Journey to the West is my favorite thing in the entire world and I recently decided to re-read through the first 7 chapters (the ones exclusively about the Monkey King) in preparation for a project I’m working on. I wanted to note interesting things I found and noticed while reading the novel, including a lot of things that don’t get a lot of attention in retellings or adaptions of the novel. The version I read was the Anthony C. Yu’s English translation; pdf provided by journeytothewestresearch.com. So all the page numbers in my notes refer to that pdf version of the translation.

General notes

• I like that a lot of the chapters end with “Let’s find out in the next chapter” or “the explanation will be revealed in the next chapter”. It gives Dragon Ball Z vibes “Next time on Dragon Ball Z!” I wonder if the novel was initially published incrementally. 

• Journey to the West is very funny. But I am entirely unsure which part is meant to be funny and which parts are serious and accidentally funny. This is actually a super common issue I’m running into while reading the novel. It’s actually cited that one of the reasons most scholars agree Wu Chen’en is the real author of XYJ is because he was known to be a funny man. Therefore it had to be him who wrote it. So there are a lot of segments intentionally written in a comedic fashion. But this is also an old piece of literature regarding mythology and customs that I am not entirely familiar with. There’s a lot of absurd moments in the book that makes me wonder if the author was intentionally writing this for comedic effect or it just happens to be funny to me now. 

• Despite being known for being the quintessential piece of Chinese Mythology outside of The Investiture of the Gods, XYJ leans very closely into Buddhist and Hindu mythological characters. A lot of the Anthony C Yu translation calls attention to the Buddhist form of a lot of characters and I can’t tell if the initial author’s intent was to use the Buddhist variant of some of them. For example annotations state that Li Jing in the novel is meant to be the Indian Devaraja Vaiśravaṇa despite Devaraja Vaiśravaṇa already appearing as one of the Heavenly Great Kings. Certain deities also have their backstory altered. Nezha in Journey to the West was revived by Buddha himself after death, where in the original story it was his teacher, Taiyi Zhenren, who rebuilt his body out of lotus roots. Overall there is just a lot of Buddhism heavy bias in the novel that the original author clearly favors over Taoism. 

• There are a lot of segments that are oddly repetitive. Characters will go on to re-narrate sequences and events that they just experienced in great detail. Which often isn’t necessarily an unrealistic thing to do from an in-story perspective. But it strikes me as odd that the author essentially copies and pastes the exact same text twice. Instead of just saying “Wukong explained to them what happened”, we get a few paragraphs of Wukong actually repeating the previous events word by word. It’s like the literary equivalent of excessive flashbacks you might see in anime. Except it’s even more jarring because you are hearing the characters repeat the exact same dialogue as what the narrator previously said. Very meta. At the bottom of this notes section, I actually keep a tally of every single time the author does this. It’s very funny. 

Volume 1

• The beginning chapters of XYJ takes place in a somewhat fictional land of Pūrvavideha, one of the four continents in Buddhist Cosmology. I’m unclear where it is located in relation to the real life locations in the novel. 

Pg 112 

• Great use of Chekhov’s lore dump. There is a nice introduction of the order of events regarding the creation myth. 

• Quick summary: there are 12 epochs consisting of 10,800 years each that roughly correspond to the life cycle of a day. 

Pg 114

• There are exact measurements given of the rock that Sun Wukong was birthed from. I find this very funny. This description is more in depth than some of the main characters later in the novel. The exact dimensions are probably around 11.6 meters tall with a circumference of 7.63 meters wide. Source in the comments here.

• The rock actually split open and turned into a stone egg before then transforming into the Monkey. There’s a nice parallel between this and Goku emerging from a Saiyan pod. 

• Thousand-Mile Eye and Fair-Wind Ear reported what they saw and heard

Pg 115

• Wukong’s immediate priorities after being born (and bowing to the cardinal directions) is to go eat lunch. 

