Monkey: Folk Novel of China by Wu Ch'?ang-?an

by Arthur Waley

Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 1847

About the author

Arthur David Waley was an esteemed English orientalist and sinologist, renowned for his translations of Chinese and Japanese poetry. He received numerous honours, including the Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1952, the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry in 1953, and was invested as a Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour (CH) in 1956.
Waley was largely self-taught, and his translations brought Chinese and Japanese classical literature to a broad Western audience. He translated works such as A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1918), The Tale of Genji (1925–26), and Monkey (1942), making significant contributions to the understanding of East Asian literary traditions in the West. Despite his extensive knowledge, Waley never visited China or Japan, nor did he speak Mandarin or Japanese, focusing solely on written texts.
Born in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, he attended Rugby School and briefly studied Classics at Cambridge University before leaving due to vision problems. In 1913, he became Assistant Keeper of Oriental Prints and Manuscripts at the British Museum, where he taught himself Classical Chinese and Japanese. Waley was also active during WWII, working for the Ministry of Information and running the Japanese Censorship Section.
He maintained a close personal relationship with dancer and orientalist Beryl de Zoete, though they never married. Waley passed away in 1966, shortly after marrying poet Alison Grant Robinson. His work left an indelible mark on the field of translation and introduced the high literary cultures of China and Japan to the English-speaking world. His translations continue to be highly regarded and widely published, influencing generations of readers and scholars.

Reviews

[James F · Rating 4 out of 5]

Buddhism, of course, originated in India, and was spread by missionaries to China and other parts of East Asia, while eventually fading away in its original homeland. For a long time, however, India remained the religious center. In the seventh century of the Common Era, a Chinese monk named Xuanzang (or Hsüan Tsang, in the older transcription used in this book), and often referred to as Triptaka, from the name of the scriptures he collected, made an almost two-decades-long (629-646) journey to India to search for and retrieve Buddhist scriptures unknown in China at the time. Over many centuries, the historical adventure of Xuanzang became encrusted with mythical elements and gave rise to both oral folk tales, and written versions, poetic and dramatic.

Near the end of the sixteenth century, these earlier sources were combined and moulded into a “novel” alternating prose and verse, called Journey to the West, which was published anonymously. While at first the book was attributed impossibly to a disciple of Xuanzang, in the early twentieth century it was attributed to a poet named Wu Ch’eng-en. Today, some scholars dispute that attribution and the more recent unabridged translations simply call it anonymous, although others still credit its present form to Wu. While there were earlier abridged translations into English, they generally just excerpted parts from each of the hundred chapters of the book; this 1942 translation by Arthur Waley, under the title Monkey, the form in which the book has most often been read by English-speaking readers, took a different direction, translating thirty of the hundred chapters in full, except for the verse which is usually omitted.

According to the Preface, Monkey contains the chapters 1-7, which give the origins of the Stone Monkey or Monkey King and his adventures before becoming a disciple of Triptaka; chapters 8-12, which give the story of Hsüan Tsang and the origin of the mission to India; chapters 14-15, 18-19, and 22, which deal with the finding of the four disciples, Monkey, Pigsy, Sandy (the last two names are Waley’s choices for Zhu Bajie, which according to Wikipedialiterally means "Eight Precepts Pig," and Sha Wujing, literally "Sand Awakened to Purity") and White Dragon Horse; chapters 37-39, 44-46, and 47-49, which give three episodes of the journey; and 98-100, which give the ending of the quest and the ultimate disposition of the characters.

As Waley’s English title suggests, the role of the impetuous and often violent Monkey (and his rival, the lusty and gluttonous Pigsy) tends to eclipse the role of their master Triptaka, much as Gawain and Lancelot eclipse the role of King Arthur in the tales of the Round Table. Sandy is less visible and mainly just mediates between Monkey and Pigsy, while White Dragon Horse is a “non-speaking” part. Journey to the West has frequently been interpreted as an allegory; Waley has been criticized for choosing his selections to emphasize the folk tale aspect over the religious implications. The book is full of stories of gods, demons, monsters and magicians, and is a humorous and entertaining read for both adults and younger readers alike.