The story of
Journey to the West is divided into three parts: (1) an early history of the Monkey spirit; (2) pseudo-historical account of Tripitaka''s family and life before his trip to to fetch the sutras in the Western Heaven; (3)the main story, consisting of 81 dangers and calamities encountered by Tripitaka and his three animal spirit disciples - Monkey, Pigsy, and Sandy (a fish spirit).
"Monkey King", or known to the Chinese as "Journey to West", is one of the renowned classical Chinese novels dated back some four hundred years ago, the other three being "The Water Margins", "Dream of the Red Mansion" and "Romance of Three Kingdoms".
"Monkey King" was based on a true story of a famous Chinese monk, Xuan Zang (602-664). After years of trials and tribulations, he travelled on foot to what is today India, the birthplace of Buddhism, to seek for the Sutra, the Buddhist holy book. When he returned to China ,or the Great Tang as was called that time, he started to translate the sutras into Chinese, thus making a great contribution to the development of Buddhism in China.
"Monkey King" is an allegorical rendation of the journey, mingled with Chinese fables, fairy tales, legends, supersitions, popular beliefs, monster stories as well as whatever the author could find in the Taoist and Buddhist religions.
While average readers are facsinated with the prowess and wisdom of the Monkey King, many critics agree that the protagonist embodies what the author tried to convey to his readers: a rebellious spirit against the then untouchable feudal rulers.
Monkey King is indeed rebellious, being in fact not an ordinary being. He was born out of a rock, fertilized by the grace of Heaven, according to the story. Being extremely smart and capable, he learned all the magic tricks and gongfu from a master Taoist. Now he can transform himself into seventy-two different images such as a tree, a bird, a beast of prey or a bug as small as a mosquito so as to sneak into an enemy''s belly to fight him or her inside out. Using clouds as a vehicle he can travel 180,000 miles a single somersault.
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