• “These creatures from the world below are born of the essences of Heaven and Earth, and they need not surprise us.”
  This is foreshadowing for when Sun Wukong later surprises them

• Wtf is a civet

• On page 115, there is an extremely odd poem that describes the daily life of the monkeys. Because most of the poem is very normal things you might expect a monkey to do, such as playing around and chasing dragonflies, searching for fruits and flowers, and bathing in rivers. However there’s one completely out of place line thrown in there nonchalantly… about how they built pagodas… This is by far the most confusing and unexplained thing in the entirety of the XYJ novel. Because of how the author just casually suggests that building entire several story buildings is a natural thing that regular monkeys can achieve and normally do on a daily basis. It’s utterly bizarre and I honestly can’t tell if I’m supposed to take this seriously or not. Like it’s just… “oh yeah they eat peaches and pick bugs off each other’s backs and also they build these sick fucking giant temples and they also swing around in trees” You know, normal monkey business. REMEMBER this part. This is part of XYJ lore. Monkeys can build pagodas in this novel.

Pg 116

• The discovery of the water curtain cave is extremely contrived. The monkeys kinda just one day got bored and decided to follow the river back to its peak and then decided to crown whoever can jump through the waterfall to be the new king. This all happens in the span of like one paragraph. A lot of very iconic moments that I knew from watching TV shows and cartoon adaptations of this novel turn out to be very brief and short segments from the novel.  

• There is a description of the water curtain cave on page 116 and 117

Pg 117

• There’s apparently a lot of furniture and cookware in the water curtain cave for some reason

• We never really find out the origins of this cave, who built it and for what purpose

Pg 118

• The name “Mei Hou Wang” (Handsome Monkey King) is coined

• There is a casual mention of a 300 – 400 year time skip

• The monkeys were racist against birds

Pg 119

• Subject to unicorn and phoenix is a phrase that’s mentioned several times in the novel

• Sun Wukong gets a mid-life crisis. At the ripe age of 300 years old…

• Monkeys are apparently affected by existential dread and this is not an exclusively human trait

• Buddhas, immortals, and the holy sages are outside the jurisdiction of the underworld. The immortals in this context are probably the Taoist Gods. It is unclear what the holy sages is referring to

• On page 119 there is mention of immortal peaches but we do not know if this is meant to be taken literally. It is likely to be a figure of speech or some sort of descriptive term rather than implying the peaches actually grant immortality

Pg 120

• ” Pears like rabbit heads and dates like chicken hearts” forget the american measurement system of using football fields. Time to measure things in rabbit hearts

• “Mankind may boast its delicious dainties, But what can best the pleasure of mountain monkeys?” VALID

Pg 121

• “He approached them and, making a weird face and some strange antics, he scared them into dropping their baskets and nets and scattering in all directions. One of them could not run and was caught by the Monkey King, who stripped him of his clothes and put them on himself, aping the way humans wore them.”

Sun Wukong straight up robs a guy I guess

• “The Monkey King searched diligently for the way of immortality, but he had no chance of meeting it. Going through big cities and visiting small towns, he unwittingly spent eight or nine years on the South Jambūdvīpa Continent before he suddenly came upon the Great Western Ocean.” 

Wukong’s quest for immortality basically amounted to that scene from Deadpool where he ran around yelling “where’s Francis!?”

Pg 123

• Wukong finds a woodcutter who he mistakes as an immortal. He then receives the actual location of the immortals from this kind man. The woodcutter lived a pretty hard life and does not have the luxury to learn the way of immortality. 

Pg 124 

• Has a good description of the “Cave of Slanting Moon and Three Stars” which resides on the “Mountain of Mind and Heart”

Pg 126

• There is a clever joke here where Subodhi (Xuputi Zushi) asks for his surname, which sounds the same as the word for temper. Wukong responds by saying he has no temper and does not get offended when disrespected. Which is false. Wukong’s immediate gut reaction to getting offended is violence. “My whole life’s without ill temper” my ass

• Wukong is stated to resemble a pignolia-eating monkey (husun)

There’s a bit here where Subodhi explains the etymology behind how he came up with the name Sun Wukong

