Hideko Mizuno

is one of the first successful female Japanese shōjo manga artists. She was an assistant of Osamu Tezuka staying in Tokiwa-sō. She made her professional debut in 1955 with Akakke Kōma Pony, a Western story with a tomboy heroine. She became a prominent shōjo artist in the 1960s and 1970s, starting with White Troika, which serialized in Margaret in 1963.

Mizuno is best known for Fire! (1969–1971), one of the first shōjo manga with a boy protagonist, for which she won the 1970 Shogakukan Manga Award. Her Honey Honey no Suteki na Bouken (1966) was adapted as an anime television series, licensed in English as Honey Honey on CBN Cable Network.

Early life Hideko Mizuno grew up in Shimonoseki. Her father was stationed in Manchukuo during World War II and never returned home afterward. Her mother died young, and thereafter she was cared for by her grandmother and an uncle.

She discovered manga very early: at the age of 8 she read the manga Shin Takarajima by Osamu Tezuka, as well as his book Manga Daigaku , which teaches the basics of manga creation. Thanks to these two books, she took Tezuka as a model and decided to become a mangaka. In 1952, at the age of 12, she regularly contributed to competitions organized by the monthly magazine Manga Shōnen chaired by Tezuka. Although her manga was never accepted, her efforts did not go unnoticed: she received an honorable mention, and publisher Akira Maruyama from Kōdansha took notice. In March 1955, when she was about to leave junior high for work, not wishing to go to high school, she received a letter from Maruyama, an order for a board and two illustrations for the magazine Shōjo Club. At the time, Mizuno was 15 years old.

Career For a year and a half, Mizuno worked at a fishing net factory to make a living and drew for Shōjo Club at the same time. It was the first shōjo manga to depict a romantic relationship. From 1964 to 1965, she published Shiroi Toroika (White Troika), a historical drama set during the Russian Revolution. for which she won the 1970 Shogakukan Manga Award. Mizuno was a fan of progressive rock such as Pink Floyd, and she visited Europe and the United States for research. The work contains characters from different races to reflect the makeup of American society, and it also depicts sex scenes. Mizuno said she "drew the art to express the hippie message, which was to throw away all pretense and be your true self."

Her Honey Honey no Suteki na Bouken (1966) was adapted as an anime television series,

Works Gin no Hanabira, 1958 Hoshi no Tategoto, 1960 Shiroi Troika, 1964 Honey Honey no Suteki na Bouken, 1966 Konnichiwa Sensei = Harō Doku, 1968 Faiyā : Fire, 1969 Yoru no Hana, 1976 Budda to Onna no Monogatari, 1986 Erizabēto, 1996