Journey to the West (complete)

Splendid Wu Cheng'en! If there was one word to describe this book, it would be: entertaining. Wu Cheng'en is writing a story first and foremost for entertainment, and it is one of the greatest virtue a storyteller can possess. Secondly, he is writing a treatise on Confucisim, Taoism, and Buddhism. The characters and the journey can be taken as allegorical, and the author welcomes this interpretative perspective because he sometimes refers the Monkey King as "mind ape". But leaving the allegory in the subconscious plane is not wrong either.

He takes you through the birth, rise, and fall of the notorious Handsome Monkey King, and how he came to become a disciple under the Buddhist monk Sanzang and his adventures to the West (India) to show more retrieve the scriptures back to China.

The story is filled with episodic adventures, each chapter is one really. Journey to the West was written as a serialised novel, and I believe it is best to read it like one--one or two chapters a day. One novel thing about this story is how poetry is integrated into the story. Whenever a new location, character, battle is described, it is always described in poetry. In a way, it gives a similar feeling to the songs from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, however, while the songs and poems in the Ring cycle are sung by the characters, in Journey to the West, the narrator interjects them into his narrative. For me, they were quite a wonderful experience. There are things only poetry can do, and I believe Wu Cheng'en smartly used poetry to do the heavy-lifting while describing these otherworldly landscape and beings. There is also a chapter where two minor characters have a poetry battle where they improvise verses to traditional Chinese tunes to praise their respective abodes, river and hill.

Journey to the West is great fun. But goodness, is it long. This is just volume 1. Two are left. Reading it is a journey itself. And I will continue on this journey after resting for some time. show less

Immortals, witches, demons, disciples, Gods, saints, sinners, fairies, tortoises, pigs, monkeys, horses, bears, mountains, lakes, rivers, pilgrims, holy books, scriptures, Buddhists, Taoists, Confucians, Buddhas, saviors, Emperors, Kings, Queens, spells, chants, transformers, shape shifters, magicians, generals, dragons, heaven, hell, judges, palaces, sages, spirits, caves, thieves, poison, gates, gardens, clouds, rain, drought, scholars, libraries, fights, massacres, death, hair, magic fans, monks, thunder, blind men, ancients, beheadings, murders, peaches, wizards, masters, fights, quarrels, wine, attacks, forgiveness, advisers, cannibalism, secrets, register of life and death, officials, lords, gatekeepers, bodyguards, spears, show more swords, priests, robes, etc, etc, etc.

That about sums it up. Mix it up, repeat, mix it up repeat. This ancient text reads like a modern movie based on comic book super heroes. They get into perilous situations where there's no hope only to be saved time and time again. The only constant is they survive. The most surprising piece of this is the repeated times when the demons threatened to eat the pilgrims with the aim of thereby achieving immortality. The pilgrims are supposed to be loosely bases on a real expedition crossing Asia seeking Sacred Scriptures. This tale has been repeated over and over and probably has morphed greatly. This is one book of four. My guess is the rest is more mix it up repeat and repeat. I'll pass. I also don't look forward to the next super hero movie. But if you like those you may want to see where this all "started". show less

Wu Cheng'en's 西游记 (Journey to the West) is a timeless classic of Chinese literature that continues to captivate readers with its rich storytelling and imaginative world-building. This Kindle Edition of the novel preserves the depth and complexity of the original work, offering a seamless reading experience.

Suitable for Studying:
西游记 is invaluable for studying Chinese culture, mythology, and literature. The novel's intricate narrative, blending folklore with philosophical insights, provides a comprehensive understanding of traditional Chinese values and beliefs. Its multi-layered characters, such as the Monkey King, Pigsy, and Sandy, offer profound lessons in morality, resilience, and redemption. The novel's allegory and show more symbolism make it an essential text for exploring themes of personal growth and societal norms. show less

As to the series, please see my review in "the Three Kingdoms" volume.

This volume in particular was a fun taste of what was to come. At this point in my journey through the four classics, I feel like I'm starting to get my sea legs under me, and am picking up on various conceits, themes, and references.

(2024 Review #8)

A classic Chinese novel with origins in oral tradition stretching back well over a thousand years. The standard version was written down in the late 16th century by Wu Cheng'en (or Cheng'en Wu if you're using European name order). It's still extremely influential today, all over Asia: reading this book explained a lot to me about both Chinese and Japanese narrative patterns. If you see a character in a work from either culture named "Goku" or "Wukong," chances are it's related to "Journey to the West."

The basic plot is that a worthy monk travels to the West (here, the "west" is India) to retrieve some holy scriptures, and has all kinds of trouble with demons along the way. Fortunate that he has three disciples to protect him - Friar show more Sand, Brother Pig, and of course Monkey, the Great Sage Equaling Heaven.

Deriving as it does from oral tradition, the format is rather episodic. The version I read contained only 34 of the 100 original chapters, but that was more than enough to get the basic idea. It was also a pretty good read. I found Monkey's means of travel especially amusing (he gets around by "somersault cloud").

It's not well known outside of Asia. Since I finished this version I've enjoyed surprising Chinese acquaintances by casually mentioning Sun Wukong (that's Monkey) in conversation. They all know the story. Works for Japanese, too, though they titled it "Saiyuuki" instead of "Xīyóu Jì" and changed Monkey's name from "Sun Wukong" to "Son Goku."

Well worth a read if you're interested in China or Japan. show less

Wu Cheng’en’s sixteenth-century novel Journey to the West tells the story of the pilgrimage of Buddhist monk Xuanzang to the “Western Regions” of Central Asia and India in order to obtain Buddhist sūtras and return them to China between 626 and 645 CE. Xuanzang wrote his own account in 646, Great Tang Records on the Western Regions, which formed the outline of Wu’s novel. The novel is a humorous adventure that satires Chinese bureaucracy while also telling an allegory of enlightenment. Many in the Euro-American world know elements of the story from Arthur Waley’s 1942 abridged translation, Monkey: A Folk-Tale of China, while some elements of the story inspired Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball. Along with Luo Guanzhong’s show more fourteenth-century novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Shi Nai’an’s fourteenth-century novel Water Margin, and Cao Xueqin’s eighteenth-century novel Dream of the Red Chamber, this novel is one of the Four Classic Novels of Chinese literature. This edition presents the complete novel in four volumes, translated by William John Francis Jenner, a noted sinologist who completed this translation while working for Foreign Languages Press between 1963-1965. It features Qing Dynasty illustrations to supplement the text. show less

Warning: Do not read on an empty stomach or with an empty refrigerator.