Pg 127

• The 12 divisions are wide (guang), great (da), wise (zhi), intelligence (hui), true (zhen), conforming (ru), nature (xing), sea (hai), sharp (ying), awakened to (wu), complete (yuan), and awakening (jue)

Wukong falls under Wu. His full name means awakened to void. Kong refers to emptiness, a concept associated with a form of enlightenment. It is a separation from earthly desires such as pleasures and self indulgence. Which is ironic since Wukong is a hedonistic little monkey that does what he wants. The central idea is supposed to be that Wukong starts off as void and unaware of enlightenment. But as a stone monkey of luminous wisdom, he achieves enlightenment and understanding. All three of the main disciples in the novel have religious names starting with Wu (悟)

Pg 128

• A 6-7 year time skip is mentioned, where Wukong learns basic life skills like how to garden and talk properly. Time is kept by counting the number of times the peach trees ripen

• Also there are peach trees

• I think I forget to mention this often, but you can really see Wukong’s characterization as a monkey here. He’s described with a sort of childlike enthusiasm and excitement towards things. He prances and leaps around as you would expect from a monkey

Pg 129

• There are 360 divisions of Taoism. Most of them don’t seem to lead to immortality. Subodhi offers to teach Wukong several but he refuses them all

• There are a few exchanges where Subodhi uses metaphors to explain the different divisions and Wukong is like “I didn’t understand a single thing you just said. I’m a monkey” 

• “This is like setting a pillar inside a wall” means something is not long lasting since “When people build houses and want them to be sturdy, they place a pillar as a prop inside the wall. But someday the big mansion will decay, and the pillar too will rot.”

• “They are no better than the unfired bricks on the kiln” means something lacks permanence as “The tiles and the bricks on the kiln may have been molded into shape, but if they have not been refined by water and fire, a heavy rain will one day make them crumble.” 

• “is also like scooping the moon from the water” means “When the moon is high in the sky, its reflection is in the water. Although it is visible therein, you cannot scoop it out or catch hold of it, for it is but an illusion.”

Pg 132

• There is a terribly convoluted riddle that involves Wukong counting his breath to wait until the third hour after midnight to find Subodhi by going through the back door. The fact that Subodhi really intended this is the most contrived thing ever. 

Pg 133

• Another 3 year time skip is mentioned

• Wukong has obtained a form of divinity by now but it is a form of magic unapproved by the court of heaven. We are first introduced to the three calamities (Heavenly Tribulations). After 500 years, the heavens will send thunder to strike him. Another 500 years and the Fire of Yin will arrive to burn him. Another 500 years will lead to the Mighty Wind, powerful enough to rip flesh from bone and disintegrate the body

Pg 134

• Wukong is not “a man” since he has much less jowl. So remember kids, in order to be a man you need not only be a featherless biped, but you must also have plenty of jowl

• I can’t actually tell if that previous part was meant for comedic effect or an actual serious discussion. Subodhi’s reasons that he cannot teach Wukong a method of escaping the calamities since he is not human. And the only criteria he gives is that Wukong has less cheek fat? Which Wukong counter-argues with the fact that he has a pouch, which makes up for the space he loses out on by having smaller cheeks… 

None of this makes sense

• So the methods in which Subodhi teaches Wukong to escape the calamities involves the art of transformation. Here we are introduced to the Heavenly Ladle and the Art of the Earthly Multitude. The latter of which has 72 transformations, twice as much as the Heavenly Ladle

• I am unclear what the 72 transformations actually are. I don’t think it’s meant to be literal and there’s a set 72 things he can transform into. Throughout the novel he is shown to shapeshift into many things (To be fair I never counted, it’s possible he just so happens to transform into 72 or less things throughout the book). But the implication is that 72 is just part of the name. The actual scope of his shapeshifting is far more. But there are parts in the novel that suggest the 72 does refer to a specific number of transformations. Like the line “he mastered all seventy-two transformations”. Which just sounds like there are only 72 things he can turn into. Which doesn’t make sense at this point in the story. As later in the novel he shape shifts into the appearance of specific people and objects etc. Maybe the 72 refers to categories of things? Like humankind is one of the 72 transformations and he can transform into the form of any one person

• There are also mentions of the 72 transformations where each acts as an extra life, like in video games. I’ll get to that later when it’s mentioned in the novel

Pg 135

• “Nothing in the world is difficult,” said the Patriarch; “only the mind makes it so.” 

