The Rose of Versailles

The setting is in France, before and during the French Revolution. The main character of the series is the young, flighty Queen of France, Marie Antoinette; however, later a woman named Oscar François de Jarjayes temporarily became a co-protagonist until her death.

Oscar's father, General Jarjayes, despaired over never getting a son (he had six daughters), and decided to raise his youngest daughter as a man. He trained her well in the arts of fencing, horsemanship and medieval combat. Oscar often practiced her skills with her best friend, companion and (technically) servant, André Grandier, whom she almost always defeated. André is the grandson of her nanny and thus they spent most of their time together in harmonic friendship; near the end of the story, this friendship blossoms into mutual love.

Oscar is the commander of the Royal Guard and responsible for the safety of Marie Antoinette, as well as the rest of the royal family. The story revolves around Oscar's growing realization of how France is governed, and the plight of the poor. Another important storyline is the love story between Marie Antoinette and the Swedish Count Axel von Fersen. The affair between the two is the subject of rumours through all of France, endangering the Queen's reputation and driving Oscar to request the Count to leave the country.

After the Count decides to leave and sign up for the American war of independence, Marie Antoinette becomes lovesick. She spends money in excess - expensive jewellery and clothes, attending balls every other night - to distract herself from pining for the only man she loved. This, in turn, weighs on the taxpayers of France, and poverty spreads throughout the country due to Marie Antoinette's squandering of money. Both the Affair of the Diamond Necklace and the appearance of the infamous Gabrielle de Polastron, comtesse de Polignac are central plot events taken from history, as well as the French Revolution and the fall of the Bastille – all given interesting interpretations through the fictional character Oscar and her companions.

On July 14, 1789, the Taking of the Bastille, the crowds rebel but lack strategy, giving the military the advantage and making themselves easy target for cannon fire. However, Oscar and the regiment B then arrive to help organize the insurgents. During the following fierce battle, Oscar is shot and killed, but the Bastille eventually falls, symbolically striking down the French monarchy. After the Bastille is taken, the revolutionaries burst into the Palace searching for Marie Antoinette and her family. Many guards are killed and the royal family taken prisoner. Big trials are started for Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, but finally, both are declared guilty and guillotined.

Ikeda's editors were opposed to her idea of a biography of Marie Antoinette, and only its popularity among readers kept The Rose of Versailles in publication. Ikeda had read Stefan Zweig's biography of Marie Antoinette in high school, and the main character is the queen. Oscar was created as a supporting character, but she eclipsed Marie Antoinette in popularity and due to reader feedback became a co-protagonist only until her death.[4] Ikeda was influenced by second-wave feminist ideas when creating The Rose of Versailles, using the French Revolution to depict the "inner revolution of the Japanese women" at that time.[5]

The Rose of Versailles is currently 14th on the list of all-time best-selling shōjo manga, having sold a grand total of 15 million volumes worldwide[26] and 12 million in Japan only,[27] a "nation-wide best seller".[28] In terms of circulation per volume, it is in fourth place with an average of 1,500,000 sales per volume. It is not well known in North America (except in Quebec) due to its age and lack of publicity, but remains a treasured classic in Japanese manga. The anime was ranked in the top 50 of a list of favourite anime series in 2005.[29] So far, the manga and anime have been translated into Arabic, Turkish, Korean, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Indonesian and Chinese. The "immense popularity" of the 1974 Takarazuka musical gained widespread attention, including academic attention, for not only Rose of Versailles, but for the field of shōjo manga.[30] The research that went into the setting of Rose of Versailles led some teachers to use it in their classrooms and purchase it for their school libraries, which was a "Japanese educational first". The popularity of the manga also created a boom in the study of the French language and made France, particularly Versailles a popular tourist destination for Japanese travellers.[31]

Moto Hagio believes the popularity of The Rose of Versailles influenced publishers to routinely collect serialized manga in paperback format.[32]

Susan J. Napier has described the court of The Rose of Versailles as being "a particularly good example of idealized Western Otherness".[33] Tierney says that the aesthetics of The Rose of Versailles cannot be described as purely Japanese or Western.[34] Deborah Shamoon says that Rose of Versailles can be used to track the development of shōjo manga from being "a genre for children to being one for older readers". The bloody end of the main characters, while shocking, also whet the audience's appetite for more serious stories.[35] Shamoon sees the Oscar-André relationship as very different from the Cinderella-Prince Charming stories which "dominated" shōjo manga in the 1960s, where the female protagonist would lose her identity to her boyfriend. Shamoon considers that the Oscar-André relationship follows the pattern of pre-war dōseiai shōjo novels, which featured same-sex love between girls.[36] Kazuko Suzuki says that after RoV, "several works" were created with "nonsexual" female protagonists like Oscar, who realize their "womanness" upon falling in love.[37]

The Rose of Versailles is famous for having the first "bed scene" in manga that was depicted by a woman,[38] which has had a "profound impact" on female readers,[39] including fan criticism of the adaptation of this scene to the anime.[40] Yukari Fujimoto has said that "for us junior and senior high school girls at that time, our concept of sex was fixed by that manga".[39]

• Buruma, Ian (1983) Behind the Mask: On Sexual Demons, Sacred Mothers, Transvestites, Gangsters, Drifters, and Other Japanese Cultural Heroes
• Schodt, Frederik L. (1983) Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics
• Protoculture Addicts issue 45, pages 17–27, May–June 1997.
• Jason Thompson Manga The Complete Guide

• The Rose of Versailles (manga) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
• TMS anime official webpage (in Japanese)
• Shueisha's manga official webpage (in Japanese)
• Riyoko Ikeda's Official Site
• "Making History: The Rose of Versailles" -(ANN)