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the book opens with the birth of Scimmiotto from a rock, shaped by the energies of Heaven and Earth
the monkey born from this stone egg was very strong and also very cunning
I immediately attract the attention of the celestial gods and the Jade Emperor (the emperor of the celestial court).

The first part tells the deeds and the early life of little monkey.
he quickly becomes King of the Monkeys and thanks to his cunning he manages to defeat several demons and monsters that threatened
his tribe
he gets a golden cloud that allows them to fly and that responds to his call and
the staff that can extend (only he can use it, very heavy) that he will use as a weapon
but his desire for power seems inexhaustible
you want to become immortal
Presto always thanks to his cleverness manages to reach Heaven, in order to try to obtain a celestial role.
but it also brings chaos and disorder here

causes so much damage that in the end the emperor decides to put an end to all this
he wants to have him executed
send an army against little monkey and a battle breaks out
the monkey army is defeated and he is captured

in the end through the intercession of the goddess of mercy and Buddha
The little monkey is not executed but locked up in a mountain sealed by the gods and protected by a guardian spirit.

this ends the first part

Then we begin with the goddess of mercy who wants to find a way to bring Buddhist scriptures to China.
which begin various digressions
It tells the story of the monk Hsuan-Tsang, also known as Tripitaka.
of how he received the task of going West to recover sacred scriptures
and how he was entrusted with the little monkey, who was supposed to protect him during the journey

The little monkey obviously did not want it, so the goddess of mercy magically forged a golden tiara and made it
to wear a monkey suit
now, the little monkey had to obey the monk's orders, he could no longer rebel.

the monk and the little monkey begin their journey, during which they experience many adventures
they encounter a dragon that mimics, defeats and has the ability to transform into a horse
thanks to him, the monk can travel more comfortably :D

they subsequently meet two more travel companions

in the end, they manage to achieve their goal

the book ends with a celestial assembly

in the end, the celestial assembly decides that for their deeds
little monkey, sandy, piglet, the dragon and the monk all obtain a heavenly role
the little monkey is freed from the golden tiara
and the five "saints" take their heavenly places under the gaze of all heavenly spirits
The novel "Journey to the West - The Monkey" ("Xiyou Ji" in the original language) is a true masterpiece.
miliare of Chinese literature; it draws on a long tradition of legends that arose around the event that really
the occurrence of the pilgrimage from China to India by the monk Xuanzang, who was sent by the Great Tang in the 7th century
in the lands of 'the West' with the sacred mission of collecting the Buddhist sutras and bringing them to the Chinese court. At that time for the
for the Chinese, the 'Western' world, or rather what was to the west of the empire, was a world that was almost unknown, around
to which countless legends circulated, somewhat in the same way that in the Middle Ages the European collective imagination
the Orient was envisioned. Thus, over the centuries, the imagination of jugglers and storytellers transformed the
the pilgrimage of Xuanzang in a journey fraught with dangers and exceptional encounters. Therefore, when around 1570 the scholar
Wu Cheng'en dedicated himself to this work, he already had a vast amount of elements to work with. The result was indeed
a very long novel, which in current versions inevitably appears almost always significantly reduced.
It is likely that the events narrated were already well known to the public, but Wu Cheng'en added his own touch: the protagonist of
his novel is no longer, as tradition has it, the monk Xuanzang, but rather Sun Wukong, the Monkey King born from a stone,
celestial creature whose story dominates the first chapters; a character eager for knowledge, incredibly skilled, but also
stubborn and arrogant, deserving of a divine punishment from the Jade Emperor, the pinnacle of the hierarchy
celestial. After a long imprisonment, our little monkey will have to become a monk and become a disciple of Xuanzang to
accompany him on his journey, accompanied by other fantastic individuals: the strong and gluttonous Zhu Bajie (in the
little pig), the mysterious monk Sandy, and a dragon transformed into a horse. In front of the
countless dangers, many of which consist of encounters with monsters that want to devour Xuanzang, the poor one
Monaco lets himself go to tears and hysterical crises, like any man who feels involved in something too much.
greater than him. On the contrary, his disciples always seem perfectly up to the task; however, in
some excerpts from a certain comicity, Monkey and Piglet, stubborn and full of himself one, greedy and spiteful the other,
they just can't get along, and they get lost in childish arguments complicating their path on their own, to the detriment of
of the importance of their mission.
This journey can be read as an allegorical journey toward enlightenment, where the characters, as much as
extraordinary, they are at the same time bearers of virtues but also of the baseness, sometimes even ridiculous, of the human soul,
as in the cases of Monkey and Piglet. For his part, Xuanzang, in difficult moments, cries, despairs, but in the end
he always finds in his faith and in the trust in his companions the courage to move forward. Sandy instead is the most
dark and taciturn of the characters. Nonetheless, he is mysteriously indispensable for the successful outcome of the
mission, and is sometimes associated with the virtue of sincerity and integrity of heart. The various adventures and monsters
faced along the way, they are ultimately the illusions that torment the human soul throughout life and from which one must
freeing oneself to reach Enlightenment.
In representing all this, Wu Cheng'en does not hold back a satirical vein; a satire that exposes the evils.
of the individual and the ills of society of the time, and who does not hesitate to strike against the traditional hierarchy of the pantheon
Chinese, of which some decidedly improbable connotations are emphasized.
"Journey to the West - The Little Monkey" is a fantasy novel that, with its relatively simple vocabulary and the
sufficiently smooth form, has enjoyed and continues to enjoy great success. The type of story narrated, a
an engaging mix of adventure, fantasy, battles, extraordinary characters, all set in
in the scenario of a journey to unknown lands, it has represented, in the Far East but not only,
important example, an incipit, for the birth in the most diverse modern and contemporary artistic expressions of trends
narratives that largely mirror, if not completely, their defining traits. Sometimes the protagonists themselves of
the novel in question has been reinvented in the key roles of subsequent works of all kinds. Think, for example, of
the most striking case: the Monkey King, in Chinese Song Wukong, in Japanese Son Goku, is actually the protagonist of the famous
Japanese manga and anime "Dragon Ball".
In short, "Journey to the West - The Monkey" potentially represents a great starting point.
for a Western-trained reader who has never engaged with a novel of the tradition
Chinese.