Yoshihiro Takahashi

Who is Yoshihiro Takahashi?

Yoshihiro Takahashi is a Japanese manga artist. He writes under a pen name in which his first name Yoshihiro is spelled out in hiragana.

Takahashi was born September 18, 1953, in Higashinaruse, Akita. He was very interested in drawing growing up and, in the 1960s, started publishing small comics in several newspapers and magazines. His first manga was Shitamachi Benkei, but his break through came in 1984 when publishing the popular manga Ginga: Nagareboshi Gin, also known as Silver Fang, or Silver Fang Legend Gin, the story about a dog who goes in search of other dogs to fight a bear named Akakabuto. He got the idea in 1980 when he read an article about domestic dogs that ran away from their owners and lived as wild dogs in the mountains. The pure idea fascinated him, which lead him to write the manga about the puppy. In 1987, the series won the Shogakukan Manga Award for shōnen manga.

Takahashi started to publish the sequel, Ginga Densetsu Weed, in 1999 and it soon became a hit as well as an anime which aired on September 17, 2005. He has been touted as the first manga artist to have featured a puppy hero.

Takahashi was the guest of honour at the Finnish role-playing and anime fan convention Tracon in Tampere on September 3 and 4 2011. It was his first visit to Finland and most likely his first time being a guest of honour outside of Japan.