A few words about the author : Yana Toboso (枢 やな) is a japanese mangaka. She was born in January the 24th of 1984 in Warabi, Japan, and is now 29 years old. Her career began with Rust Blaster, a one-shot of six chapters published by the Square Enix editions, which takes place in a world where humans and vampires are forced to live side by side. But the work that made her famous is Black Butler (Kuroshitsuji, 黒執事), her main series since 2006 and one of the most popular manga of our generation, which is sold in Asia, in the United-States and in many european countries. Her readers love her fine drawing line and her precious and baroque graphics which are recognizable anywhere.

A picture of Yana Toboso.

A short summary of the plot : In the victorian Great-Britain, Ciel Phantomhive, the thirteen-year-old heir of the Phantomhive family, must manage the famous toys' company that he leads while investigating on unavowable politic affairs as the Queen's Dog, an hereditary responsability of his family. For this, he has Sebastian Michaelis, his mysterious and fautless butler whose nobody knows where he comes from. But, in front of inexplicable phenomenons like Jack the Ripper, a strange circus kidnapping children or Gods of Death searching for missing souls, even a demon may fails...

Ciel Phantomhive and Sebastian Michaelis.

What makes this story gothic ?

→ The story takes place in Great-Britain, at the end of the nineteenth century, under the Queen Victoria's reign, and most of the time in London, or in the Phantomhive's Manor, which is isolated in the countryside. In the Book of Murder's arc, a violent thunder comes up and the manor's inhabitants and guests are stuck in the house until the end of the storm. This climate of promiscuity and tension facilitates the series of inexplicable murders which follows.

Furthermore, the manor is bursting with secret passages and alarms to warn the domestics of anyone's intrusion. In the Book of Circus' arc, when the circus' members are coming to the Manor to kill Ciel, the domestics are well-aware and follow them in the house thanks to a system of bells like the ones which are usually used to call the domestics without moving.

→ The character of Sebastian Michealis makes this story more gothic. As Dracula, we gradually learn more about his evil nature. At the beginning, he attracts the reader's attention because of the perfect way he is managing his butler's job in despite of the negative attitude of his master and the incapable domestics. In the first chapter, he succed to save his master's reception whereas the afternoon has been a complete disaster as if the domestics were doing everything they could to prevent Sebastian from doing his job. He very handsome, charismatic and athletic while being quite young because as a demon he reflects the humans' most secret desires. Most of the time, he has a rather superior smile and sometimes is obviously laughing at the human race, but he cannot stop studying and observing them « as a hobby » he says. Furthermore, as Dracula and other characters from gothic stories, Sebastian's eyes are reflecting his demonic nature. When he uses his demon's powers or when he is striken by a strong emotion, his eyes are no longer human's and become red and skinny in the middle like a snake's ones. He seems immortal, one cannot be hurt by any human's weapon. Sebastian has a great strength and can have an influence on animals' behaviour, like the character of Dracula when he calms down the horses of the carriage.

→ In despite of some scenes which are more comical, the general mood of the story is very dark. It is created by the tackled issues like the death, present in all the investigations of the Queen's Dog and personified in the Gods of Death or Grim Reapers (Shinigami, 死神) ; and also present in the past of Ciel, whose the parents were killed when he was younger. Some scenes and characters are very bloody and merciless ; the author uses suspens and mystery created by the contact between the real and normal world with the demons and shinigami's one to keep her readers captivated, and it works, when you see how famous this manga is now.

→ There is a definite evolution from the beginning to the actual end of the story. The characters are confronted by much more violence and crazy investigations. The first affair, where members of the britain underworld kidnapped Ciel to blackmail him, was quickly resolved by the help of Sebastian ; but in the last intrigues, Sebastian cannot but only helping his master and is almost helpless, so Ciel has to more and more learn how to manage without his butler. In the Weston College's arc, he has to go to the school as a simple pupil and cannot bring with him any of his domestics (even if Sebastian also becomes a college's teacher to keep a close eye on his master), so he is then exposed to the other pupils' violence.

→ Black Butler has some recurrent themes :

  • The death : in the investigation of Jack the Ripper, on dead prostitutes ; in the Noah Circus' arc, where little children are kidnapped and killed to have their bones ; in the Book of Murder's arc, by the successive deaths of the guests whereas they all have an alibi ; in the Campania affair, where dead bodies are bring back to life by the experimentations of an ignorant scientist and a denied shinigami, then escape from their control and begin to kill all the boat's passengers.

  • The humans' nature : numerous Black Butler characters are showing a certain face at the beginning and then reveal their true nature ; this is the case of the Ciel's aunt, who is helping « Jack the Ripper » to kill prostitutes and wants to kill the count because he looks like her sister ; of the Weston College's prefects who are able to kill to preserve the traditions and the dignity of their school ; of the members of the Noah Circus who are nice and welcome Ciel and Sebastian when they rejoin them as Smile and Black, but then are no longer nice and welcoming when they learn their true identities. But Ciel used to lie too and recognize it, when he uses some naive people to achieve his aim.

  • The humans' responsability : at the end, we can notice that the mortals are responsible of all the troubles that happened in this story, and imaginary creatures are only a help, a "tool" that helps them to achieve their aim : in the Jack the Ripper's arc, Grell Sutcliff, the deviant shinigami, appears and decides to help Madam Red to take her revenge only after she killed the first prostitute. Even if Sebastian is a demonic creature, he is bound to Ciel by the Pact and most of the time only acts on order of his master ; he says himself that he is nothing but his "dog". In the Weston College's arc, Undertaker and Doctor Ryan Stoker introduce the "Bizarre Dolls" in the school only because the prefects of Weston needed them to hide the fact that they killed some pupils. So, even if Black Butler contains some fantastic creatures which could discourage some people to read it, this is still a story about humanity and the consequences of its actions.

→ Notion : the imaginary :

Black Butler is a complete fantastic story, even if it takes place in a real time and place. The author uses fantastic characters and figures, as the demon, a famous figure in all the societies and religions, which represents the evil and tries to pull the humans to the « dark side » (as he does with Ciel : the pact that they entered into promises that when Sebastian would concrete Ciel's wish, he would have his soul ; during all the story, he tries to « prepare » the soul of his master so it would be very « tasty » when he will have it) ; the shinigami, which are a real part of the japanese mythology, are a real industry which is recover all the dead souls, to verify and classify them. They are neutral characters who have to not to take sides for the humans or for Heavens ; but some shinigami are escaping to this law like Grell Sutcliff, an uncontrollable agent who takes the nickname of Jack the Ripper and kills people who are not in the Death List. The story also talks about humans trying to bring back dead bodies to life, like, on the Campania, the couple of parents who did not succeed to forget their daughter's death and uses the ignorant Doctor Ryan Stoker (whose name refers to the Dracula's author, Bram Stocker), manipulated by a shinigami, to bring her daughter and other dead bodies back to life ; but it didn't work and the "Bizarre Dolls" escape the Doctor's control and kill almost all the passengers of the boat ; this proves that even this old human desire about defeating death is only a dream and that imagination has its limits, even in this world. But Black Butler also has some kind of reality, a dark reality whose we don't like to hear about, when it talks about the human's nature and the murderers and other crimes that the mortals are ready to make in the name of a reason that seems good to them.

A shinigami (William T. Spears).

Madam Red and Grell Sutcliff ("Jack the Ripper") :