2026-01-26

The Climber (manga) - Wikipedia

The Climber (manga) - Wikipedia

The Climber (manga)

The Climber
First tankōbon volume cover
孤高の人
Genre
Created byJirō Nitta
Manga
Written by
Illustrated byShin-ichi Sakamoto
Published byShueisha
English publisher
ImprintYoung Jump Comics
MagazineWeekly Young Jump
Original run1 November 2007 – 27 October 2011
Volumes17
icon Anime and manga portal
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Climber (Japanese: 孤高の人, Hepburn: Kokō no Hito; lit. 'Solitary Person') is a Japanese manga series written by Shin-ichi Sakamoto, Yoshio Nabeta (first two volumes), and Hiroshi Takano (volumes 2–4), and illustrated by Sakamoto, based on a two-volume 1973 novel by Jirō Nitta. It was originally serialized in Shueisha's seinen manga magazine Weekly Young Jump from November 2007 to October 2011, with its chapters collected in 17 tankōbon volumes. It has been licensed for English release in North America by Viz Media.

The series tells the story of introvert solo mountain climber Mori Buntarō—partially based on real-life mountain climber Buntarō Katō [ja]—who is introduced to sport climbing after being transferred to a new high school and later dedicates his entire life to professional mountain climbing, keeping the ascent of K2's East Face as his goal.

In 2010, The Climber won an Excellence Prize at the 14th Japan Media Arts Festival.

Synopsis

The story follows a lonesome and "gloomy" student named Buntarō Mori (森 文太郎, Mori Buntarō) and his journey from the discovery of his new passion, climbing, starting from a high school climbing club, to being a world class professional climber. Going through the different stages of his life dealing with loneliness, solo climbing, and depression, in pursuit of his dream, conquering the most difficult mountain, K2.

Publication

Based on Jirō Nitta's two-volume 1973 novel,[2][3] The Climber manga was written by Shin-ichi Sakamoto, Yoshio Nabeta (first two volumes),[4][5] and Hiroshi Takano (volumes 2–4),[5][6][7] and illustrated by Sakamoto. It was serialized in Shueisha's seinen manga magazine Weekly Young Jump from 1 November 2007[8] to 27 October 2011.[9] Shueisha collected its chapters in seventeen tankōbon volumes, released from 18 April 2008[4] to 18 November 2011.[10]

In May 2024, Viz Media announced that they licensed the series for English publication releasing in Q2 2025.[11]

Volumes

No.Original release dateOriginal ISBNEnglish release dateEnglish ISBN
118 April 2008[4]978-4-08-877426-815 April 2025[12]978-1-9747-5152-5
218 July 2008[5]978-4-08-877475-615 April 2025[12]978-1-9747-5152-5
319 September 2008[6]978-4-08-877522-715 July 2025[13]978-1-9747-5516-5
419 November 2008[7]978-4-08-877549-415 July 2025[13]978-1-9747-5516-5
519 February 2009[14]978-4-08-877593-721 October 2025[15]978-1-9747-5866-1
619 May 2009[16]978-4-08-877642-221 October 2025[15]978-1-9747-5866-1
719 August 2009[17]978-4-08-877696-520 January 2026[18]978-1-9747-6190-6
819 November 2009[19]978-4-08-877753-520 January 2026[18]978-1-9747-6190-6
919 February 2010[20]978-4-08-877807-521 April 2026[21]978-1-9747-6258-3
1019 March 2010[22]978-4-08-877835-821 April 2026[21]978-1-9747-6258-3
1118 June 2010[23]978-4-08-877880-8——
1217 September 2010[24]978-4-08-879030-5——
1317 December 2010[25]978-4-08-879077-0——
1418 February 2011[26]978-4-08-879120-3——
1519 May 2011[27]978-4-08-879145-6——
1619 August 2011[28]978-4-08-879187-6——
1719 November 2011[29]978-4-08-879236-1——

Reception

The Climber won an Excellence Prize in the Manga Division at the 14th Japan Media Arts Festival in 2010.[30][31] It also won the Best Seinen Manga category at the 2011 Prix Mangawa Awards.[32]