Ok

• Sudbohi doesn’t teach Wukong a traditional Cloud Soaring method and instead teaches him the Somersault Cloud after witnessing his acrobatics skills and reasoning it better fit his form

• The Somersault Cloud can take you one hundred and eight thousand miles in one go (Chinese li, not miles)

• Everyone’s immediate reaction to Wukong’s cloud soaring skills is the fact that he would make so much money as an Amazon Prime delivery person

Pg 136

• Wukong gets expelled from school for turning into a tree

• “I don’t want people to see you shapeshifting. Which is why I’m expelling you and sending you back into the world… where everyone will be able to see you”

Stellar logic Mr. Subodhi. You really are the brightest mind

• Subodhi really seems to want Monkey to leave. Saying he is no longer safe if he remains here. I question if that’s actually true. Maybe he’s just tired of Wukong and wants to kick him out. Though he does seem genuine in showing concern for Wukong’s safety in case someone will try to harm him in exchange for spilling the secrets of the 72 transformations. But that just makes things even more confusing, because wouldn’t he want Wukong to stay then?

Pg 137

• Subodhi basically says “snitches get stitches”

His exact words are “See that you don’t get into trouble and involve me: that’s all I ask. Once you leave, you’re bound to end up evildoing. I don’t care what kind of villainy and violence you engage in, but I forbid you ever to mention that you are my disciple. For if you but utter half the word, I’ll know about it; you can be assured, wretched monkey, that you’ll be skinned alive. I will break all your bones and banish your soul to the Place of Ninefold Darkness, from which you will not be released even after ten thousand afflictions!

Yeesh. Youch. Harsh. 

Pg 139

• The demon’s name is Monstrous King of Havoc. He has a black gold helmet, black iron breastplate and vest on top of black silk robe, and wields a scimitar

• Wukong’s clothing is described as wearing a red robe with a yellow sash and black boots

• “You think I’m without weapon, but my two hands can drag the moon down from the edge of Heaven. Don’t be afraid; just have a taste of old Monkey’s fist!” 

Pg 141

• Name of the monster’s lair is the Water Belly Cave

Pg 143

• “There must be ready-made weapons around here. But going down there to buy a few pieces from them is not as good a bargain as acquiring them by magic” From this we can tell Sun Wukong is a type 1 Asian (refer to Asian Financial Type Chart) 

Pg 144

• Sun Wukong can use the “magic of body division” to create an army of small monkeys. It’s interesting because in the novel, it’s specified that each monkey he creates is somewhat unique, since some of them were stated to be smaller and weaker and some were larger and could carry more weapons

Pg 145

• Here’s some examples of the animals that lived on Mount Huaguo

“wolves, insects, tigers, leopards, mouse deer, fallow deer, river deer, foxes, wild cats, badgers, lions, elephants, apes, bears, antelopes, boars, muskoxen, chamois, green onehorn buffaloes, wild hares, and giant mastiffs”

• “ The water below this sheet iron bridge of ours flows directly into the Dragon Palace of the Eastern Ocean.”

• Yaksha appear in this novel as water based spirits/demons

Pg 146

• The Eastern Sea Dragon’s name is Aoguang 

• There are shrimp soldiers, crab generals, tortoise marshals, bream admirals, and carp brigadiers

• They serve tea underwater… somehow…

• First weapon to be presented was a long-handled scimitar, then a nine-pronged fork (three thousand six hundred pounds), then a giant halberd (seven thousand two hundred pounds)

Pg 147

• The Jingubang pins the Milky Way

• It’s been glowing for the past few days as if in anticipation of its true owner arriving. This was brought up by the Dragon Queen unlike the 1999 cartoon where the rusty old rod was brought up only as a means to trick the Wukong and get him to leave

• “It was an iron rod more than twenty feet long and as thick as a barrel”

• He found a golden hoop at each end, with solid black iron in between. Immediately adjacent to one of the hoops was the inscription, “The Compliant Golden-Hooped Rod. Weight: thirteen thousand five hundred pounds.” 

