Victor's Pursuit of Serenity Chapter 24

I made these complaints because I bought a new edition of Journey to the West for writing this article. I hadn't read Journey to the West for many years. When I opened it this time, I was greeted by a gloomy preface. After reading for a while, I threw the book out of the window, secretly hoping that it would hit the young man who had just delivered the book. Is this the Journey to the West that I read as a child? I almost indulged in an evil thought in my heart, which was to let more people share my misfortune. The way to do this was to carefully introduce the history of Journey to the West and Wu Chengen in this article, or to talk about the various profound meanings of the character of Zhu Bajie. In the end, my kind nature prevailed, and I decided to bear the anger and despair alone. I had also intended to introduce the countless people who have been interpreting Journey to the West since the publication of the book. The so-called interpretation is to put their own stupidity between each page and use their own dullness to tear our sMiles Liu off our faces like the skin. I was going to laugh at them severely, but I immediately realized that in order not to help these evil people to gain fame, I would not mention their names or quote their nagging, but just say in general that those are all nonsense.

Journey to the West is not a great work. Its most important qualities are childlike innocence and playfulness, which are exactly what people lack the most. It is a kind of work, the kind of book you can read three times in your life. The first time you read it in childhood, it can make you imagine with bright eyes or giggle; the third time you read it in old age, while reading it, you will recall your childhood and smile unconsciously; as for the second time, when you read it in middle age, it is not interesting, but it is not meaningless, because it can let us know how boring we are now.

Is it strange that there are few female readers for Journey to the West, as well as two other famous books, Water Margin and Romance of the Three Kingdoms? Female readers may hate the rudeness of Water Margin and the fighting of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but why don't they like Journey to the West? Maybe they have their own games, which are different from those of men, or, as the vicious Mencken concluded, they are much smarter than men. When we were struggling in the mud, they had already arrived in front, chatting and waiting for us.

Don't read the Three Kingdoms

Is Romance of the Three Kingdoms a good novel? Yes. Is it a great novel? That depends on how you define "great". If you think that something huge and influential is great, if you think that something that is worshipped is great, if you think that something that makes people feel humble is great, then Romance of the Three Kingdoms should be among the great ones. If you think that something personal and spiritual is great, if you think that something that is beyond everyday experience and difficult to understand is a brand new creation rather than an accumulation of small things is great, then the pyramids are nothing special, the Great Wall is not as good as Huang Dao Po's spinning wheel, and Romance of the Three Kingdoms is just a good novel.