Emma MMF Daily Diary Special: The Emmaverse
The term Emmaverse comes from Mori herself (at least in translation) in the afterword to what was to have been the final volume — volume 7:
Emma, vols. 8, 9, & 10; & Shirley (one-shot)
Writer & Artist: Kaoru Mori
Published by: CMX
Vol. 8
[this cover features a very young Kelly Stownar, with her husband Doug, 1851]
208 (201) pages.
Vintage: 2007. US edition Mar. 2009.
isbn 9781401220709
Vol. 9
[This cover features Dorothea and Wilhelm, whose last name in Mölders, or Mulders, but which is translated in the CMX version as “Meredith”]
224 (206) pages
Vintage: 2007. US edition Jul. 2009
isbn 9781401220716
Vol. 10
[since I’m concentrating on side-stories, that’s the back cover to vol. 10, featuring Arthur Jones and his fellow Eton Prefect, Henry Preston]
240 (228) pages
Vintage: 2008. US edition Dec. 2009
isbn 9781401220723
Shirley
200 (193) pages
Vintage: 2003. US edition Jul. 2008
isbn 9781401217778
[Unlike the Emma Volumes, Shirley is rated by the publisher as “Teen”, not “Teen Plus”]
Original Language: Japanese
Orientation: Right to Left
Translation & Adaptation: Sheldon Drzka
Lettering: Janice Chiang
Design: Larry Berry
Assistant Editor: Sarah Farber
Editor: Jim Chadwick
Publisher’s Rating: Teen Plus, for “Nudity & Suggestive Situations”
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Even restricting myself to just a few scans from each volume, there is a lot of manga to cover and this will be (already has been) an image-heavy post. I’ll start with Shirley, and then we’ll get to the Emma side-stories:
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Though it was published by CMX as a kind of coda or bonus after volume 7 (it came out about 4 months after the “end” of the Emma series) Shirley in fact dates to much earlier — it was published in Japan in 2003, when only 2-3 volumes of Emma were out, and based on both the tone and complexity (or lack thereof, rather) I think it’s safe to say the stories in Shirley either predate Emma or are contemporaneous with the earliest Emma chapters.
Recently (as in just last month, 16 Feb.) Anime News Network posted an article translated from the Japanese reporting Mori’s return to Shirley with at least two new chapters to post in nos. 10 and 11 of Enterbrain’s Fellows! magazine. (I say ‘at least two’ because each magazine installment might just be more than a single chapter each) Fellows! #10 publishes in Japan on April 15, so it’ll be quite some time yet before we know CMX’s plans (if any) regarding the new content.
That said, Shirley as published to date is only 4 chapters, the first 120 pages of so of the volume that bears her name. The basic premise is that over-worked pub owner Bennett Cranley advertises for a live-in maid, and the only response to her ad is from a young orphan girl named Shirley — the background and details of Shirley’s life before she appears on Bennett’s doorstep are left intentionally vague (though she appears to have been previously employed as a domestic… somewhere) but these are the sorts of introductory details that are swept under the carpet in the first 12 pages or so, to make way for the actual story.
The charm of Shirley, as both character and manga, is the dichotomy presented of a 13-year-old maid: seemingly capable as a servant but also emotionally still growing—and needy, though she takes pains to hide it. Bennett Cranley is both an older-sister-figure and foster mother—and employer, let’s not forget that dynamic—and perhaps the most touching part of this too-short story is the simple gift of a doll (soon to be named Marie) from employer to maid.
Following the Shirley chapters are a couple of much more generic maid stories, featuring domestics who must care for both the very young, and the very old. These are pleasant enough, just not much worth writing about; though this guy:
is my new Twitter icon.
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Before I go on about the Emma side-stories, let me just catalogue them all:
Vol 8.
- Two chapters with Doug and Kelly Stownar
- Two chapters with Eleanor Campbell, her sisters, and her new beau.
- A chapter featuring a number of minor characters with little to hold it together past the conceit of the daily newspaper “The Times”
- a home visit by Tasha, one of the Merediths’ maids, to see her large, boisterous family
Vol 9.
- a vignette featuring Erich, the young son of the Meredith’s, and his pet squirrel Theo (in fact, the squirrel gets most of the pages in this one)
- a sweet chapter featuring Dorothea & Wilhelm in bed, savoring a slow, leisurely morning together, interspersed with flashbacks on how the two first met.
- the first meeting of Hakim and William, when both were boys.
- a chapter featuring Polly & Alma (& a number of the other Meredith household servants) and a shopping holiday in the nearby town.
- Two chapters featuring the opera (notably, three singers who perform there) in a side-story that can only be considered tangental, at best, to the main narrative
Vol 10.
- A single chapter featuring another date between William & Emma (remember those two?)
- A flashback to Germany, showing Adele and Maria when they were first hired by the Merediths
- A chapter with Arthur, the Jones’s second son, showing his days at Eton as a Prefect.
- A short chapter—six pages—giving Eleanor Campbell what might just turn out to be her happy ending
- A fun shift toward 4-koma (4 panel gag comic strips) with brief asides featuring nearly all the secondary charaters
- & the final 100 pages, which return to the main story and cap the series with it’s ultimate conclusion — but that’s another Daily Diary.
Most of these asides work just fine on their own; in fact they could have been interspersed thoughout the first seven volumes (especially the flashbacks) with very little effort. They’re included in these last three volumes because that’s the way Mori wrote them — like many of us, she just couldn’t leave these characters, and their lovely Victorian (and pre- and post-Victorian) setting alone.
Very few chapters in these last volumes are ‘necessary’; even the first chapter of Vol 10, actually featuring William and Emma, is just a nice diversion with little to add to either plot or character. Still, Mori’s art is exceptional and the characters are fun. And we also get to see a bit beyond stereotypes of ‘maid’ and ‘gentry’ — each side-story is a different facet, and by shifting the spotlight we get to see how each facet contributes to the gem that is Emma
Aside from the squirrel chapter, which is actually quite beautiful in its depiction of nature
but which struck me as flat (& a tad boring) storywise, each chapter in these 2 1/2 volumes was well worth going out of the way for. Of course, much of this is due to Mori’s care in depicting setting; chapter 5 of vol 8 “The Times” is all about setting: the paper is used both as a narrative device to pull many different character stories together, and also—from typesetting early in the morning to it’s eventual fate as a cleaning accessory the next day—as a way to outline a whole day of Victorian life.
Detail and setting are why we love Mori; though most of her plots are strong enough without the gilding, it is the attention to detail that makes the books a joy and wonder.
In many ways, these side-story chapters were inevitable: after doing years of research, and attempting to draw both servants and gentry as characters, not just stereotypes, there were details and inspirations that just couldn’t be left on the ‘cutting room floor’. The individuals in Mori’s manga demanded more, and thankfully, she (and her editors) thought enough of the original books to actaully write down many of these stories.
In particular, I feel Arthur & Henry’s life at Eton, their rivalry, and eventual role as Prefects would make an excellent spin-off manga (if we could get Mori off of her maid fetish long enough to draw it)
While the ‘original run’ of Emma is already 2 1/2 years old (by US reckoning) these last three volumes are all less than a year old (at time of posting). Volume 10 only released about 4 months ago.
For many of us, who believed the rather prominent “THE END” on page 264 of volume 7
getting any new Emma at all has been a pleasure. I have some other thoughts about both the ending of volume 7, and volume 10, but that is of course the topic of the next Daily Diary post.
To pick a favourite side story, though… well, that’s almost obvious: Vol 9, Chap 8, “On Wings of Song”
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