JBBY News_11/2025_JBBY Publishing and Editing Seminar
2026年7月29日
Taro Gomi Reflects on More Than 50 Years of Creating Picture Books
On November 8, 2025, JBBY held a special seminar featuring renowned Japanese picture book creator Taro Gomi. Now 80, Gomi will mark his 53rd anniversary as a picture book author in 2026 and has created nearly 400 books. Takahiro Taniguchi, an editor at Fukuinkan Shoten who edited I Am a Boat, winner of the Grand Prize at the 30th Japan Picture Book Awards, moderated the conversation.
Using his books as examples, Gomi discussed his creative process and his long collaboration with editors. His classic Who Ate It? (Tabeta no Dare, 1977), for instance, was inspired not by a story but by the size and physical presence of a book an editor showed him—the story came afterwards. He also compared making books to digging holes as a child, and said he has never thought of bookmaking as a job but rather as something he loves to do.
Former Fukuinkan Shoten editors in the audience shared behind-the-scenes stories about Gomi’s best-selling The Goldfish Got Away, which has sold more than three million copies, as well as a touching episode involving a young reader’s response to Everyone Poops.
Gomi also spoke candidly about education in Japan, expressing his belief that top-down, teacher-led instruction does not serve children well, and stressing the importance of letting children develop their own relationship with books.
The seminar closed with Gomi’s memorable words: “There are no fixed rules for picture books. You can do anything. That’s why I love them.”