[Exclusive] Interview with Kore Yamazaki, creator of The Ancient Magus' Bride

The Ancient Magus' Bride mangaka – Kore Yamazaki has recently attended the Comic Fiesta 2017. The highly praised fantasy shonen manga has garnered international attention with its peculiar characters and story line. We caught up with the creator herself and she shared her inspiration derives from the works of J. K. Rowling but mainly she expressed Diana Wynne Jones, the author of Howls Moving Castle has shaped her own way of story telling. Additionally, Yamazaki mentioned that reading the works of Manga artist - Minagi Tokuichi has jump start her path towards creating her own manga. When asked if she would like to see other adaptations of her manga and her views on the recent release anime version of  The Ancient Magus' Bride, she explained that there were plenty of consultation and creation on her part of the anime, but the publication house is the one who gets the say whether it turns to animation, live-action or novelization. The main focus of her is to get the manga up and running. She does however gets a say in setting the story in the anime version, such as backgrounds, colors scheme and the characters voices. However she did not specifically pick out a certain voice actor, but she knew what type of voice goes with certain characters. 

With a on-going manga series, Kore Yamazaki expressed that as she goes on drawing, she tends to forget the older scenes because whenever she draws up a new scene, Yamazaki has a mindset “Every time I draw something new, it has to be my best work”. If she would to pick her best drawn scene currently, she have a soft spot for the dragon story arc. When asked about the most difficult part of drawing, she shares that the process of drawing and bringing her ideas to life in which satisfy her is the most difficult process she had to go through. In addition, the mangaka disciplines herself to keep on drawing on a daily basis because there’s a possibility that she may forget how to draw. From the beautifully drawn manga, it is true when she mentioned how she enjoys drawing the landscapes and scenery. When creating the manga, it was build up from all the different stories she has read. The relationship between a human and a non-human on paper for her is a lot easier because since they have nothing in common, therefore she adds there’s much to build from. Comparing to a human to human relationship, there’s a certain kind of basis of the characters, but if you take that away, it becomes an interesting story in which builds up the narrative. 

With The Ancient Magus' Bride garnering international attention, she’s grateful for the well reception from overseas and stating it acts a good drive for her because originally the manga is catered for the Japanese’s taste. Kore Yamazaki expressed her sincere gratitude on how the foreign readers takes in the story well and how it transcends beyond language.