artistico, 300 g/m² cold pressed “not”), 56 cm x 76 cm. I set up the drawing mostly using an Ohto “no-noc” mechanical pencil (HB) and a Mitsubishi High-Uni pencil (2B). I used a grid to make it easier to match the original picture.
I first applied Chinese ink to the key Japanese writing in the drawing, and dark watercolour for the rest of the writing, using watercolour brushes. Then I applied watercolour to the characters and the background. The watercolour paint is Kuretake Gansai Tambi and I know this paint is actually not very light resistant, so the colours will fade, some more than others, but but it is nice paint to work with and I am curious what it will look like in a few years. I also used new brushes, KUM Memory Point which I never had before but I now like a lot. Finally I did the line drawing in Chinese ink, again using watercolour brushes.
Portraits
As the drawing is large, the photograph doesn’t do it justice. Here are two close-ups of the portraits of the Major and the lady who keeps the Memento Shop.
The expression on the Major’s face seems neutral at first, but there is something at the same time watchful and unsure there, and also a hint of sadness.
I always wanted to draw a portrait of Kiki Kirin, and happy with the way it turned out.
The final drawing
This is the final drawing. I framed it by sandwiching it between two sheets of plexiglass. The picture is the original resolution, so you can zoom in on the details.
The Chinese characters on the bottom left are 草迷宮, which reads kusameikyuu, with the double meaning of “Kusanagi’s Labyrinth” and “The Grass Labyrinth”.
The banner is a still of the episode showing the shop front of the Memento Shop, at the back of a narrow blind alley.
(Note: in 2020, the Japanese government changed the convention for writing Japanese names in the Latin alphabet from Western order to Japanese order and recommended that the family name is capitalised. As that is very shouty, I have taken the liberty of using small caps.)