For students, fans, and scholars alike, this wide-ranging primer on anime employs a panoply of critical approachesWell-known through hit movies likeSpirited Away,Akira, andGhost in the Shell, anime has a long history spanning a wide range of directors, genres, and styles. Christopher Bolton’sInterpreting Animeis a thoughtful, carefully organized introduction to Japanese animation for anyone eager to see why this genre has remained a vital, adaptable art form for decades.Interpreting Animeis easily accessible and structured around individual films and a broad array of critical approaches. Each chapter centers on a different feature-length anime film, juxtaposing it with a particular medium—like literary fiction, classical Japanese theater, and contemporary stage drama—to reveal what is unique about anime’s way of representing the world. This analysis is abetted by a suite of questions provoked by each film, along with Bolton’s incisive responses.Throughout,Interpreting Animeapplies multiple frames, such as queer theory, psychoanalysis, and theories of postmodernism, giving readers a thorough understanding of both the cultural underpinnings and critical significance of each film. What emerges from the sweep ofInterpreting Animeis Bolton’s original, articulate case for what makes anime unique as a medium: how it at once engages profound social and political realities while also drawing attention to the very challenges of representing reality in animation’s imaginative and compelling visual forms.
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