Pg 149

• “That piece of iron—a small stroke with it is deadly and a light tap is fatal! The slightest touch will crack the skin and a small rap will injure the muscles!”

• Wukong obtains a pair of cloud-treading shoes the color of lotus root, a cuirass of chain-mail made of yellow gold, and a cap with erect phoenix plumes made of red gold

Pg 150

• “Bending over, he cried, “Grow!” and at once grew to be ten thousand feet tall, with a head like the Tai Mountain and a chest like a rugged peak, eyes like lightning and a mouth like a blood bowl, and teeth like swords and halberds. The rod in his hands was of such a size that its top reached the thirty-third Heaven and its bottom the eighteenth layer of Hell. Tigers, leopards, wolves, and crawling creatures, all the monsters of the mountain and the demon kings of the seventy-two caves, were so terrified that they kowtowed and paid homage to the Monkey King in fear and trembling.” 

• Two female monkeys with red buttocks as marshals Ma and Liu

Two bareback gibbons as generals Beng and Ba

• They set up monkey government

Pg 151

• List of the Fraternal Order of Seven
  • Bull Demon King
  • Dragon Monster King
  • Garuda Bird King
  • Giant Linx King
  • Macaque King
  • Orangutan King

Pg 152

• First time someone says he looks like a hairy faced thunder god, meant to be a comment on how scary and ugly he looks. This happens a lot from this point forward. Really makes you question his title as the “handsome monkey king”

• I think that it is funny that while Wukong is angrily fighting his way through hell (angry because he’s supposed to be immortal but they dragged him down here anyways), the underworld kings call him immortal as a title probably out of respect (or appeasement)

Them: “Great immortal! Why are you angry?” 

Wukong: “ok… say that back again slowly. And take a look around as of where we are”

• There are no individual Ox-Head and Horse-Face, rather they are types of demons as the novel mentions them in plural

Pg 153

• Sun Wukong’s Soul number is 1350 and his official description is “Heaven-born Stone Monkey” and the age at death was 342 years old. This matches with previous detail of the 300 year time skip

• A lot of monkeys in this book are henceforth immortal since Wukong essentially white-outed the ledger of death pertaining to monkey-kind

• There is a mention of the Bodhisattva, Kṣitigarbha

• Wukong woke up and it was all a dream (or was it? *vsauce music plays*)

Pg 154

• A Taoist deity by the name of Qiu Hongzhi is mentioned but there does not appear to be a precedent for this figure in existing Chinese mythology. He is brought up multiple times later in the novel. The translator notes suggest it may be an apotheosized Qiu Chuji, one of the seven true Taoists. 

• Aoguang calls Wukong a “bogus immortal” 

• Gold cap with phoenix plumes; giving him also a chain-mail cuirass and cloud-treading shoes

Pg 155

• “subdue dragons and tame tigers” is a stock metaphor for anyone with great power

• The character of Taibai Jinxing (Gold Star of Venus) is introduced here. This raises some interesting questions. He’s said to be the son of one of the 5 manifestations of God. God with a capital G. At least to an extent for Chinese folklore, which refers to Wufang Shangdi, the true highest form of divinity. This predates Taoism by a couple centuries. What I don’t know is his relation to the Taoist pantheon. As the Jade Emperor serves as the figure of the “sky father” in the Taoist pantheon. The novel has a much bigger focus on the rise of Buddhism or “new divinity” vs Taoism the way of the “old gods” with very little mention of older forces. Taibai Jinxing is also stated to originally be a woman. The popularization of Wu Chen’en novel appears to have cemented him as an old man. 

