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Del Rey's Middaugh, AX Anthology's Wilson Interviewed
posted on by Heather Skinner
In an August 11 article at Comic Book Resources' Robot 6 blog, Del Rey Manga's associate publisher Dallas Middaugh confirmed that Del Rey's parent company Random House intends to remain in the manga business despite fans concerns that the company would no longer publish manga. Middaugh said that while some of Del Rey's titles have moved into omnibus editions, the publisher is producing the same amount of pages of manga each year.
Middaugh said that since the Del Rey Manga site has been merged with the company's Suvudu site, the web updates on Del Rey Manga have been more frequent. He also confirmed that new graphics novels from Diana Gabaldon, Dean Koontz, GB Tran, and others are expected later this year and early next year. Middaugh did not directly address the status of the remaining untranslated volumes of Nodame Cantabile, Gakuen Prince, and Pumpkin Scissors — all titles that Del Rey had licensed from Kodansha.
Meanwhile, the Graphic Novel Reporter website has posted an interview with Sean Michael Wilson, the co-editor of Top Shelf's AX anthology of alternative manga. In the interview, Wilson talked about AX's cultural relevance in Japan, its perceived image in Japan, its contributions to manga overall, its unique traits, and other topics.
AX (no relation to the Anime Expo convention or Sony Magazines' defunct AX anime magazine) is an anthology of underground manga that Top Shelf licensed in 2008. The 400-page anthology brings diverse works from Japan and translates them for an American audience. AX has featured manga artists such as Suehiro Maruo, Shin'ichi Abe, Usamaru Furuya, and Akino Kondoh among others.
