Wu Ch'eng-en – författare

Also known as Journey to the West, Wu Ch'êng-ên's Monkey is one of the Four Great Classical Novels in Chinese literature, translated by Arthur Waley in Penguin Classics. Monkey depicts the adventures of Prince Tripitaka, a young Buddhist priest on a dangerous pilgrimage to India to retrieve sacred scriptures accompanied by his three unruly disciples: the greedy pig creature Pipsy, the river monster Sandy - and Monkey. Hatched from a stone egg and given the secrets of heaven and earth, the irrepressible trickster Monkey can ride on the clouds, become invisible and transform into other shapes - skills that prove very useful when the four travellers come up against the dragons, bandits, demons and evil wizards that threaten to prevent them in their quest. Wu Ch'êng-ên wrote Monkey in the mid-sixteenth century, adding his own distinctive style to an ancient Chinese legend, and in so doing created a dazzling combination of nonsense with profundity, slapstick comedy with spiritual wisdom. Arthur Waley's humorous and energetic translation is accompanied by an introduction discussing the story's background in history and legend, its elements of anti-bureaucratic satire and the allegorical nature of its characters Very little is known about Wu Ch'êng-ên (c.1505-80) although he is believed to have held the post of District Magistrate for a time. He had a reputation as a good poet but only a few rather commonplace verses of his survive in an anthology of Ming poetry and in a local gazetteer.If you enjoyed Monkey, you might like Confucius's The Analects, also available in Penguin Modern Classics.

Monkey depicts the adventures of Prince Tripitaka, a young Buddhist priest on a dangerous pilgrimage to India to retrieve sacred scriptures accompanied by his three unruly disciples: the greedy pig creature Pipsy, the river monster Sandy – and Monkey. Hatched from a stone egg and given the secrets of heaven and earth, the irrepressible trickster Monkey can ride on the clouds, become invisible and transform into other shapes – skills that prove very useful when the four travellers come up against the dragons, bandits, demons and evil wizards that threaten to prevent them in their quest. Wu Ch’êng-ên wrote Monkey in the mid-sixteenth century, adding his own distinctive style to an ancient Chinese legend, and in so doing created a dazzling combination of nonsense with profundity, slapstick comedy with spiritual wisdom.

La historia del picaresco Mono y sus encuentros con espíritus mayores y menores, dioses, semidioses, de­mo­nios, ogros, monstruos y hadas en su camino para alcanzar la iluminación es la novela más popular en la historia del Lejano Oriente —el Quijote de la literatu­ra china— y un clásico de la literatura universal.  He aquí una combinación de actos asombrosos y escenas de la vida cotidiana, lecciones de madurez y muy buen humor. Narración de primerísimo nivel, colmada de personalidad y diversión,  Rey Mono  es una obra única en su combinación de belleza y absurdo, profundidad y sinsentido. Folclor, alegoría, religión, historia, sátira antiburocrática y poesía.   En 1942 Arthur Waley, reconocido orientalista y sinólogo británico, tradujo al inglés una versión abreviada del original en chino. Por primera vez en español, Perla Ediciones ofrece una traducción del trabajo íntegro de Arthur Waley, fiel al espíritu y al significado del original.  "No existe nada igual a  Rey Mono  en la literatura occidental. Imagina una combinación de novela picaresca, cuento de hadas,  fabliaux , Mickey Mouse, Davy Crockett y  El progreso del peregrino ; y luego figúrate, si puedes, que cada uno de estos elementos se fusiona en un todo artístico de tal modo que, sin importar cuán fantástica sea la aventura o cuán enigmática sea la alegoría, la caracterización y el significado siempre permanecen humanos." The Nation