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First I should explain why I use different titles when describing the same thing. The original Japanese title of the manga was Berusaiyu no Bara, which translated into English means The Rose of Versailles. However, because of the long title, this manga is called simply Berubara by the Japanese fans. This is also what I prefer to call it.
The shoujo manga are created mostly by woman artists for girls and young women. This genre was launched by Osamu Tezuka (with the work Ribon no kishi Eng. Knight of the Ribbon in 1954) as longer, more in depth stories combining drama, adventure, tragedy, fantasy, humor and romance.
While in the 50ies the majority of the shoujo manga were created by male artists, a flood of women artists appeared between 1967 and 1969. These became known as the "Nijuuyo-nen Gumi Eng. Fabulous Forty-Niners" - most of them being born in 1949. Among these was also the mangaka (the artist that draws manga) Riyoko Ikeda. They expanded the thematic area of the shoujo manga, experimented with new styles and also took older readers in consideration. The strongest and most important characteristic of the shoujo manga are the subtle interpersonal relations, mood and setting and the importance of the emphasis of relationships over action.
It is often stated, that it was Riyoko Ikeda-sama's work Berusaiyu no Bara (The Rose of Versailles) that set of the shoujo manga boom in 1972.
Berubara is a classical manga in Japan and everyone knows it. Though it is old, it has never lost its charm or its value. It is reprinted on a regular basis and easy to find in Japan.
It first appeared in Weekly Margaret at the Shueisha publishing house in the spring of 1972. It ran for 82 weeks into the autumn of the year 1973. It was the first manga with a historical background ever published and its future was uncertain. The author, Ms Riyoko Ikeda herself said she had to struggle with the publishers for her work. But it became very popular, not only with young girls, but also with adult women, and was published as a collection of nine, ten, five or two books (1881 pages - the authors comments excluded). All editions carry also some coloured manga style pictures, either on the covers or inside.
Two volumes have been translated into English by Frederick L. Schodt, but they should be difficult to locate. I managed to obtain a copy of both books with some search and I think some copies should still be available somewhere in Japan. You can look at the pictures of the two covers here. This translation unfortunately only reaches the part where André discloses his feelings for Oscar to Rosalie (after Oscar dances with Marie Antoinette) and quite a number of scenes has also been left out, though mostly such, that are not of vital importance to the understanding of the plot. There are also some pages in his book Manga! Manga! The world of Japanese Comics which is said to be quite easy to find.
The manga has also been translated into Italian two times (1983/84 and 1993/94). What is interesting is that both translations are very different and that the first, that was published in a girls'-magasine has been heavily censured. That was also the edition that was completely colored.
Details about other translations are still being collected.
Of course the best is still to look for the original! The artwork in the original is wonderful and if you know the story of the anime, the understanding of the manga should not be too much of a problem. The story, as told in the manga, is much longer and more complicated, developing various side motives and dealing with the main characters far more in-depth than the anime. While the anime allowed André to be physically present more, it changed the characters a lot. Also, many events have been added, or left out for that matter. And what is most important: comparing to the manga, the love story between Oscar and André lacks romance and the whole story is much less dramatic. Furthermore the anime broke the coherence of the original story: while happenings are interwined in the manga and new characters are appearing all the time, the anime looks a lot as if it had been devided into chapters, each handling a certain middle event of the story.
The manga is in every way my favourite and in my opinion, everyone who call themselves fans of Berusaiyu no Bara, should own a copy of the manga. Even if in black white drawings it is a truly beautiful work, that does not take knowledge of the Japanese language (though it helps) to make one laugh or cry.
There have also 4 Berusaiyu no Bara side stories been drawn by Riyoko Ikeda-sama later. The happening is placed in the original manga just before André loses his eye. The main characters are Ruru-chan (Oscar's little cousin - from the vampire manga), Oscar and André. There are many new characters being introduced, besides the old-side characters. Marie Antoinette hardly appears. The story is drawn in the Eroica-style (unfortunately). There's not much I can say about the content (Sorry, I do not understand Japanese), except that Ruru-chan is helping to disclose some evil plan some nuns had... Thigi-chan, thanx for giving me this book!
In 1976 an Berusaiyu no Bara artbook has also been published by Shueisha, containing many colour portraits of Oscar, Marie Antoinette, some scenes from the manga and some pictures of Oscar and André together. The pictures are too wonderful to describe. The book also conatines a report from Versailles and Ikeda-sama's trip to the USSR aswell as many pages of detailes about the manga (André's birthday and Oscar's measurements are among these - aven a picture of Oscar taking a bath). I guess this book is today virtually imposible to find. I had the luck of meeting a wonderfull person, Tomoko Yonemoto, who gave me hers as a present. Arigatou gozaimasu Tomoko-san!
Unfortunately, for someone who lives outside Japan and is not used to using the www-resources yet, it might be difficult to find the manga. This is why I took a look in the Web and found some people, who will buy mangas for you in Japan and then send it to you. Take a look at these manga agents. There is also a list of shops that helped me find Berubara related stuff and I think they are all reliable, but above all, you can contact them all by mail.
This is just to expand our common knowledge a little. The manga are divided into several groups: shonen (boys'), shoujo (girls'), seinen (young men's), redisu (ladies') and seijin (adult, mostly men's erotic manga).
Page crated and maintained by Shrinemaster; elite of the Rose Clan