Suiho Tagawa (1899–1989) was a Japanese manga artist and rakugo writer whose real name was Nakataro Takamizawa. After working in abstract art and writing comic storytelling scripts, he made his manga debut in 1928 with “Medama no Chibichan.” His best-known series, “Norakuro,” began in the magazine Shonen Club in 1931 and follows an orphaned black dog who joins a canine army, repeatedly fails, and gradually rises through its ranks. The series expanded into books, animation, records, toys, and other merchandise, becoming an early example of character-based media in Japan. Tagawa also mentored younger artists including Machiko Hasegawa, Shigeru Sugiura, and Shosuke Kurakane, contributing to the development of Japanese children’s narrative manga.
