University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Jin Yong's chivalry: gender and ethnicity in wuxia fiction, film, and television

(USC Thesis Other)

Jin Yong's chivalry: gender and ethnicity in wuxia fiction, film, and television

PDF

Download a page range

Download transcript

Copy asset link

Request this asset

Transcript (if available)

Content 1

JIN YONG’S CHIVARLY:
GENDER AND ETHNICITY IN WUXIA FICTION, FILM, AND TELEVISION

by
Gladys Mac

Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures
Doctor of Philosophy
Faculty of the USC Graduate School
December 2016

2

Table of Contents
Abstract ……………………………………………………………………………..…………… 4
Introduction – Jin Yong’s New School Wuxia in a Sinophone Context ……...…………………. 5
Ch. 1 – The Book and the Sword: The Uighur Female Xia and Chinese Scholar Rebel ………. 24
Introduction
Chinese Femininity and Masculinity
Similarities to A Tale of Heroic Lovers
Huo Qingtong: Jin Yong’s Undomesticated Uighur Female Xia and Female General
Princess Fragrance Hasli
Chen Jialuo the Scholarly Rebel
The Koran and the Swords
Conclusion
Ch. 2 – The Legend of the Condor Heroes and The Return of the Condor Heroes: Imagined
Loyalties ………………………………………………………………………………………... 62

Introduction
Loyalty and Ethnicity
Guo Jing: Han Chinese and Mongol Hybridity
Wanyan or Yang Kang: The Link between Guo Jing and Yang Guo
Yang Guo: The Temporary Xia
Conclusion

Ch. 3 – Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils and The Deer and the Cauldron: Two Different Types of
Masculinities ……………………………………………………………………………......... 105

Introduction
Demi-God’s Xiao Feng and Wu Masculinity
The First Stage of Life: The Beggar Clan Leader
The Second Stage of Life: Wandering with Azhu
The Last Stage of Life: In the North with the Jurchens and Khitans
Inability to Overcome the Wu Archetype
Deer’s Scoundrel Duke Wei Xiaobao
The Political Chameleon
Sworn-brothers and Wives
Conclusion

Ch. 4 – The Shaw Brothers’ Cinematic Adaptations of Jin Yong…………………………...…149
Introduction
The Shaw Brothers and Jin Yong’s Cinematic Adaptations
Chang Cheh’s The Brave Archer Series
3

Chor Yuen’s The Emperor and His Brother
Huahsan’s Tales of a Eunuch
Conclusion

Ch. 5 – Television Adaptations of Jin Yong …………...………………………………………180
Introduction
The Novel Proud, Smiling Wanderer
Swordsman II and Asia the Invincible
Television Adaptations with Men Playing Dongfang Bubai
Television Adaptations with Women Playing Dongfang Bubai
Conclusion

Conclusion …………………………………………………………………………….……… 217
Appendix ……………………………………………………………………………………… 221
Works Cited …………………………………………………..…………………………….… 227

4

Abstract
Jin Yong is one of the most widely read contemporary Sinophone authors. His fiction
was originally serialized in Hong Kong Chinese newspapers between 1955 and 1972. This
dissertation examines Jin Yong’s redefinition of the chivalric figure by manipulating the
elements of gender and ethnicity. His redefinition of the xia figure is now the contemporary
standard of chivalry through the circulation of fiction through newspapers, novels, movies, and
television. This exposure influenced Sinophone popular culture to adopt this narrower definition
of a xia as a man who is loyal to the Chinese state and its people. The first chapter examines the
two protagonists of The Book and the Sword and how they are modeled after the traditional
young-scholar and non-Chinese female xia and general. The second chapter focuses on the ethnic
loyalty and chivalry of the male protagonists from The Legend of the Condor Heroes and The
Return of the Condor Heroes. The third chapter explores the relationship between ethnicity and
different types of masculinities exhibited by the male protagonists from Demi-Gods and Semi-
Devils and The Deer and the Cauldron. The fourth chapter looks at the Shaw Brothers’ Jin Yong
adaptations, and how their reduction of the geographical setting omits the aspect of chivalry. The
last chapter examines the television adaptations from various Sinophone locations, specifically
looking at the gender and sex transformation of the character Dongfang Bubai from Proud,
Smiling Wanderer. For Sinophone readers and audiences, these stories placed them in the
Chinese heartland where premondern and modern conflicts took place. This shared history
impacted those living in and outside of China proper.

