A p p e n d i x I : T h e M o n k e y K i n g W u Ch’êng- ê n’s The Journey to the West depicts multiple Monkey Kings and more than one trickster. In the first ten chapters, the Monkey King is an emotional child, mischievous, totally self-centered character, gluttonous for food but also for honor and glory. Smart and powerful, he easily outwits and overcomes a series of demigods and even the leaders of the heavens until he is overcome and incarcer- ated by the Buddhist Patriarch Tathagata. The first ten chapters are about the unfettered trickster who lacks self-control and has to be finally subdued by forces. The early books of The Journey to the West establish the Monkey King’s initial greedy self-absorption, his indolence, and his need for self-glorification. He epitomizes the unsocialized individual in a society where everyone has a foreordained place and a role, and everything in life is bound by precedent. The world of the immortals reflects the mortal world. In both, “[e]very class has its proper place and direction.” 1 The Monkey King, however, refuses to accept a proper place. Nonetheless, while the Monkey King of the early book admits no limitations, over the course of the tale, he becomes a culture hero who marshals his considerable gifts to aid the quest of Hsu ä n-tsang, the T’ang monk. In fact, along with the T’ang monk, in the last chapters, the Monkey King becomes a Buddha. Before that, however, the Monkey King goes through multiple changes: Born a stone egg, he is transformed into a stone monkey. In no time, he becomes the leader of the monkeys and discovers a magical place for them behind the waterfall; the rest of the monkeys acknowledge him as Handsome Monkey King. That is just the start. Dissatisfied with the limitation of mortality, the Monkey King travels over oceans and through two continents in order to study with a Patriarch who gives him a new name—Sun Wu k’ung. The Patriarch teaches him magical arts, and also recognizes that he has “entered into the divine substance” (I: 89). However, recogniz- ing in addition the Monkey King’s aptitude for action before thought, the wise Patriarch asks only that the Monkey King not “get into trouble and involve me” (I: 92). The next five chapters do not find the Monkey King involving the Patriarch, but he gets into plenty of trouble. 172 Appendix 1 Acknowledging no one’s prerogatives but his own, the Monkey King easily defeats a monster who has been afflicting his monkeys during his absence and then steals armor as well as weapons for his monkeys from one of the oceanic dragon kings. He even forces the dragon king at the bottom of the Eastern Ocean to give him the dragon king’s magical “Compliant Golden-Hooped Rod” (I: 105). “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!” (I: 107). This wondrous rod comes to be iden- tified with the Monkey King. 2 Still dissatisfied, the Monkey King then forces the brothers of the dragon king to outfit him with mar- tial clothing: “cloud-treading shoes, . a cuirass of chainmail made of yellow gold, . and a cap with erect phoenix plumes made of yel- low gold” (I: 107). In time, the Monkey King’s depredations bring him to the notice of the Emperor of Heaven. His early adventures have prepared him, however, to take on even heaven. Since the Monkey King is already immortal, at first the Jade Emperor of heaven tries to placate him. So Monkey King is put in charge of the imperial stables, but he quickly realizes and resents that his heavenly appointment is at the “meanest level” (I: 122). Defeating one heavenly champion after another, the Monkey King then receives “an empty title . rank without compensation”; he is named “Great Sage, Equal to Heaven” (I: 131). In a further attempt to neutralize the Monkey King’s rambunctious behavior, the emperor entrusts the Monkey K ing with temporary care of the Garden of Immortal Peaches. The Monkey King’s response is to gorge himself on the Immortal Peaches, eating “to his heart’s content” (I: 136). Using trickery and magic, he also steals and eats most of the rest of the “dainties” and “delicacies” (I: 143) prepared for the Queen Mother’s Peach Festival feast. Still worse, when he encounters five gourds of Lao Tzu’s concen- trated divine elixir, “he pour[s] out the contents of all the gourds and [eats] them like fried beans” (I: 141). All of this renders him almost invulnerable. After