Who is Yoshihiro Togashi?

Yoshihiro Togashi

is a famous manga artist born on April 27, 1966 in Yamagata, Japan. Manga are Japanese comics which are popular worldwide, but more well known in Japan. Togashi began drawing manga casually in elementary school and in high school he joined an art club to get better at drawing. He later went to college at Yamagata University to be a teacher. During his college years, Togashi sent some of his manga that he wrote and drawn to a famous manga magazine publisher in Japan called Weekly Shonen Jump. In 1986, at just the age of 20, he received an award for one his manga works titled "Buttobi Straight (ぶっとびストレート)." The award Togashi received was the “most prestigious award for new manga in Japan.” Togashi later on gave up on being a teacher after he won another award for his manga Jura no Miduki (ジュラのミヅキ). When Togashi was in his last year of college, he was contacted by an editor of Weekly Shonen Jump, the famous manga magazine publisher where Togashi had published his manga, and was asked if he could move to Tokyo and that is where his career started to begin. (Togashis comments on other works)


From November 1987 to April 1989, Togashi wrote one shots and on May 1st, 1989, Togashi published Ōkami Nante Kowakunai!! (狼なんて怖くない!!) in Weekly Shonen Jump which was his first time to be featured in the magazine. Shueisha later published all the one shots in one volume

which sadly isn't licensed in the U.S. but is available digitally for purchase in Japanese at:
https://bookwalker.jp/de8c9444b5-13f1-4858-8338-e01fe995d76b

From July 11, 1989 to February 27, 1990, Togashi had written and drawn another manga called Ten de Showaru Cupid which consisted of two volumes.

This manga also has not been licensed in the U.S. but is available for purchase digitally here in Japanese:

https://bookwalker.jp/ded9fd79dc-76f8-4181-9776-ae52d9fb2768/

It wasn’t until 1990 when Togashi started making a name for himself with his manga titled “Yu Yu Hakusho”.

He had to draw and write a 20 page chapter for it every week for years with of course, holidays and some breaks in between. The manga finished it’s run in 1994 with 175 chapters which sold 44 million copies in Japan alone. Togashi received many awards for this manga and even an anime adaptation which for those who don't know is basically a Japanese cartoon.

He started having back problems when drawing this manga close to the end of it’s run and thus rushed the story’s ending. From drawing manga, Togashi had to work hours and hours every day barely having any time to sleep let alone free time. He stated in a comment he wrote that 70 percent of his earnings went to taxes which made him feel like the 20 hours he worked every day was 14 hours of free labor. Togashi was in so much pain and stress from working so much that he could not appreciate all the number of the millions of copies from his manga. If you want to read Yu Yu Hakusho you can find it online or in stores and if you want to watch the anime you can click here.

In 1995, Togashi wanted to write a different kind of manga that wouldn’t be as popular as his last work; something unique. Thus he created Level E

which ran until 1996 and later in 2011 received and anime adaptation.

It indeed wasn’t as popular as his last series, Yu Yu Haksuho, but is still appreciated today. Level E manga to my knowledge is not licensed in North America but is available online. If you want to support Togashi you can buy the volumes in Japanese here. The anime is available to watch and/or purchase on Funimation's website.

In 1998, Togashi's next major series called Hunter x Hunter

had done very well commercially and was very popular among fans. It sold millions worldwide and in 1999 received an anime and later in 2011 got an anime reboot of the series. The

There has been no republication of the 1999 anime in the U.S. so the DVD's are becoming rare these days but the manga and 2011 anime are still available to read and watch here and here.

In 1999, Togashi got married to a the creator of the very popular manga, Sailor Moon, Naoko Takeuchi,


and later had two children. Togashi took breaks in between years but it wasn’t until 2006 when his breaks started to be very consistent. With him getting older and working consistently can put strain on his body and in such did. Togashi was having back problems before but wasn’t as severe as this. He was in so much pain that he couldn’t even get out of bed. In 2015, (Hiatus Schedule) he didn’t even put out one chapter for his manga and a year later his comments were depressing showcasing how bad he was feeling. Fans get upset with all the breaks he has but they are still concerned for his health. Thankfully today it seems like he is doing better with his breaks becoming shorter and shorter.

Togashi is one of the most famous and favorite manga artist of all time and with his work he is considered a genius. Some fans may even call him a lazy genius since he barely puts out any work through the years. Although fans are usually never let down when Togashi does bring out material for his manga, which showcases just how good he is at writing. As the old saying goes “You can’t rush genius.”

Togashi was also always a fan of videos games, specifically Dragon Quest and there have been a lot of memes gone around about Togashi going on break just to play the new DQ game out at that time.

Whether or not that's the case now, who's to know. 

On August 23, 2017 in Grand Jump Premium magazine, Akuten Wars (2 part one shot) first part was published.

This was written by Yoshihiro Togashi but drawn by a newcomer mangaka, Hachi Mizuno and the second part was later published on October 25, 2017. 

There has been no translation of the one shot at present but you can find the Japanese raws here.

In 2017, one of Togashi's past assistants wrote a manga about great it was working with him titled Sensei Hakusho. It's definitely worth the read.

In it, you can learn a lot about Togashi and if you're curious about what is said in it, you can click here. I also have the manga available here for you for free in Japanese here. So far 2 chapters have been translated!

In late 2017, Togashi began to show his love for the Japanese idol group Keyakizaka46. He commented about their songs

and even referenced one of their most well known songs in his manga.

Later in early 2018, Togashi did not stop showing his love for the group where he sent flowers to them and this wouldn't be the only time. There are also many more times when Togashi references the group so if you are interested I've made a thread listing those.

Yoshihiro Togashi has a lot of influence on millions of people in the world with his stories and many of those people are excited to see what he does next. ..Probably another hiatus.

EDIT: Will update with more info eventually!