5

Introduction: Jin Yong’s New School Wuxia in a Sinophone Context
Jin Yong was born in Haining 海寧, Zhejiang 浙江 province in 1924. Jin Yong is the
penname of Louis Cha Leung-yong 查良鏞. The penname consists of the last character of his
given name split into its two radicals, and has no special meaning. The Chas were an illustrious
family of scholars during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). Prominent figures from the Cha clan
include scholars Cha Jizuo 查繼佐 (1601-1676) and Cha Shenxing 查慎行 (1650-1727), and
modern poets Mu Dan 穆旦 (penname of Cha Liangzheng 查良錚, 1918-1977) and Xu Zhimo
徐志摩 (1897-1931).
Jin Yong is most famous for being a fiction writer, more specifically a wuxia 武俠
novelist. Wuxia fiction is typically translated into martial arts novels in English, but martial arts
only make up half of the content. Wu literally translates to martial arts, violence, or anything
related to the military. Xia, on the other hand, has no English equivalent. James Liu’s The
Chinese Knight-errant, the only English language work that examines the xia figure in Chinese
literature and theatre thus far, translates xia as knight-errant.
1
The meaning of xia and its
portrayal has changed so much over the centuries that no single English translation can convey
its cultural meaning. Hence, I use the transliteration of the term instead of attempting to translate
it. Specifically focusing on the elements of gender and ethnicity, I trace the evolution of Jin
Yong’s xia figure throughout his writing career, and his fiction’s adaptation to film and
television.
Wuxia fiction is generally categorized as Old 舊派 or New School 新派. The New School
is composed of writers who wrote outside of China after 1949. John Christopher Hamm points

1
James J. Y. Liu, The Chinese Knight-errant (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967).
6

out that there really is no clear cut distinction between the Old and New Schools, but I think the
relocation and flourishing of wuxia fiction outside of China proper is definitely a marker of a
new trend.
2
Jin Yong integrates a number of Old School elements into his own works. His
dedication to portraying martial arts techniques in detail closely resembles one of the Old School
subgenres, martial techniques (jiji 技擊) fiction. These works focus on the realism of martial arts
techniques, and describe how the techniques are practiced and how they are physical performed
when in battle. The realist portrayal of martial arts is a strong contrast to the other subgenre of
Old School fiction, the fantastic swordsmen (jianxia 劍俠).
Jin Yong did not begin his fiction writing career until he relocated to Hong Kong. In his
youth, Jin Yong had aspired to be an ambassador, but he could not gain admission to the Central
Political University 中央政治學校 in Chongqing 重慶 because he lacked a Kuomintang ( 國民黨
KMT) party membership.
3
In 1946, Jin Yong’s journalism career began at Shanghai’s Dagong
Bao 大公報. Two years later, he was transferred to the paper’s branch in Hong Kong. He was
again transferred in 1952 to be the deputy editor at New Evening Post 新晚報. It was also at New
Evening Post where he met fellow writers Liang Yusheng 梁羽生 (1924-2009) and Ni Kuang 倪
匡 (1935- ), who would become his lifelong friends.
The 1940s to 1950s were a turning point in Hong Kong's literary world with the arrival of
southbound 南來 Chinese writers, who were part of a larger population movement from China to

2
John Christopher Hamm, Paper Swordsman: Jin Yong and the Modern Chinese Martial Arts Novel (Honolulu:
University of Hawai'i Press, 2005), 34.
3
Sun Yixue 孫宜學, A Thousand Year’s Dream of Literary Sainthood: A Biography of Jin Yong 千古文壇俠聖夢:
金庸傳 (Taipei: Storm and Stress Publishing 風雲時代, 2004), 52.
7

the British colony.
4
Hong Kong's population had swelled from two million in 1945 to two and a
half million within ten years, supported by a healthy economy and booming trade.
5
Despite the
refugee mentality many Chinese in Hong Kong held at the time, the founding of the People’s
Republic of China (PRC) discouraged them from returning to the homeland. Jin Yong was one of
the many who had permanently relocated to Hong Kong.
While working at New Evening Post, Jin Yong serialized his first work of fiction, The
Book and the Sword 書劍恩仇錄 in 1955. At that time he was also writing scripts and co-
directing films for Great Wall Film Company 長城電影公司. It is rumored that Jin Yong's great
admiration for the actress Xia Meng 夏夢 was the main reason he had worked for Great Wall,
because she was one of the key figures in the studio at the time. In 1959, Jin Yong left New
Evening Post and founded Ming Pao (Mingbao in pinyin) with his former classmate, Shen
Baoxin 沈寶新.
6

