Comic-Con International has revealed this year’s nominees for the 2020 Eisner Awards Hall of Fame which includes Japanese authors Moto Hagio and Keiji Nakazawa, as well as Japanese-American author Stan Sakai.

Moto Hagio’s Nominee Profile

Moto Hagio is one of a group of women who broke into the male-dominated manga industry and pioneered the shōjo (girls’ comics) movement in the early 1970s. Hagio’s 1974 work Heart of Thomas was one of the early entries in the shōnen-ai (boys in love) subgenre. Hagio’s linework and dramatic imagery have influenced many manga artists, and she helped shape the style of emotional and symbolic backgrounds that many manga artists draw today. Her major works include A Drunken Dream, They Were Eleven, and Otherworld Barbara. She’s won the Japanese Medal of Honor with the Purple Ribbon (the first woman comics creator to do so), received Japan’s SF Grand Prize, the Osamu Tezuka Culture Award Grand Prize, and an Inkpot Award, among other accolades.

Keiji Nakazawa Nominee Profile

Keiji Nakazawa was born in Hiroshima and was in the city when it was destroyed by a nuclear weapon in 1945. He settled in Tokyo in 1961 to become a cartoonist. He produced his first manga for anthologies like Shonen Gaho, Shonen King, and Bokura. By 1966, Nakazawa began to express his memories of Hiroshima in his manga, starting with the fictional Kuroi Ame ni Utarete (Struck by Black Rain) and the autobiographical story Ore wa Mita (I Saw It). Nakazawa’s life-work, Barefoot Gen (1972), was the first Japanese comic ever to be translated into Western languages. Barefoot Gen was adapted into two animated films and a live-action TV drama and has been translated into a dozen languages. Last Gasp’s U.S. translations were nominated for the 2005 Eisner Award for Best U.S. Edition of Foreign Material. Nakazawa passed away in December 2012.

Stan Sakai Nominee Profile

Stan Sakai was born in Kyoto, Japan, grew up in Hawaii, and currently lives in California. His creation Usagi Yojimbo first appeared in 1984. Usagi has been on television as a guest of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, as toys, on clothing, in comics, and in a series of trade paperback collections. Stan is a recipient of numerous awards, including National Cartoonists Society Comic Book Division Award, six Eisner Awards, five Spanish Haxturs, an Inkpot, an American Library Association Award, a Cultural Ambassador Award from the Japanese American National Museum, and a couple of Harvey Awards, including one for Best Cartoonist.

The three join eleven other authors from various genres to make up a pool of fourteen, from which voters can select four authors to join the Hall of Fame.