The Journey to the West, Volume 4
Mar. 1st, 2025 12:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliThe Journey to the West, Volume 4 by Wu Cheng'en
And off to more episodic adventure. People want to marry the monk, people want to eat the monk and so prolong their lives, a king forces his subjects to raise their sons in goose coops so he can eat their hearts, a princess is thrown into wilderness by a monster who takes her place, and more.
There's no particular reason to cut off the adventures when they do -- but they do.
I look back. I remember particularly how, in the opening, freeing women from the palace and arranging marriages for them is one of the acts of generosity the king performs to celebrate, how many people talk of having only daughters and so taking a son-in-law rather than marrying off a daughter, and the time when they hear the sad story of a pair of brothers who each have one child -- one a son and one a daughter -- who has now been chosen for the yearly sacrifice of a virgin girl and a virgin boy, and how Monkey's first suggestion is that a virgin girl and a virgin boy are easy to buy.
And off to more episodic adventure. People want to marry the monk, people want to eat the monk and so prolong their lives, a king forces his subjects to raise their sons in goose coops so he can eat their hearts, a princess is thrown into wilderness by a monster who takes her place, and more.
There's no particular reason to cut off the adventures when they do -- but they do.
I look back. I remember particularly how, in the opening, freeing women from the palace and arranging marriages for them is one of the acts of generosity the king performs to celebrate, how many people talk of having only daughters and so taking a son-in-law rather than marrying off a daughter, and the time when they hear the sad story of a pair of brothers who each have one child -- one a son and one a daughter -- who has now been chosen for the yearly sacrifice of a virgin girl and a virgin boy, and how Monkey's first suggestion is that a virgin girl and a virgin boy are easy to buy.