• I probably should have noted this earlier but heaven is referred to as “The Upper Region” by multiple gods 

Pg 158

• The entirety of this page is part of the poem describing The Upper Region

Pg 159

• BiMaWen is basically a glorified stable boy. It was believed that horses who ate the menstrual excretions of female monkeys would be cured of diseases. So there was a historical precedent to keeping monkeys around horses in ancient China. Making this title especially offensive to Wukong. He of course does not know this

• Officially, this makes Wukong the Chinese God of Horses

Pg 160

• There’s some descriptions of the celestial horses here

• The horses seem to like and respect Wukong, as he actually takes good care of them

Pg 161

• One day in heaven equates to one year on earth

Pg 162

• Two minor demon king characters with singular horns show up. They present Wukong with a red and yellow robe. They also inspired the title of “Qi Tian Da Sheng” or Great Sage Equal to Heaven

• They were appointed to be Vanguard Commanders, and Marshals of the Forward Regiment

Pg 163

• Nezha and his dad get promotions before even leaving to go fight Wukong

• Mighty-Spirit God wields a spreading-flower ax (formally known as”the Celestial General of Mighty-Spirit, the Vanward Commander and subordinate to Devarāja Li”

Pg 164

• The poem describes Wukong as having beaked mouth, forked ears, and gaping teeth

• “If you dare but utter half a ‘No,’ you will be reduced to powder in seconds!” – Mighty Spirit God

• One of the places and locations in heaven is called Treasure Hall of Divine Mists

Pg 165

• Li Jing was going to have the Spirit God executed for failing to subdue Wukong

Pg 166

• Nezha’s arsenal is a little bit more diverse:

a monster-stabbing sword, a monster-cleaving scimitar, a monster-binding rope, a monster-taming club, an embroidered ball, and a fiery wheel

• Wukong matches Nezha’s 3 headed form

Pg 167

• Nezha was ultimately defeated by when Wukong made a fake copy to distract him and then struck his shoulder

Pg 168

• Bull Demon King proclaims himself as the Great Sage Parallel to Heaven. This may also be interpreted as Great Sage Who Levels the Heavens. Or the Heaven Pacifying Great Sage. I think Heaven Pacifying Sage is the best translation

• The rest of the demon kings also state their various made up sage names

Pg 169

• Gold Star of Venus suggests committing wage theft

• TDIL bellicose means demonstrating aggression and willing to fight

• Wukong is very polite and puts on clothes before greeting his guests

Pg 170

• “the monkey uttered a great whoop of thanks”

Pg 171

• “His sole concern was to eat three meals a day and to sleep soundly at night.”

Mood

• There’s a whole list of new friends and gods to research on this page (research as needed)

Pg 172

• “In the front are one thousand two hundred trees with little flowers and small fruits. These ripen once every three thousand years, and after one taste of them a man will become an immortal enlightened in the Way, with healthy limbs and a lightweight body. In the middle are one thousand two hundred trees of layered flowers and sweet fruits. They ripen once every six thousand years. If a man eats them, he will ascend to Heaven with the mist and never grow old. At the back are one thousand two hundred trees with fruits of purple veins and pale yellow pits. These ripen once every nine thousand years and, if eaten, will make a man’s age equal to that of Heaven and Earth, the sun and the moon.”

Pg 173

• The peach festival is held at the Palace of the Jasper Pool

• The rainbow gown goddesses included white and black but not orange, which makes sense since there wasn’t a word for orange in Chinese for the longest time

Pg 174

• Everyone invited to the peach festival:

the Buddha, the Bodhisattvas, the holy monks, and the arhats of the Western Heaven; Kuan-yin from the South Pole; the Holy Emperor of Great Mercy of the East; the Immortals of Ten Continents and Three Islands; the Dark Spirit of the North Pole; the Great Immortal of the Yellow Horn from the Imperial Center. These were the Elders from the Five Quarters. In addition, there were the Star Spirits of the Five Poles, the Three Pure Ones, the Four Deva Kings, the Heavenly Deva of the Great Monad, and the rest from the Upper Eight Caves. From the Middle Eight Caves there were the Jade Emperor, the Nine Heroes, the Immortals of the Seas and Mountains; and from the Lower Eight Caves, there were the Pope of Darkness and the Terrestrial Immortals.

