Over four decades ago, Yoshihiro Tatsumi expanded the horizons of comics storytelling by using the visual language of manga to tell gritty, literary stories about the private lives of everyday people. He has been called "the grandfather of Japanese alternative comics" and has influenced generations of cartoonists around the world. Now the visionary creator of "The Push Man and Other Stories" and "Good-bye" has turned his incisive, unflinching gaze upon himself. Over ten years in the making, "A Drifting Life" is Tatsumis' most ambitious, personal, and heart felt work: an autobiographical bildungsroman in comics form. Using his life long obsession with comics as a frame work, Tatsumi weaves a complex story that encompasses family dynamics, Japanese culture and history, first love, the intricacies of the manga industry, and most importantly, what it means to be an artist. Alternately humorous, enlightening, and haunting, this is the masterful summartion of a fascinating life and a historic career.

Gekiga Hyouryuu won the 13th Tezuka Osamu Cultural Grand Prize along with Oooku in 2009.

The series was published in English as A Drifting Life by Drawn & Quarterly on April 14, 2009. It was also published in Polish by Komiksowe as a 2-in-1 omnibus volume in July 2014; and in Brazilian Portuguese by Editora Veneta on December 10, 2021.