horrendous battles, however, the Monkey King is subdued by Lao Tzu’s diamond snare. But even imprisoned in the Brazier of Eight Trigrams, the Monkey King is refined rather than destroyed. So by “[t]his time our Monkey King ha[s] no respect for persons great or small; he lashe[s] out this way and that with his iron rod, and not a single deity c[an] withstand him” (I: 168). He is at a crossroads because He could be good; He could be bad; Appendix 1 173 Present good and evil he could do at will. Immortal he’ll be in goodness or a Buddha, But working ill, he’s covered by hair and horn. (I: 170) According to Yu’s endnote, this last phase means that “he is reduced to an animal” (I: 511). The Jade Emperor of heaven appeals to the Buddhist Patriarch Tathagata who first demonstrates to the Monkey King his relative insignificance (I: 174) and then has him imprisoned for 500 years, pinned down in a “kind of stone box” (I: 195) on the Mountain of Five Phases until the Monkey King learns the “meaning of penitence” (I: 195) and is “willing to practice religion” (I: 195). His confinement does not convince the Monkey King; he is not particularly penitent. He is smart enough, however, to recognize a superior force; so he tones down his impetuosity. Actually, at the beginning of his journey with the T’ang monk, the Monkey King demonstrates that he has been only partially cowed. The T’ang monk holds him in check pri- marily by a golden fillet on his head; when the T’ang monk recites a sutra, the fillet afflicts the Monkey King with implacable headaches. He does not want to serve any master, but he is not self-destructive; so he does start to help the T’ang monk. Nonetheless, in the course of their journey, the Monkey King changes. 3 The Monkey King changes so much that by the end of the pilgrims’ journey, he is worthy to be “the Buddha Victorious in Strife” (IV: 425). In contrast, the T’ang monk’s second disciple, who embodies the trick- ster’s more earthy qualities, Pa-chieh, barely achieves enlightenment. Although the T’ang monk is the putative head of the group, both he and his other disciples—Chu Pa-chieh, Sha Monk, and the dragon horse—depend primarily on the Monkey King’s phenomenal power, talents, and wits to deliver them from an exhausting series of trials. When the T’ang monk and the Monkey King, now called Pilgrim, first encounter him, Pa-chieh—though like Monkey actually an incarna- tion of another marvelous creature—is married, a glutton, and generally swine-like. 4 Although Pa-chieh’s name means “eight commandments” and refers to the first eight of Buddhism’s ten commandments—against killing, stealing, immorality, lying, the use of cosmetics and other per- sonal comforts such as a fine bed, strong drink, the use of music and dancing, and eating outside of regulation hours, Pa-chieh indulges in all of these prohibited activities. Particularly identified with his outsize appetite for food, 5 Pa-chieh also grumbles and complains throughout the journey, has no sense of what is proper, is always ready to abandon 174 Appendix 1 the T’ang monk, and at one point actually does leave him. Pa-chieh retains his interest in women; in general, he lacks self-control. He is fun- damentally slothful, callow, and venal. He makes so many stupid com- ments and choices that the T’ang monk and Pilgrim regularly address Pa-chieh as “Idiot.” Athough often the butt of Pilgrim’s tricks, Pa-chieh also pulls sly tricks on his “elder brother.” In short, he remains lech- erous and greedy, a typical earthy trickster. All of the travelers retain their natural bent. Pilgrim develops his wiliness, however, and places his talents at the service of the T’ang monk while Pa-chieh retains the trick- ster’s earthy, animal-like qualities. Pilgrim has twice Pa-chieh’s talent at transformation, but both are gifted. Usually in a doltish fashion, Pa-chieh is also funny. Even in hor- rendous situations, he can demonstrate a wry humor as when a fiend counsels other fiends to tie up the captured Pa-chieh, drop him in a pond, then “[w]hen his hairs are soaked off,” rip him open, cure him with salt, and finally sun-dry him because then he will be “good with wine when it turns cloudy.” Hearing this, Pa-chieh complains, “I’ve run into a fiend who’s a pickle merchant” (IV: 9). In keeping with Pa-chieh’s clownish role, The Journey portrays his situation as ludi- crous rather than dangerous.