, often shortened to , is a Japanese light novel series written by with illustrations by Reine Hibiki. Originally written as a short story in 1997, Shueisha published 37 light novel volumes from April 1998 to April 2012. The story focuses on a group of teenage girls attending the Catholic Lillian Girls' Academy in Tokyo, Japan. Its storyline largely revolves around the lives and close relationships of the school's student council known as the Yamayuri Council.
A manga adaptation was published by Shueisha in Margaret and its sister magazine The Margaret. Between 2004 and 2009, the series was adapted by Studio Deen into three 13-episode anime television series and a five-episode original video animation (OVA) series. The anime adaptations have been released in North America by Nozomi Entertainment under the title Maria Watches Over Us. The license was later transferred to Maiden Japan. A live-action film adaptation was released in Japan in November 2010. Several audio dramas and music albums were also published.
Maria-sama ga Miteru received generally positive reviews by critics. It has been described as representative of yuri novels, and has been credited with starting "the modern yuri trend," in addition to reviving the Class S genre. Critics have praised the series for its strong characterization, even among peripheral characters, and for its emphasis on romance and emotion over sexuality. The dramatization, however, has been criticized as being overly dramatic at times, but the lack of malicious characters has been described as reducing the chance for more drama. The extensive use of French titles has also been criticized as being distracting and initially difficult to follow. Over 5.4 million copies of the light novels have been published.
Plot Setting and themes The setting for Maria-sama ga Miteru is , a fictional Catholic school founded in 1901 in Musashino, Tokyo, Japan; the school is depicted as an elegant, clean, pure, and very prestigious institution. Among the facilities of Lillian, aside from the classrooms, there is a church, a greenhouse, a kendo dojo, an auditorium, a park, and the Rose Mansion, where the Yamayuri Council meet. The students are very respectable and in good standing. The uniform at the school is a long, black Japanese school uniform with a white collar.
The school uses the fictional sœur system where any second- or third-year student, the grande sœur ("big sister"), might pick a younger girl who will become her "sœur" (sister in French). The grande sœur gives her the petite sœur ("little sister") a rosary and promises to look after her and guide her. The basic etiquette demands the petite sœur to call her grande sœur "onee-sama" (older sister in Japanese). Aside from being used in prayer, the rosary is the instrument that certifies the sœur union and relationship between two students. There is an implicit code of behavior between sœurs, especially in the Yamayuri Council—the student council of the school: quietness, measure and respect towards each other; values deeply attached to traditional Japanese education.
French is occasionally used throughout the story; for example, the series is given the French subtitle La Vierge Marie vous regarde, which means "The Virgin Mary is watching you". In keeping with the tone of the series, formal language is used: is a strictly formal and respectful greeting in Japanese, and is used both to greet and to bid farewell. By custom, this greeting is used often in the Lillian School; this has been one of the distinguishable and popular phrases of the series, and it is used to begin or to finish each volume. The Animax English-language version translates the word as "good day to you".
The Lillian Girls' Academy uses the lily symbolism as the white lily is the flower of the Virgin Mary. The white lily is a Christian symbol of virginity and purity. This lily imagery is also used as a reference to yuri: the story has some elements of romance between female characters; the use of lilies reinforces this in subtext, as do the names of the student council and of the school itself. The series is only explicit about a romantic relationship once in a flashback, but many of the sisters have romantic friendships.
The musical choices of the Maria-sama ga Miteru anime adaptations are generally classical music-inspired. The Christian hymn is often referred to in the series. In the context of the series, it is a children's song taught to the students at Lillian.
Story and characters
Maria-sama ga Miteru'''s story revolves around the students of the Lillian Girls' Academy and is character-driven, focusing on interactions between the characters rather than any sort of ongoing plot or goal to attain. When the story begins, Yumi Fukuzawa, a first-year student at Lillian, is praying in front of the Virgin Mary statue near the school entrance when she is suddenly approached by a cold second-year student named Sachiko Ogasawara who straightens Yumi's uniform neckerchief. This seemingly simple act of kindness stays with Yumi the rest of the day, and she speaks of her meeting with Sachiko to her friends during class and lunch.
After school is over, Yumi's classmate Tsutako Takeshima meets with Yumi to show her that she took a photograph of Yumi's meeting with Sachiko earlier that morning. Yumi asks if she can have the photo, but Tsutako says she will give her the snapshot under two conditions: one being that Tsutako can display it at the upcoming school festival, and two being that Yumi get Sachiko's permission to do so as well. Yumi agrees to this, which sets in motion a series of events involving the entire Yamayuri Council. A few weeks after first meeting Sachiko, Yumi accepts Sachiko's rosary and therefore agrees to become her petite sœur. This officially inducts Yumi into the Yamayuri Council where she assists them in school matters alongside Yoshino Shimazu and Shimako Tōdō—the petite sœurs of Rei Hasekura and Sei Satō, respectively. Through her activities in the Yamayuri Council, Yumi becomes closer to the other members and generally finds her experiences with the group to be enjoyable.
