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Rediscovered Classics of Japanese Animation is the first academic work to examine World Masterpiece Theater ( Sekai Meisaku Gekijo , 1969-2009), which popularized the practice of adapting foreign children''s books into long-running animated series and laid the groundwork for powerhouses like Studio Ghibli. World Masterpiece Theater ( Sekai Meisaku Gekijo, 1969-2009) is a TV staple created by the Japanese studio Nippon Animation, which popularized the practice of adapting foreign children''s books into long-running animated series. Once generally dismissed by critics, the series is now frequently investigated as a key early work of legendary animators Isao Takahata and Hayao Miyazaki. In the first book-length examination of the series, Maria Chiara Oltolini analyzes cultural significance of World Masterpiece Theater , and the ways in which the series pioneered the importance of children''s fiction for Japanese animation studios and laid the groundwork for powerhouses like Studio Ghibli. Adapting a novel for animation also means decoding (and re-coding) socio-cultural patterns embedded in a narrative. World Masterpiece Theater stands as a unique example of this linguistic, medial, and cultural hybridisation. Popular children''s classics such as Little Women , Peter Pan , and Anne of Green Gables became the starting point of a full-fledged negotiation process in which Japanese animators retold a whole range of narratives that have one basic formula in common: archetypal stories with an educational purpose. In particular, the series played a role in shaping the pop culture image of a young girl ( shojo ). Examining the series through the lens of animation studies as well as adaptation studies, Oltolini sheds new light on this long-neglected staple of Japanese animation history.
