May 1990 Pt.6 Nippon Shuppan Hanbai USA INC

Having just found paperwork (sorry hard copies) from Nippon Shuppan Hanbai USA INC .(Books Nippan) buried among reams of correspondence in a few tightly packed surviving boxes, finding more fragments from May 1990 for you the reader to ponder over.

It was about this time I joined the B.N.A.F.C. (Books Nippan Animation Fan Club) that gave you discounts on what the company was selling [much like Manga video did in the UK later in the 90's].

My Membership of Books Nippan Animation Fan Club Paid $12 (invoice 04.18/1990) - Membership Card 05/90 to 06/91.

I had seen their advertisement in April's issue of 'Protoculture Addicts' fanzine of their subtitled Japanese Animation on VHS 'GUNBUSTER Vol. 1' and ' DANGAIOH' a first for Anime to the direct-to-home American market, to be released January 1990 by U.S. Renditions. 

 

[NOTE: According the internet (post 2000) GUNBUSTER Vol. 1 was released in March 1990. But I can not confirm this.]

U.S. Renditions was the Special Projects Division of Books Nippan, the American branch of Nippon Shuppan Hanbai, the only UK connection being the shop in London 'Books Nippon' that I knew of at the time.

 The B.N.A.F.C. Had a leap in membership from about 1000 to 4000 members in just a short space of time, that triggered a re-organisation of their mail-ordering department to harmonise to meet the new demand for goods. 

Looking at BOOKS NIPPAN's Newsletter #8 - (copyright Shinji Aramaki IDOL/ARTMIC 1985) Previous newsletters were originally to come out Yearly. Can you imagine waiting 12 months or more for News and feedback from a distributor of Anime, that's breaking into a new market!?

[NOTE: U.S. Renditions Update “Work continues on the new English subtitled videos for 1991. The original U.S. Renditions production team along with new translators Toshfumi Yoshida and Trish Ledoux (Editors of ANIMAG Magazine) are currently (late 1990\early 1991) projecting an April 1991 release for 'GUNBUSTER Vol. 2', and APPLESEED, GUNBUSTER Vol. 2 which contains episodes 3 & 4 will also have the “Science Classroom II” which was cut out of 'GUNBUSTER Vol. 1' due to length of time considerations.]

  [NOTE: Sometime during June or July will be the Release of 'GUNBUSTER Vol. 3 and Black Magic M-66. ( There are currently other projects being discussed for FALL 1991 release.).] 

February 1990 Pt2. Japanese Anime Magazines

The fruits of establishing a rapport with a little Japanese book shop called 'Books Nippon' (Nippon Shuppan Hanbai) based in London.

Not reading a word of Japanese did nothing to hinder my enthusiasm for Anime and Manga, and with no monthly English magazines being produced at the time, you needed to go to the source, and there were a few Japanese magazine focusing on Anime. 

 

'Animage',

'Animedia',

'Anime V' (New Video Magazine.),

'Newtype' (the moving pictures magazine.).

In picking up an issue of each of the most popular 4 magazines, I then decided to selected 3 of the magazines for mail-order subscription to test the water so to speak, and see what all the fuss was about!

[Note: at a off the self cost of £7.99 then and at today's value (inflation) would be £15.38 each.]

[UPDATE: February 2023 £7.99 is worth £23.24 today.]

[Note: Little did I know at the time, that 'Animage' ran the infrequent serialization of the comic-book 'Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind' - Written and illustrated by Hayao Miyazaki, one of my all time favourites! - What a fool]

https://www.in2013dollars.com/uk/inflation/1990?amount=7.99

What you could find!

What could you find in the shops, and how to get items from Japan!

Armed with numerous scraps of information on Artists and Writers of manga, Publishers and Animation studios, and above all else, an inquiring mind, it was time to “let your fingers do the walking” and see who in the Phone Book had a Japanese connection. The London capital is sure to have some shops, and I could always write to the Japanese Embassy

[Telephone Directory (commonly known as “the Phone book”) was a regional book with hundreds of white pages listing individuals and businesses who had phone (land-line) listed in alphabetic order with an addresses. Each city would have held one or two copies of the other cites and counties Phone books in your Central Library]

Back in the late 80's in to the mid 90's London had its far share of Japanese book shops, one that I found was behind St. Paul's Cathedral called 'Books Nippon' (whose parent company was Nippon Shuppan Hanbai) [look it up!], another book shop I encountered was 'OCS Books' (Overseas Courier Service – that did bespoke logistical Worldwide delivery). You could subscribe and have delivered Japanese Anime magazines to your door, and even ask them to hunt down the 'trade paperbacks' of popular Japanese comic books [a must for collectors] if you had enough details for them to go on.

 

 

 [remember No online shops, or google to help you get what you were after!].