The success of Jin Yong’s fiction and his newspaper are tightly intertwined, and one
would not have flourished without the other. Jin Yong had already garnered much popularity
from his first three works. His third novel, The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄傳,
originally serialized in Hong Kong Commercial Daily 香港商報 from 1957 to 1959, was
especially popular. He capitalized on the fame of The Legend of the Condor Heroes by
serializing a sequel in his own newspaper. The Return of the Condor Heroes 神雕俠侶 was
serialized in Ming Pao from 1959 to 1961, and helped the fledgling newspaper weather its early

4
Chan Shun-hing 陳順馨, “The Chinese Cultural Transition in the 1940s to 1950s and Hong Kong” 香港與四 0 至
五 0 年代中國的文化轉折, in Hong Kong Literature: Succession to Traditions and Metamorphosis 香港文學的傳
承與轉化, ed. Leung Ping-kwan 梁秉鈞 et al. (Hong Kong: Infolink Publishing 匯智出版有限公司, 2011), 57-78.
5
Steve Tsang, A Modern History of Hong Kong (London: I.B. Tauris, 2004), 162-167.
6
I could not find any biographical information on Shen Baoxin other than his relationship with Ming Pao.
8

storms of competition with both large and small local newspapers. When The Return of the
Condor Heroes was also well received, Jin Yong’s fiction became the major contributor to Ming
Pao’s sales figures. However, the author’s influence cannot be quantified by counting newspaper
and books’ sales figures, it can only be examined qualitatively through looking at how his
creations have permeated the media.
Ming Pao became a dependable medium to publish his own works, eliminating the
insecurities of low pay and sudden closures. Wuxia fiction was generally serialized in
newspapers before book format publications. The genre thus became closely associated with
urban centers, because this is where most newspaper costumers were located. Since the
newspapers catered to a general readership, serializing fiction writers also catered to the same
population. This ability to appeal to a wide readership also caused wuxia fiction to be considered
unsophisticated and lowbrow. Later on, magazines and the internet became the initial platforms
for serialization before publishing in book format. Many wuxia fiction writers, especially those
from the Republican era (1912-1949) and in Taiwan, had encountered many insecurities while
writing for newspapers. During the Republican period, the journalism industry was volatile, and
sometimes a newspaper would fold without prior notice, leaving the writers unpaid for their
works. Another shortcoming to the industry was that the writers were paid meager salaries, thus
they had to write for multiple papers at the same time. Many times they confused the various
plots and characters, or they neglected one while devoting more attention to another. In Taiwan,
when the craze for martial arts films and television series soared in the 1970s, many novelists
turned to the entertainment industry for higher pay and recognition. Those who had to keep up
their newspaper serializations sometimes hired ghost writers to fulfill their responsibilities. For
those who had already established fame, they simply no longer cared for the quality of work that
9

was produced under their names, as long as they continued to receive the paycheck for
rubberstamping their name onto others' works. Many reasons contributed to the stigma and
infamy of wuxia fiction and authors, which was why such a popular and influential body of
literature has been ignored and belittled by the academic community for so many years.
7

Hong Kong was not the only location where wuxia fiction and film was produced after
the PRC’s takeover in 1949. Although the KMT regime had attempted to stamp out wuxia fiction
and film in 1935, the wuxia genre was widely popular in Taiwan after the KMT’s relocation. In
fact, a majority of New School wuxia writers resided in Taiwan. Even though the island was
under martial law from 1949 to 1987, there was no longer an attempt to ban the genre. However,
authors still had to be careful of their stories’ content. Sensitive topics included historical
references and issues of ethnicity, which appear in a majority of Jin Yong’s works. In 1959, Jin
Yong’s fiction was banned in Taiwan, but not because of the historical contents and portrayal of
various ethnicities. The reference to shooting condors in The Legend of the Condor Heroes’ title
is similar to a poem by Mao Zedong 毛澤東 (1893-1976), which alarmed the Taiwanese censors
at the time of Jin Yong’s leftist affiliations.
An example of a Taiwanese authors’ self-censorship can be best seen through Gu Long’s
古龍 (1938-1985) works. A contemporary of Jin Yong, Gu Long was born in Hong Kong, but
moved to Taiwan at a young age. Gu Long is typically categorized as a New School writer, but
his works are extremely different from other wuxia novelists. His style and content stray far from
the wuxia mold, with settings in unspecified ancient China, strongly contrasted by his use of
modern and contemporary words, phrases, and syntax. Gu Long’s works typically portray the

