Akatsuka Fujio

赤塚 不二夫
Akatsuka Fujio
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(September 14, 1935 – August 2, 2008) was a pioneer Japanese artist of comical manga nicknamed the King of Gag Manga. His birth name is 赤塚 藤雄, which is pronounced the same as 赤塚 不二夫. He was born in Rehe, Manchuria, the son of a Japanese military police officer. After World War II, he grew up in Niigata Prefecture and Nara Prefecture. At 19, he moved to Tokyo. While working at a chemical factory, he drew a lot of manga and lived at Tokiwa-so, which is famous for housing many prominent mangaka.

He started his career as a shōjo artist, but in 1958, his manga Nama-chan (ナマちゃん) became a hit, so he became a specialist in comedic manga. He won the Shogakukan Manga Award in 1964 for Osomatsu-kun and the Bungeishunjū Manga Award in 1971 for Tensai Bakabon. Many of his manga feature supporting characters who ended up becoming more popular and more associated with their series than the main character, such as Papa (Tensai Bakabon), Iyami, Chibita (Osomatsu-kun), and Nyarome (Mōretsu Atarō). He is said to have been influenced by Buster Keaton and MAD magazine. In 1965, Akatsuka established his own company, "Fujio Productions Ltd.". In 2000, he even drew manga in braille for the blind.

In April 2002 he was hospitalized for intra-axial hematoma and was frequently said to be in a persistent vegetative state from 2004 until his death. In July 2006, his second wife, Machiko, who had been nursing him, suddenly died from a subarachnoid hemorrhage. On August 2, 2008, he died of pneumonia at a hospital in Bunkyō, Tokyo.