Hidamari no Ki (陽だまりの樹) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Osamu Tezuka about a friendship between a samurai and a doctor in the final decade of the Tokugawa Shogunate. Hidamari no Ki received the Shogakukan Manga Award in 1984 for general manga.
The story is partly based on Tezuka's great-grandfather who was one of the Japanese physicians pushing for acceptance of Western medical practice at the time. The title is a metaphor for the Tokugawa shogunate which is compared to an old camphor tree which has enjoyed the sunshine and shelter from the winds for 300 years, but is slowly dying because it is being eaten away from the inside by termites and gribbles.
It was adapted into an anime series, by Madhouse and premiered in Japan on NTV on April 4, 2000. It was also adapted into a television drama, and also a 2021 stage play starring Sugeta Rinne of the boyband 7 MEN Samurai.[1]
Plot
The story follows two young men whose lives intersect during the political turbulence and social upheaval in Japan in the time before the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Dr. Ryoan Tezuka is a medical student attracted to the radical new of Western medicine under