Pg 176

• Wukong stumbles into the Tushita Palace by accident

Pg 177

• Sun Wukong obtains post nut clarity after eating the elixirs of immortality and sobers up 

• “If the Jade Emperor has knowledge of this, it’ll be difficult to preserve my life! Go! Go! Go!” 

Bitch you is immortal?? What are you worried about???

Pg 178

• Wukong is offered coconut wine but hates it

Pg 179

• “As we went looking for him, he unexpectedly made his appearance and threatened us with violence and beating”

• Moreover, we do not know where he went.” These words gave the Jade Emperor added anxiety

Pg 180

• Some mentioned characters:

Twenty-Eight Constellations, the Nine Luminaries, the Twelve Horary Branches, the Fearless Guards of Five Quarters, 15 the Four Temporal Guardians, 16 the Stars of East and West, the Gods of North and South, the Deities of the Five Mountains and the Four Rivers, 17 the Star Spirits of the entire Heaven, and a hundred thousand celestial soldiers

Pg 183

• Wukong does fight off all 9 luminaries, the 4 heavenly kings, Nezha, and Li Jing on his own

• A few of the demon kings and monsters were capture but none of the monkeys 

Pg 186

• Bimawen is used here in the translations instead of Ban Horse Plague

• The Jade Emperor clarifies that since Wukong was not a paid worker, he was not invited to the festival. So in all honesty, Wukong burning heaven to the ground was really justified

• Moksha (or Hui’an) is Li Jing’s second son (Nezha’s half brother)

Pg 188

• Interestingly, one stanza of a poem states Wukong is a “wayward primordial god”

• I found this to be interesting. Nearly every time the Jingu Bang’s size is brought up specifically during combat, it’s said to be 20 ft long and has the thickness of a rice bowl. Although in descriptions of combat, it oftentimes feels more like it’s in the form of a regular bo staff. But throughout pretty much the rest of the novel, whenever a combat scene is being described, Wukong’s Jingu Bang is always said to be used at a size where the thickness is that of a rice bowl, meaning it’s essentially a small angry monkey swinging around a massive pillar of iron

Pg 189

• Mentions of Erlang Sheng’s title and accomplishments can be found on this page

Pg 191

• I find it quite interesting that these pages describing Erlang Shen appear to describe him as quite young or at the very least, small. Wukong calls him a small warrior and a little boy. Erlang Shen himself refers to himself as a little sage. This is in stark contrast to how he is often depicted in modern media, always a tall intimidating presence with the “ultimate warrior” vibe

• Note the poem on this page for more visual descriptions of his depiction. He has long earlobes 

Pg 192

• Erlong and Wukong grow to a hundred thousand feet tall. This is more than 3 times taller than Mt Everest. This could be exaggeration? 

Pg 193

• The start of their shapeshifting dual starts here
  • Wukong starts by hiding as a sparrow
  • Erlang uses his third phoenix eye to spot him
  • He responds by turning into a sparrow hawk
  • Wukong thus turns into a cormorant
  • Erlang turns into a huge ocean crane
  • Wukong escapes into the stream as a small fish
  • Erlang chases as a fish hawk
  • Wukong slithers away as a snake
  • Erlang turns into a scarlet-topped gray crane
  • Wukong turns into a spotted bustard 

• “When Erlang saw that the monkey had changed into such a vulgar creature—for the spotted bustard is the basest and most promiscuous of birds, mating indiscriminately with phoenixes, hawks, or crows—he refused to approach him. Changing back into his true form, he went and stretched his bow to the fullest. With one pellet he sent the bird hurtling”

• Wukong then turns into a temple, disguising his tail as the flagpole. Erlang sees through this disguise since temple aren’t supposed to have flagpoles I guess

Pg 195

• River of Libations 

Pg 197

• “He rolled up his sleeve and took down from his left arm an armlet, saying, “This is a weapon made of red steel, brought into existence during my preparation of elixir and fully charged with theurgical forces. It can be made to transform at will; indestructible by fire or water, it can entrap many things. It’s called the diamond cutter or the diamond snare.”

