Shonen Jump Interview #1
Q: What were you like in High School?
A: Exceedingly normal. That's why now I really understand the feelings of normal kids.
Q: One Piece takes place mostly on sea. Did you grow up near the ocean?
A: No, I grew up in the mountains.
Q: How old were you when you first started drawing? What sorts of things did you draw?
A: I've always been drawing as long as I remember. I drew things like animals from pictures in encyclopedias.
Q: Can you tell us about some of your artistic influences?
A: I'm influenced by all of Akira Toriyama's work.
Q: When did you get to know his manga?
A: When I was in third grade.
Q: You worked as an apprentice to Nobuhiro Watsuki (creator of Rurouni Kenshin), and one of your coworkers at the time was Hiroyuki Takei (creator of Shaman King). Can you tell us about this period of your life?
A: There was a call from the editorial department to recruit assistants, and it was a title that I liked so I applied. In the workplace, we discussed manga all the time.
Q: When you first became a full-time manga artist, did you always focus on One Piece and it's predecessor Romance Dawn?
A: I drew many works with many main characters. Even the ones that were rejected have come in handy in creating One Piece.
Q: When you created One Piece, did you come up with the idea of the main character first, or the 'world view' first, or did they develop simultaneously?
A: The world came first. I wanted to draw an era where pirates rummaged around as they pleased. Although I wouldn't like that if it was like that in real life.
Q: How did you come up with the main character with stretching powers, instead of another technique or attack, such as projectile weapons?
A: I wanted the fighting style itself to be silly, so that no matter how tense the situation gets, you can relax and read it without becoming too stressed out.
Q: It seems that drawing a full time manga would be isolating - the work is so intense, and you have to stay in your studio for long periods of time. Do you find it difficult to keep your connections with other people and find new influences? If not, how do you do it?
A: If you think it's intense, it's the type of work that will seem endless. But if you seriously embrace manga, you'll increasingly become aware of the joy of drawing it, so it won't be that much of a chore. To me, it's more like I'm playing all the time than working.
Q: Do you have the same partying style as your characters? If our readers could see you now, would you have a glass of grog in one hand and a piece of meat in your mouth?
A: I can't afford to do it everyday like pirates, but I enjoy getting rowdy in a crowd of people, so I party whenever I get the chance.
Q: Have you ever been on board a sailing vessel? If so, how was it?
A: I realized that sailing a ship isn't as easy as it's depicted in One Piece. But that's alright since it's a manga.
Q: How did you become interested in pirates?
A: I think it started with an anime show about Vikings.
Q: Of all the pirates that actually existed, who catches your fancy the most?
A: Blackbeard (Edward Teach)
Q: Your manga is incredibly detailed. Do you ever use reference material for the strange looking clothing, weapons, ships, landscapes and buildings which appear in your manga?
A: I am attempting to fuse the past and present eras, so I use a wide range of references.
Q: Visually, one of the interesting things about your art is that the character's movements are very fluid-looking and rubbery (and I don't just mean Luffy) in an exciting way. It is similar to what is called the 'squash and stretch' effect in American information. How did you develop this style?
A: I just love the movements of Tom and Jerry.
Q: Who is your favorite villain in the series? How did you put them together?
A: Buggy the Pirate. I just threw him together.
Q: One of the interesting things about One Piece is that the battles are really bloody, but hardly anyone ever dies. Is this part of the characters' super human powers, or do you feel that if people were dying left and right it'd change the tone of the happy-go-lucky tone of the manga?
A: It's important what impression people will take away after reading manga. Even if peace is attained after battle, if there are dead people, it doesn't feel good, so I don't like it. I think one of the good things about manga is that you're forgiven if you let your characters survive situations which would have killed real people.
Q: In your question-and-answer sections and artists? comments in your books you have a crazy, weird, irreverent sense of humor. Do you think it expresses a side of yourself you can't get away with in the actual manga? How do you balance the 'weirdness level' with the classic shonen elements of yujo, doryuoko, shori (friendship, perseverance, victory)?
A: With regards to the reader's corner, it's not that I'm weird, but that questions that come in are bizarre, (laughs) In any case, there are a lot of questions posed to me in the fan letters, so I just want to respond to them as much as I can, making a forum for light hearted exchanges between the readers and author. So, I don't really think about it too deeply.
Q: You're the number 1 manga artist in Japan, and you're still young. Do you think in 100 years people will think of One Piece as your life's work, or is it just one of the many manga that you plan to draw in the future?
A: I don't intend to continue this for so long that it would be considered my life's work, but I do think it will become the representative work of my manga. There are more things other than manga I'd like to do in the future.
Q: What advice would you give to someone who wants to become a manga artist?
A: All you need to draw a manga is paper and a pen. As for the rest, it's a world where the toughest survive, Good Luck.
Q: What if that person decides to become a manga artist by going from America to Japan in a rowboat and applying to be your assistant?
A: First of all, I would suggest that they become a boat racing competitor, and then if they still say they insist on becoming my assistant, I would first have them learn Japanese. I can't speak English.