Romanticsm, the Gothic and the Middle Ages in Kentaro Miura’s Berserk

Kentaro Miura’s manga series Berserk (1989-present) is largely based on late medieval and Renaissance Europe, but its author relied on a much broader array of references, among which those related to Romanticism and the Gothic genre are of prime importance. Through published interviews with the author and comparisons between the manga’s panels and works of fiction, poetry and the visual arts, we seek to investigate the persistence of the Romantic and the Gothic traditions in Berserk. We argue that their imprint on the manga may be discerned in five main aspects: Berserk’s borrowings from the Romantic visual arts; its employing of vastness, repetition and uniformity in order to attain sublime effects; its affinity with the Gothic genre, whose macabre subjects and whose treatment of religion, cruelty and sexuality make its way into the manga; the Gothic and Romantic elements in its mythology; and its Romantic sentiment for nature. Some similarities between the manga and historical works point to direct and deliberate borrowings, resulting from the author extensive knowledge on Western art and academic background, while other similarities point to intermediate sources, which act as conduits between Miura and works of older periods. We conclude that the Japanese continuing of the Romantic and the Gothic traditions, exemplified by Berserk and other works, indicate that these traditions have kept their power to fuel creativity in contemporary culture and to shape our perceptions of the Middle Ages.