"Journey to the West"

Journey to the West (Wu Cheng'en, translation by WJF Jenner) [Second look!]

Second on my hit list of the four classics of Chinese literature. Unfortunately, I couldn't really get into this the way I became absorbed in Romance of the Three Kingdoms. I put this down to two factors: The first is that our hero, Sun Wukong, never really grew on me the way he apparently did with most readers. I just found him to honestly be kind of a dick and not very likable, and given that he's the star and main attraction of the story, this was a rather major impediment to my enjoyment. The second issue is that where Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a historical novel, Journey to the West is pure mythology, and a bit of a slog to someone like me who is not very familiar with Chinese religion and culture. It's tough to recommend this book for that reason; it's a classic story and a good translation, but I just couldn't make reading it feel like anything but a chore.

Grade: @_@