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Sasei San's life has not changed for almost eighty years. She her husband, and children live together with her parents. She spends most of her time keeping house, as most postwar Japanese women do. Her children have not aged. She will stay twenty four forever.
Today's Spotlight is on Sasai San. Sasai San is the main character of the longest running cartoon or animated drawing television program in history. Her name Sasaisan gives the program its title Sasai San. She represents a simpler time for Japanese people, but the main character's history is anything but simple. Created during a difficult time in Japan's history, Sasai San was part of a wave of changes that transformed the country itself.
Machiko Hasegawa was a Japanese artist. She made manga stories with drawn pictures and words. She also created Sasai San. Born in nineteen twenty Hassegawa was a strange girl in Japanese society, most women were expected to be gentle. Their mothers trained them that men were in charge, but Hasegawa did not like to obey the rules. By the time she was fourteen, Hassegawa had decided she would have her own career. She was going to make a living creating manga.
Hasse Gowa's courage helped her succeed. She published her first manga or story cartoon, called Badjamasque, when she was still a teenager, but Sasaisan was her first major success. First published in nineteen forty six, the manga explores the home life of the main character. Unlike the sasaisan of today, Hassegwa's first manga explored life in modern Japan.
Sazai San's Japan was a very complicated place. Much of the country's traditional culture held great importance, but the Second World War had just ended. Japan was on the losing side. Its defeat forced many changes in Japanese culture. The United States and Europe brought different technology and ideas. Philip Lu studied these changes and taught about them.
He said, the nineteen fifties were very disorganized, changing times. They subjected the Japanese people to shifts in beliefs and changes in old ideals.
One of the greatest changes was a shift toward democracy. The new Japan promised that everyone would have the right to vote on their government. This included women, who had very few rights in traditional Japanese culture. Though Sazai San was still traditional in many ways, its main character was a good example of a free Japanese woman. Sometimes she worked outside of the house to make money. She made her opinions known, especially to her husband.
Hasegawa's original manga also examined other changes in everyday life. In one Sasai San is waiting in line for rations, a small amount of food given to people in times of hardship. This was a real situation many Japanese people lived through during the war.
While Sazai San contained many of these situations, it was not about them. At its center. The manga was about f family and the humor that comes from it. It showed the difficulty of everyday life in Japan, but it also gave readers a way to laugh at themselves and their situation. Hassegwa worked through the seriousness of her age, but she understood it through laughter.
Hassegwa's manga changed her life. Soon after she first published Saseei San, the manga became a national sensation. Everyone knew about and read Sasei San. By the time Hassegawa retired in nineteen seventy six, she was the best known female manga artist in the country. Sasei San is still one of the best selling manga of all time.
Machiko Hasegawa died in name nineteen ninety two, but her creation would last much longer, and it would change in ways that Hasseigwa could never have expected. Shortly before she retired, the company Fuji Television talked to Hasseigawa. They requested her permission to make a television program based on the manga. The show, also called Sasai San, first aired in nineteen sixty nine. It has been running ever since.
At first, the Sasai San show was very similar to the manga, but it was different in one very important way. It stopped being about modern life. Its showrunners. The directors and creators of the show wanted Sasai San to be as close as possible to the original Jano manga, so its characters did not change much. Even today, Sasei San's main character has the same haircut that was popular in the nineteen forties and fifties. The show's family does not
use modern technology. The family all still lives together. This is different than most current Japanese families.
The Sasaisan show was most popular in the nineteen seventies, but even today it holds a wide viewership. Many of its viewers are older sixty years old or more. For many of these people, watching Sasaisan is like looking into the past. Japan has changed even more since the manga was published. The show offers comforting memories. It is a reminder of a time when things seemed simpler. Deborah Shamoun is a teacher at the National University of Singapore. She told The New York.
Times Sasai San is like a box where you store memories. It has become a warm, colored memory of how things used to be.
The Sazai San show is not just popular with old people. The television series makes the past seem like a pleasant place. Some younger viewers are drawn to the sense of happiness it gives. Watching this show is like comforting yourself with a warm blanket. But its current popularity can be explained by one Japanese word, natsuka Shi. Erika Hobart is a writer whose family is Japanese.
She explains in Japan, nats Kashi is a reminder that you are lucky to have had the experiences you have had in life. You cannot return to those experiences, but this makes these memories even more touching.
Sasai San's show creates this feeling of Natsukashi in viewers. It is recognizing the life you have lived. Japan's population is aging, Fewer young people are being born each year. Not as many people watch the show, but as long as there are people who remember, there will be people who watch Sasai Sa. This may be why the show
is the longest running animated television show in history. It helps people feel happy about what they have done, and it lets younger people dream of a simpler, easier time.
Midori Kato is a voice actor. She has been the voice of Sasai Sun since she was in her twenties. She has a different theory about why the show is so popular. She told The New York Times.
This is the worst thing people are afraid of.
All women say this is good. The characters live forever.
Holding on to something which remains the same can be a comfort in a constantly changing modern world Sasai San and her story offers Japanese audiences the joy of an earlier time of life.
What makes you happy about the things you have experienced? What creates natsukashi for you? A good memory of an earlier time in your life. We want to hear your thoughts. You can leave a comment on our website at www dot Spotlight English dot com. You can also find us on YouTube, Facebook, TikTok, Blue Sky, and x. You can also get our programs delivered directly to your Android or Apple device through our free official Spotlight English app.
The writer of this program was Dan Christman. The producer was Michyo Ozaki. The voices you heard were from the United States and the United Kingdom. All quotes were adapted for this program and voiced by Spotlight. This program is called Sasa is sa. Life never changes.
We hope you can join us again for the next Spotlight program. Goodbye,