References

  1.  "The Official Website for The Climber". Viz Media. Retrieved 6 April 2025.
  2.  孤高の人〔上〕 (in Japanese). Shinchosha. Archived from the original on 20 September 2024. Retrieved 3 February 2025.
  3.  孤高の人〔下〕 (in Japanese). Shinchosha. Archived from the original on 20 September 2024. Retrieved 3 February 2025.
  4.  孤高の人 1 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  5.  孤高の人 2 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  6.  孤高の人 3 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  7.  孤高の人 4 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 20 April 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  8.  【ヤングジャンプ】ヤングジャンプ№48特大号は、11月1日発売!!. manganohi.jp (in Japanese). 1 November 2007. Archived from the original on 15 November 2007. Retrieved 9 January 2022.
  9.  ヤンジャンで「パパ聞き！」始動、「孤高の人」は堂々完結. Comic Natalie (in Japanese). Natasha, Inc. 27 October 2011. Archived from the original on 9 January 2022. Retrieved 9 January 2022.
  10.  【11月18日付】本日発売の単行本リスト. Comic Natalie (in Japanese). Natasha, Inc. 18 November 2011. Archived from the original on 11 November 2021. Retrieved 9 January 2022.
  11.  Hodgkins, Crystalyn (1 June 2024). "Viz Media Licenses Beyblade X, Mujina Into the Deep, Firefly Wedding, The Climber, More Manga". Anime News Network. Archived from the original on 1 June 2024. Retrieved 1 June 2024.
  12.  "The Climber, Vol. 1". Viz Media. Retrieved 25 December 2024.
  13.  "The Climber, Vol. 2". Viz Media. Retrieved 6 April 2025.
  14.  孤高の人 5 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  15.  "The Climber, Vol. 3". Viz Media. Retrieved 8 July 2025.
  16.  孤高の人 6 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  17.  孤高の人 7 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  18.  "The Climber, Vol. 4". Viz Media. Retrieved 3 October 2025.
  19.  孤高の人 8 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  20.  孤高の人 9 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  21.  "The Climber, Vol. 4". Viz Media. Retrieved 28 December 2025.
  22.  孤高の人 10 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  23.  孤高の人 11 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 23 May 2017. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  24.  孤高の人 12 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 14 November 2016. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  25.  孤高の人 13 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 25 May 2017. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  26.  孤高の人 14 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 24 May 2017. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  27.  孤高の人 15 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 23 May 2017. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  28.  孤高の人 16 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 25 May 2017. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  29.  孤高の人 17 (in Japanese). Shueisha. Archived from the original on 22 May 2017. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
  30.  "Excellence Award – KOKO NO HITO | Manga Division | 2010 [14th] Japan Media Arts Festival Archive". Japan Media Arts Festival. Archived from the original on 13 November 2022. Retrieved 13 November 2022.
  31.  Loo, Egan (8 December 2010). "Tatami Galaxy, Historie Win Media Arts Awards". Anime News Network. Archived from the original on 30 June 2022. Retrieved 13 November 2022.
  32.  "Vainqueurs du prix Mangawa 2011". Manga-News (in French). Archived from the original on 24 November 2018. Retrieved 7 April 2016.
===

The Climber Is An Incredibly Beautiful, Devastating Manga About Hubris

You'll never look at mountains the same way again.

By Isaiah Colbert
3 comments|

The first time I encountered the word “egoist” was while watching the shonen sports anime Blue Lock. By all accounts, it was a solid first foray into how an (ego) death game-lite soccer tournament comprised of nothing but strikers would have hotheads butting heads. However, everything Blue Lock had to offer me might as well have been baby food by the time I finished the underappreciated seinen gem The Climber—a brutal, transcendent tale about when grit and enlightenment arrive a hair too late to save men already ruined by their own compulsions. 

Rather than being a glorified glossary of the sport like its breezier contemporaries, The Climber, written by novelist Jirō Nitta and adapted into a manga by Shin-ichi Sakamoto, is essentially about a group of climbers and the folly and pyrrhic victories of their impulses—namely, those of protagonist Mori Buntarō. When we first meet Mori, who’s loosely based on the real-life legend Katō Buntarō, he’s an edgy transfer student already halfway checked out of humanity. After a run-in with a classmate who impressively scaled the school roof just to poke fun at Mori for being an antisocial prick, Mori repeats the climb, to the horror of everyone at the school, without a belaying rope. The instant he pulls off a ballsy double dyno jump to the school roof, Mori’s life shifts into a new paradigm as he chases an insatiable high for climbing, a sport the manga frames as his supposed salvation.

