Moto Hagio is considered a "founding mother" of modern shoujo manga. She is also a member of the Year 24 Group.
Moto Hagio made her professional debut in 1969 at the age of 20 with her short story Lulu to Mimi in Nakayoshi. Later, for Shogakukan Publishing, she produced a series of short stories for various magazines.
Two years after her debut, she published 11-gatsu no Gymnasium, a short story which dealt openly with love between two boys at a boarding school. The story was part of a larger movement by female manga artists at the time which pioneered a genre of girls' comics about love between young men. In 1974, Hagio developed this story into the longer Thomas no Shinzou.
She was awarded the Shogakukan Manga Award in 1976 for her science fiction classic 11-nin Iru! and her epic tale Poe no Ichizoku.
