Thermae Romae, Vol. 1

by Mari Yamazaki (Created by)

Overview

When Roman architect Lucius is criticized for his "outdated" thermae designs, he retreats to the local bath to collect his thoughts. All Lucius wants is to recapture the Rome of earlier days, when one could enjoy a relaxing bath without the pressure of merchants and roughhousing patrons. Slipping deeper into the warm water, Lucius is suddenly caught in the suction and dragged through the drainage at the bottom of the bath! He emerges coughing and sputtering amid a group of strange-looking foreigners with the most peculiar bathhouse customs...over 1,500 years in the future in modern-day Japan! His contemporaries wanted him to modernize, and so, borrowing the customs of these mysterious bath-loving people, Lucius opens what quickly becomes the most popular new bathhouse in Rome-Thermae Romae!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316232227
Publisher:	Yen Press
Publication date:	11/20/2012
Series:	Thermae Romae , #1
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	322,300
File size:	141 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	16 - 18 Years

About the Author

Mari Yamazaki was born in Tokyo on April 20, 1967. At age seventeen, she moved to Italy, where she started studying drawing at an art school in Florence. Yamazaki made her manga debut in 1996 with an autobiographical look at her life in Italy. After bouncing around between Japan, the Middle East, and Italy, she finally settled down in Lisbon, Portugal, in 2003. In 2008, she began drawing Thermae Romae for the monthly magazine Comic Beam on an irregular basis, and the first collected volume was a smash hit upon its 2009 release. In 2010, Thermae Romae received the Manga Taisho Award 2010 and the 14th Osamu Tezuka Cultural Prize, Short Story Award.
Mari Yamazaki currently lives in Chicago with her Italian husband and their son.

Editorial Reviews

Roman architect Lucius Modestus despairs of surviving in 128 CE's cutthroat world of bathhouse design. But as he meditates on his problems while surrounded by relaxing warm water, he's sucked into a hole as if by a vacuum; he comes to in a thermae surrounded by curious, flat-faced people. Somehow Lucius has made it to modern-day Japan, where he's about to get a lesson in bathhouse design that serves him well upon his return home. These mysterious journeys recur whenever a thermae-related problem puzzles him. Lucius never figures out what's happening and his confusion coupled with the Japanese reactions to his sudden appearances give Yamazaki plenty of fodder for playful jabs at both cultures. The series is very popular in Japan and has won two manga awards. VERDICT Amusing, touching, and educational, this book should appeal to adults and older teens interested in culture clashes, classical life, and group bathing customs. The beautifully rendered realistic art evokes Roman sculpture, infusing a degree of seriousness into the sometimes puckish plot. Occasional full male nudity, drawings of phallic objects, plus references to dalliances and homosexuality leave little to the imagination.—M.C.

Library Journal