Yamayuri Council Much of the story of Maria-sama ga Miteru revolves around the , which acts as the student council. The Yamayuri Council meets in a building called the . It is located within the school and consists of two stories, including a meeting room on the second. The Yamayuri Council itself consists of three offices, named after roses: , , and . These are also referred to by their colors; the is Rosa foetida, the is Rosa gigantea, and the is Rosa chinensis.
Due to the high importance the three Rose families have in the development of the student activities within school, those who become petites sœurs of any of the mentioned families receive a functional "inheritance" through the grandes sœurs teachings, to adopt a position given certain circumstances. In this way, patrons are recognized through the generations of the members of the Rose families. Still, after graduating, the grandes sœurs of the Yamayuri Council may continue with a fair participation in the events concerning their families, as shown in the novels.
A , or , is one of three senior members of the Yamayuri Council. It is also possible to generally speak of all the members of the Yamayuri Council as roses. A Rose makes the critical decisions within this group since she controls the student council. Candidates for the position, which lasts through the school year, are chosen through an election. Any student can run to become a Rose, although the position is usually given to the en boutons, the Roses' petite sœurs.
The petite sœur of a Rosa is called an , otherwise known as a . En bouton is French for "in bud"—as used in the example Rosa Chinensis en bouton—and is unofficially considered part of the Yamayuri Council, as is the petite sœur of the en bouton, if she has one. The en boutons must be in a lower year than their Rosa, and generally, the en boutons execute the plans discussed by the Roses like assistants. Although the Rosa positions of the Yamayuri Council are traditionally passed to the en bouton on the graduation of the current holder, they are nonetheless elected offices that anyone may run for.
The petite sœur of the en bouton is called —as used in the example Rosa Chinensis en bouton petite sœur—and is otherwise known as the . She must be in a lower year than her en bouton and performs small duties, such as attending to the Roses' en boutons, cleaning the Rose Mansion, and making tea and snacks for the Yamayuri Council. This lasts a school year; the following year, when their en bouton is elected as Rosa, the petite sœurs automatically become en boutons.
Production After writing her debut novel series for three years starting in March 1994, Oyuki Konno published a short story called "Maria-sama ga Miteru" in the February 1997 issue of the shōjo magazine Cobalt with illustrations by Yuma Aoi. In 1993, Konno had previously won both Cobalt's Novel Award and Readers' Award for Yume no Miya, and by February 1997, nine volumes had been released.
According to Konno, the idea for the story emerged in the mid-1990s during the height of the Boys' Love (BL) boom. Konno gathered with writer friends and the group discussed how recent novels and manga intended for girls were dominated by male characters and "boring," lamenting the scarcity of works featuring large casts of female characters. While the group was tossing around ideas, Konno enlivened the conversation by jokingly acting out a scene, saying, "Sister, the Virgin Mary is watching!" ("Onee-sama, Maria-sama ga miteru kara!"). This joke established the basic concept of relationships between girls in different school grades, as well as the title. Her friends subsequently began frequently pressuring her, asking "Aren't you going to write Maria-sama ga Miteru?" Konno eventually obtained the consent of her friends to use the idea and wrote the first novella for the February 1997 issue of Cobalt.
In the afterword of the first Maria-sama ga Miteru light novel volume, Konno admitted that Maria-sama ga Miteru marked a significant departure from her usual storytelling genre in Yume no Miya, which she described as an "imperial court tale" set in a fictionalized classical Japan. For the basis of Lillian Girls' Academy, Konno drew from her own experiences attending an all-girl high school and junior college for five years. She notes that when she took the entrance exam for the combined junior and senior high school, she was shocked to see only girls in the classroom; she projected this experience onto the character Noriko Nijo, who enters the school as a student from the outside rather than moving up from the middle school. Some of the scenery of Lillian was also taken from her school, such as a ginkgo pathway stretching from the main gate. The laid-back atmosphere of the school was also incorporated into Lillian, although Konno's school did not have a sœur system and it was not a Catholic school. However, Konno had been exposed to Christianity from a young age: she attended a strictly Christian kindergarten which had a sanctuary and cloister in the middle of the school. Konno notes that she put her own questions about the Virgin Mary's heart into the story via Yumi. Konno ultimately mixed together various sources and ended up with Lillian Girls' Academy.