John Lennon manga
“Astro Boy Pocket Biography: John Lennon” is a manga (Japanese comic) about the life of John Lennon of the Beatles. It’s a children’s biography comic that I picked up in Japan. Astro Boy introduces the story.
IMPORTANT: This comic is scanned in 2-page spreads. Japanese comics are read right-to-left. In other words, follow the speech bubbles for the right page of the spread and THEN the left page in right-to-left, counter-clockwise fashion. Click the thumbnails to see larger images.
Some of the pages are in color, while others are in B&W. This is how the original work was published.
Sorry about the changes in font and style…it took me a while to find a good program for editing the images that worked fast enough.
Important Note: please do not distribute this translation for profit or without linking back to this page. This could jeopardize the future of the project. Also, please do not take any images from this page without visibly and discreetly crediting Recca Phoenix.
Note: if you want to buy this manga in Japanese, it is available here at amazon.co.jp.
Last update: 6/14/10 – Uploaded Chapter 2: The Rebel and Q&A #2.
Sections:
- Prologue
- Chapter 1: My Wounded Heart (birth – age 5)
- Q&A #1: What type of place is Liverpool?
- Chapter 2: The Rebel (age 11 – 15) and Q&A#2
- Chapter 3: Meetings and Goodbyes (age 17-21)
- Q&A #3: What is a “Live House”?
- Chapter 4: Fame – Light and Shadow (age 21-22)
- Q&A #4: Just how popular were the Beatles?
- Chapter 5: Love and Peace (age 22-40)
- John and Yoko’s Love Song: Love and Peace
- The rest of the segments are mostly textual information (not manga) on John’s friends, what was going on in the world while he was alive, and his influence. Not really all that exciting, so I won’t translate them.
October 31, 2007 at 8:20 pm
[…] Lennon manga – 1st page up! PLUS, Tezuka’s MW (ムウ) See the John Lennon manga page for more […]
April 5, 2008 at 7:47 pm
OMG I never knew about this. Thank you for translating it!
February 21, 2009 at 6:15 pm
This is so awesome….! Which volume of Astro Boy is this in? I wanna see if I can find it somewhere…
Thanks so much for scanning, and please post more pages =)
February 21, 2009 at 9:56 pm
It’s not in a volume of Astro Boy, it’s a stand-alone paperback from the “Tetsuwan Atomu Pocket Biography” series, only available in Japan.
September 3, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Cool site, love the info.
June 21, 2010 at 3:29 pm
You’re doing a wonderful job by translating this manga! Thank you so much.
July 18, 2010 at 9:59 am
Hello! Thanks for your scanlations, seeing Lennon in a manga sure is exciting, and Astro Boy is my favorite hero ever, it was a cute surprise.
Can I share the chapters with my friends? (surely linking back here and with proper credits). Thanks again ^^
October 25, 2010 at 10:44 am
Yes, feel free to share via link and credits. But no profiteering 😉
August 28, 2010 at 10:22 pm
Hello! I just had to leave a comment to tell you how much I enjoy your John Lennon manga! Your an absolutely incredible artist and you capture all the obstacles John faced in his childhood. Please continue to upload! 🙂
October 25, 2010 at 10:43 am
I’m sorry, but I didn’t write this manga! I only translated it. It was written by the very talented Yuiko Asano and Jun Watabe. I’m glad you enjoy it, though.
October 16, 2010 at 12:42 pm
Wow, always very good to find out other persons from the hole world in my searching, I really appreciate the time it should have taken to put together this great site. kind regards
January 27, 2011 at 2:25 am
keep up the good work on the site. Do like it! :p Could use some more frequent updates, but i am sure that you have got better or other things to do like we all do. 😉
January 31, 2011 at 6:50 am
Hi Rebecca, I am an italian music journalist, editor at Rolling Stone magazine, italian oissue, and a Beatles’ fan. Surfin’ in the web I found your blog and the news about the Astro boy manga about John Lennon. Please can you help becaue I don’t read/write japanese and I would like to add that book to my collection. I mean, eìwhere can i buy it, the original japanese version? Thnaks a lot, i will appreciate. ciao. f.
February 10, 2011 at 1:36 am
some times its a pain in the ass to read what blog owners wrote but this internet site is very user pleasant! .
February 22, 2011 at 9:44 pm
thanks 4 sharing this
i would love to know how it ends (yes, i know what happened on dec8th), the 75-80 years with his child are my favorites
July 5, 2011 at 7:56 pm
Hey not to steal, but to spread, do you think i could upload this to my deviant art page? i’ll credit you for everything 😀 i’ll even post the link to your blog on my page. 😀
September 13, 2011 at 6:22 am
Love your work! Big fan of Lennon and Tezuka.
Greetings from Belgium.