• Sun Wukong can no longer transform if he’s pinned in such a manner such as a spear through the breastbone 

Pg 199

• There is a quick rundown of all the ways Wukong is immortal. He first obtained a sort of pseudo immortality from master Subodhi. Gaining immortality of the mind. He then erased his name from the ledger of death, escaping jurisdiction of the gods of the underworld. Gaining immortality of the soul. He then feasted on the heavenly peaches and heavenly wine, gaining immortality of age and body. Finally, he consumes the elixirs of immortality to attain immortality of the spirit. 

• He “ate five gourdfuls of it [elixir of immortality], both raw and cooked” hence becoming the hyper immortal murder monkey we all know and love

Pg 200

• The aptly named Brazier of Eight Trigrams contains eight compartments. The compartment Xun symbolizes wind and thus does not have any fire. Wukong managed to escape the Samadhi Fire this way. However the smoke entering his eyes gave him his signature Samadhi Diamond Pupils

• Chinese myths are really obsessed with perfect squares. 81 trials, 4 Heavenly Kings, 9 Luminaries, 36 thunder deities, etc. Sun Wukong is cooked for a total of “七七四十九天” or “seven-seven forty nine”. This may be alluding to Buddhist religious practices where they begin the funeral ceremonies 7 days after the death of the person and then mourn for 49 days. Although this is just speculation, since Laozi is a Daoist, Buddhist practices don’t really make sense here

• “wild as a white brow tiger in a fit, a one-horned dragon with a fever”

Pg 201-203

• There are some interesting mentioned deities here that could make for good characters

• Buddha’s full title is “Śākyamuni, the Venerable One from the Western Region of Ultimate Bliss”

Pg 204

• Sun Wukong advocates for term limits

Pg 205

• Wukong’s deal with Buddha involves the Jade Emperor retiring and moving in with Buddha

• Buddha’s hand as he appears in front of Wukong is roughly the size of a lotus leaf

• Buddha calls Wukong a “Pisshead Ape”

Pg 206

• Pigsy makes a cameo here, several whole chapters before he shows up as a pig demon in the journey proper

Pg 207-210

• This is basically a curtain call of all the deities and them holding a thanksgiving banquet for Buddha called the “The Great Banquet for Peace in Heaven”

• These pages are weird because it’s just three whole pages of various immortals going up to the Buddha offering him gifts and thanking him. There’s a lot of extensive details of the feasts and celebrations that transpire

• Wukong’s head is sticking out from underneath the mountain. Which is probably really funny

• He is to be fed iron pellets and molten copper as a prisoner

THIS CONCLUDES CHAPTERS 1-7 OF THE NOVEL

Every Instance of repeating dialogue:
Volume 1

Pg 114

• Thousand-Mile Eye recounts the birth of Sun Wukong down to the details of how he decided to take a lunch break after bowing to the cardinal directions

Pg 141

• Wukong recounts his journeys to become immortal to his fellow monkeys

Pg 153

• Wukong recounts his adventures in hell to the monkeys and informs them of their newfound immortality 

Pg 154

• The letters to the Jade Emperor recount Wukong’s transgressions in the Dragon’s palace and the underworld

Pg 174

• The 7 maidens recounts why they were in the peach garden

Pg 178

• This one is a little bit different, the commander repeats information for Wukong that he should already know, since on page 161, Wukong was already made aware of the time dilation between Heaven and Earth

• Wukong also recounts his second adventures in heaven, including some dialogue that sounds suspiciously like information that only the narrator would know

Pg 179

• The gown maidens retell how they were immobilized by Wukong

Pg 182

• The 9 luminaries list Wukong’s crimes

Pg 186

• The Jade Emperor tells Guanyin of the Wukong problem

Pg 189

• Moksha recounts his encounter with Wukong to Guanyin

Pg 203

• The two sages recount Wukong’s backstory to Buddha. In. Great. Detail. Like, they were really thorough 

Pg 212

• The author repeats how many of the Buddhas there was