Born in Kumamoto, Japan, on March 21, 1953,[1] Yoshihiro Yonezawa began drawing parodies of his favourite manga characters with the encouragement of his father when he was a child.

[2] As a fan of Osamu Tezuka and Shigeru Mizuki he would start dōjin activities in middle school, releasing several works under the circle "Azu Manga Research Club."

In 1969, Yonezawa joined the staff of Kyukon and met SF writer Shinji Kajio at age 16.

He began criticizing manga while he was studying engineering at Meiji University,[1] as part of the group Meikyu.

[6] To explore the potential of the medium,[5] he co-founded Comiket (The Comic Market) in 1975 with Harada Teruo (chairman) and Aniwa Jun, who were university students.