(Viz Media)

At the onset, Mori’s got everything your typical shonen protagonist would have: a built-in rival in his former bully turned climbing senpai, a mentor in his homeroom teacher and climbing coach, and a cute girl cheering him on from the sidelines. All signs point toward a clean, redemptive path to being a normal guy. But climbing doesn’t save him; it drags him deeper into himself. Mori doesn’t want to tether himself to a partner—he wants to be a solo climber, and if he could help it, he wants to be a solo climber without the lifeline of a belay rope. What follows are chapters, cleverly stylized as “climbs,” that amplify everything fundamentally broken in Mori long before they ever offer a way out—which he frequently refuses—as the manga tracks his psychological descent with grisly patience, from dropping out of high school to the isolating, obsessive adulthood that cements his effigy as the “immortal climber.”

Part of what makes The Climber so arresting is its insistence that the logic of “the ground” does not apply to the logic of the mountain. Down here, cutting a belay rope is unthinkable. Up there, if it comes down to severing that line or dying alongside your partner, you cut the rope. The manga never sensationalizes this binary choice of extremes; it simply presents the reader with the reality of a world where survival demands choices that would make no sense to anyone not already resigned to the possibility of dying for having made the climb in the first place.

(Images: Viz Manga)

To keep readers grounded without slowing the pace, each volume includes a glossary of climbing terms—clean, unobtrusive, and genuinely helpful—as well as interviews with real climbers explaining why they do what they do. But as the series reminds you, just because you can cut your ear off doesn’t make you Vincent Van Gogh. The Climber interrogates the “Why do you X?” refrain that runs through other art/athletics‑driven stories like Look Back or 100 Meters, only here the characters are often too far gone for a redemption that isn’t self‑destructive. Real egoists, the manga argues, are R.U.N.s: revolting, ugly, nauseating, and shameless—and The Climber is packed with them. 

No arc better epitomizes the ambitions and the hubris of an egoist than The Climber putting its characters through the wringer in their attempt to conquer K2, one of the five tallest mountains on Earth, and also the deadliest. Given the mountain has killed one person for every four who reached the summit since the year 2021, totalling to around 96 deaths for every estimated 800 climbers who summited by the year 2023, the odds of The Climber’s egoists being successful are dog water considering its climbing team would climb the bodies of their partners if it meant being the first to conquer its eastern face. 

(Images: Viz Media)

The Climber is also one of those manga where the artistry illustrates its point far more effectively than dialogue ever could. For 170 chapters, The Climber’s pages capture the true devastation of an avalanche, not as the usual cloud of powder sliding politely down a mountain, but as a catastrophic force of nature rendered through panels of skyscrapers and semi‑trucks plummeting downhill at blistering, irrational speeds. It’s a visual language designed to make you feel, in your bones, how dangerous climbing really is. And Sakamoto’s artistry drives that point home, shifting effortlessly between the magical realism of trippy, ethereal, dreamlike climbing sequences and the raw, uninhibited anguish his characters endure as they bivouac on the mountain and as they curl up in a husk below it, should they be fortunate enough to descend a climb by their own power without their frozen carcasses being helicoptered from a rocky metaphor for their own hubris.

The Climber manga panel of Mori carrying a boulder on his back.
(Image: Viz Media)

The Climber’s answer to “Why do you X?” is a deceptively simple one. Mori doesn’t climb because he loves it, nor does he do it to be the best. He does it because it’s natural to go where you feel compelled to go. And, as in life, the path that demands the most courage is, more often than not, the one you’re supposed to take. Whether that place is the zenith of a man‑killing mountain, or its nadir, where the people who love you white-knuckle it out through deafeningly silent weeks for your safe return. Along his trek, Mori metamorphosizes from an irredeemable little shit into someone worth rooting for one brutal climb at a time. 

By the time I tore through The Climber, taking many a “woosa” break, I felt I’d read a masterpiece on par with Vinland Saga. It gave me a new appreciation for climbing—and scared me straight out of ever wanting to solo climb a mountain, much less face life’s less voluntary obstacles alone.

Isaiah Colbert

Isaiah Colbert

Isaiah is a contributor who loves to write correct takes about anime and post them on the internet.

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Avatar
Threddle
·24 Jan
Thank you for the recommendation. Kind of shocked that I had never heard of this before.

Surprisingly breezy read considering the number of emotional kicks in the stomach forcing me to take a break from it.


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DR

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Don Reba
·(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻·22 Jan (edited)
That reminds me that I still have not read The Summit of The Gods manga. The animated adaptation was outstanding. Watching it, as an avid climber, I savoured how well they conveyed the mood and how thoughtfully captured
the details.


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P

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pocaribreeze
·21 Jan
Appreciate the seinen manga coverage. I can picture salarymen reading this and weeping.


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