Promo!

Moeru Classic Heroine Collection

October 9th, 2010, 9:00PM by nat | 4 comments

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 26

Moeru Classic Heroine Collection is a compilation of illustrations featuring girls from famous, and sometimes not so famous literary works. I found myself at a loss in recognizing many of these characters on sight, but at least I can recognize the artists! Moeru Classic Heroine Collection actually features a lot of the same artists from last year's Moeru Japanese Sword Girls and has a very similar layout and style.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 1 Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 2

Moeru Classic Heroine Collection is B5 sized and 128-pages. It's in full color, and all the illustrations are either printed on a full page or a two page spread. The cover illustration is by Kishida Mel, and there is actually another variation on that illustration inside in a rough, unfinished style. It was likely one of the alternate covers proposed.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 3Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 4Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 5

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 6Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 7Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 10

I was really hesitant about picking this up at first because there were only 29 artists included, and from recent books, I assumed that would mean 29 illustrations. But a lot of the artists had two illustrations apiece, so there are a total of 44 illustrations in Moeru Classic Heroine Collection. Most recognizable above are the illustrations of Pipi Longstocking by Taiyou and Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz by Midori Foo. And of course, Alice in Wonderland by Kishida Mel, which was reprinted inside without text. Jyuu Ayakura's illustration features Ann from Ann of Green Gables.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 9 Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 8

Beside each illustration is a page with author, book and character information, along with a bit of a story summary. Above is also the other Alice in Wonderland picture in the book, by Momiji Mao.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 11Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 12Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 13

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 14Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 15Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 16

Refeia's second illustration in the book is Cosette from Les Miserables. Fuzi Choko, who also had an illustration in the recent Railway Girls and Scenery Pictorial Book depicts the heroine from Taketori Monogatari Kaguya-hime. At the end of each section is a fantasy depiction of a girl writing, like the one by Masakichi above. Artists' names and websites are included in each photo description, so just click any picture for more information.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 18 Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 22

Moeru Classic Heroine Collection had an impressive variety of illustrators, with ones that I'd previously overlooked but caught my eye this time around. Both of the above illustrations are by Maguchimo. The characters depicted are Mark Twain's Joan of Arc and Joe Haldeman's heroine from The Forever War, Marygay Potter. Not exactly what first comes to mind when you think classic literary heroines, but definitely more entertaining.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 20Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 21Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 24

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 28Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 29Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 30

Hisakata Souji's illustration above depicts a heavenly Beatrice from The Divine Comedy by Dante. And Hagiwara Rin takes on the original Mai Hime (舞姫) heroine Ellis. There are so many interesting character depictions, it's really worth taking the time to look through and learn about them.

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 31 Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 32

Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 33 Moeru Classic Literary Heroine Collection - 35

Towards the end, mini author biographies are provided. For some of the Japanese authors included, their real life dwellings and memorials were photographed. The artist index is nicely organized, with illustrations grouped per artist and short comments provided. Though I was hesitant at first to get Moeru Classic Heroine Collection, it turned out to showcase an excellent variety of artists, with a more creative theme than we've been seeing lately in these kinds of books!


  • Title: Moeru Classic Heroine Collection
  • タイトル: 萌える名作文学 ヒロインコレクション
  • Pages: 128
  • Release dates: 09/27/2010
  • Buy: Amazon Japan
Promo!

Comments

Already signed up? Login.
  •  
guest avatar
Anonymous

13 years, 5 months ago

 

The images are 403ing when viewed from Google Reader. Please stop using broken referer blocks.

Avatar for nat
nat

13 years, 5 months ago

 

They're not broken, guess it's an issue on your end ^^

Avatar for Smithy
Smithy

13 years, 5 months ago

 

Looks like a nice book with a very varied mix of different styles.

guest avatar
Anonymous

13 years, 5 months ago

 

Argh! Pages of text in an artbook! My worst nightmare!