Why You Should Read Berserk

Welcome to MeowMed’s Musings, a weekly (and juicy) well-being self-improvement newsletter. But sometimes I may also delve into something I find intriguing yet unrelated to those topics. In fact, this week’s newsletter is more along the lines of one of my personal interests.

I wanted to briefly discuss one of my favorite works of fiction, the dark fantasy manga Berserk by Kentaro Miura. I am going to try to keep this as spoiler-free as possible, because this work of art is so good that if there’s even a slim possibility that one of you may come across it, I want you to share the same experience that I had.

So what is it about? Well, in broad strokes, the protagonist, Guts, goes through a story of friendship turned into deep vengeance and hatred. But through time and great struggle, he grows as a human being to support those he cares about and discover a higher purpose in his life.

There is a key emphasis here on struggle, because I do not know of many protagonists or even people in real life that go through what Guts has gone through. For this reason, within the cult following that this manga has, there are plenty of people on their own path of fitness or some form of self-improvement. Thus, it seems that Guts’ struggle resonates with their own path in life.

Also, the art is really good. Some of the panels could qualify to be in museums (here’s a video to illustrate what I mean):

So if you have the time, I highly encourage that you read Berserk. A word of warning—this is NOT for the faint of heart. There are some extremely gory and dark moments that may be shocking to some readers. But nevertheless, I will stand by my praise of this work. It is actually so good that after Kentaro Miura passed away 3 years ago, his best friend Kouji Mori decided to pick up where he left off.

Do any of you have a piece of fiction that has had a notable impact on your life? Feel free to share by replying to this email! If you missed out on last week’s newsletter, feel free to find it here. Other than that, I hope you have a fantastic rest of your week!