Reading Dai-sensei ( 「大先生」を読む ) is a manga by Fujio Akatsuka and Fujio Pro, which ran in Shueisha's seinen magazine Big Comic Original from 1986 to 1989.
Overview[]
The mysterious Dai-sensei (lit. "Great Master"/"Great Author") is a smart but selfish, serious, and demanding man who is well-known for his writings. This title revolves around the life and writings of this man, and the conversations and antics he gets into with other professionals around him.
Akatsuka's editor in Big Comic at the time, Yoichiro Hayashi, was immortalized as the "Hayashi-kun" editor that brings Dai-sensei the proposal for his new "Reading Dai-sensei" series. Other real-life writers and editors also get some form of appearance in the series, including Shotaro Ishinomori who Akatsuka had also parodied via having himself originally credited as "Fujio Akanotsuka".
Characters[]
Dai-sensei[]
Our protagonist. His most notable trait is the smoke that almost always surrounds his head from his pipe-smoking habit, and he doesn't like this smoke being displaced (to reveal that he is bald with one hair, ala Chibita, though this hair often gets pulled out). He is harsh and strict to most around him, including his wife, but is prized for his great ideas.
Hayashi[]
Dai-sensei's editor-in-chief, who works with him on developing a new series.
Oota[]
Another writing professional, seen the most in company with Dai-sensei after Hayashi. He is a tall, long-faced man often wearing a beanie cap on his head.
Nagasaki[]
A rather eerie-faced writer in Dai-sensei's group, who once comes to him with the revelation of being haunted by ghosts (one of which, Kaoru, takes up residence in Dai-sensei's smoke).
Horie[]
A scrawny, nerdy-looking professional among Dai-sensei's group. He can also be seen to cameo in Yarasete-ojisan.
Jo Reino[]
A character that appears for a few chapters in the manga, in an arc revolving around the disparity between him and Dai-sensei. Jo Reino was once an attractive yet manipulative classmate of Dai-sensei in high school, who often copied his work to get credit. In the present day, he is living as a homeless man and entirely filthy and shabby, yet has amassed great knowledge and talent that gets Dai-sensei highly jealous. This leads to Dai-sensei attempting to live on the street in an attempt to get the talent that Jo has, only for things to go haywire.
Serialization[]
- Big Comic Original: #21 for 1986 to 1989 #24
Reprints[]
- Koshinsha: 1 volume (2001)
- Shogakukan: 2 volumes as part of the "Fujio Akatsuka Complete Works" DVD-ROM set (2002)
- eBookJapan: 3 volumes