Blog 3: Free Topic: Junji Ito

 

Junji Ito (伊藤 潤) is Japanese horror mangaka. He was born on 31 july 1963 in Sakashita (a town located at Ena District, Gifu prefecture, Japan). His experience in the horror world began at a very young age. He was influenced by his older sisters. They read Kazuo Umezu (an author of Japanese horror and other manga, as well as a musician and actor) in magazines and consequently he began to read them too. He grew up in Nagano. In the house where he lived the bathroom was at the end of an underground tunnel, where there were spider crickets. Such experiences were later reflected in his works.

Some of his most notable works include Tomie. This manga centers on the titular character: a mysterious, beautiful woman named Tomie Kawakami, identified by her sleek black hair and a beauty mark below her left eye.

"Uzumaki" is one of them too. It's  a three-volume series about a town obsessed with spirals.The series tells the story of the citizens of Kurouzu-cho, a fictional city which is plagued by a supernatural curse involving spirals. The story for Uzumaki originated when Ito attempted to write a story about people living in a very long terraced house, and he was inspired to use a spiral shape to achieve the desired length.