7
For more information regarding Taiwan’s history of wuxia fiction, see Ye Hongsheng 葉洪生 and Lin Baochun’s
林保淳 The Historical Development of Taiwan’s Wuxia Fiction 台灣武俠小說發展史 (Taipei: Yuanliu, 2005).
10

power struggles between martial arts masters, or conspiracies between competing schools. He
does not dedicate as much attention to portraying martial arts techniques in his works, but is
innovative in other ways. One of his most well-known characters is a male character named Chu
Liuxiang 楚留香 who has a dysfunctional nose, and must breathe through his pores.
8

The portrayal of the xia and the understanding of chivalry changed with each landmark
work’s reinterpretation of the topic. The New School authors brought many changes to the
portrayal of the xia and new interpretations to what is chivalry. Jin Yong is the most influential
of the New School writers, and his works are the contemporary landmarks that impact our
understanding of the xia today. Sima Qian 司馬遷 (145 B.C. - 87 B.C.) was the first to write
about the historical youxias 遊俠 in his Records of the Grand Historian 史記.
9
These were
strongmen who pursued their own forms of justice outside of the law in the chaos of the pre-Qin
world. Wei Zhengtong 韋政通 suggests that the xia tradition was Mohist 墨家 in origin, and it
eventually merged with mainstream Confucian thought.
10

Wei Zhengtong breaks down chivalry (xiayi 俠義) into six elements: the first is rescuing
those in distress (jinan xiangjiu 急難相救); the second is that chivalry operates beyond the
family structure (chaoyue qinqing 超越親情); third is taking promises seriously (yinou qianjin
一諾千金); fourth is antagonizing the powerful (yu quanshi weidi 與權勢為敵); fifth is robbing
the rich to feed the poor (jiefu jiping 劫富濟貧); last is the protection of one’s reputation (zhong

8
Gu Long 古龍, The Legend of Chu Liuxiang 楚留香傳奇 (Kunming 昆明: Yunnan renmin chubanshe 雲南人民出
版社, 1988).
9
Sima Qian 司馬遷, “The Biography of Wandering Knights” 遊俠列傳 in Records of the Grand Historian, trans.
Burton Watson (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), 409-18.
10
Wei Zhengtong 韋政通, “The Spirit of Xiayi in Mohism: A New Perspective in Mohist Studies” 墨家的俠義精
神: 墨學研究的新視野 (paper presented at the International Conference of Modernizing Mohist Studies 墨學現代
化國際學術研討會, Taipei, Taiwan, August 22, 2005).
11

mingjie 重名節). I think Wei Zhengtong’s breakdown is a good summary of chivalric
characteristics, especially when applied to Sima Qian’s presentation of the historical youxias.
Later fiction writers adopt most of these chivalric characteristics into their stories, but not all of
these characteristics can be applied to Jin Yong’s xias, discussed in more detail below.
Later, unconstrained xias (haoxia 豪俠) and female xias (nüxia 女俠) appeared in the
Tang romances. The xia was transformed from historical figures into lively fictional characters.
In the Ming 明 Dynasty (1368-1644), Shi Nai'an’s 施耐庵 (1296-1372) Water Margin 水滸傳
portrayed chivalric behaviors that were embodied in rugged outlaws, but in Qing 清 Dynasty
(1644-1911) chivalric (xiayi 俠義) and court case (gongan 公案) fiction, the xia are those who
work for the yamen.
11
In the modern era, the neologism wuxia became the prominent description
for fiction that includes both martial arts depictions and chivalrous deeds. Wuxia is actually a
term borrowed from Japanese, which uses the same Chinese characters (kanji 漢字), bukyou 武
俠. Huanzhu Louzhu’s 還珠樓主 (1902-1961) fairy-like swordsmen from the Legend of the Shu
Mountains 蜀山劍俠傳 and Bai Yu’s 白羽 (1899-1966) more realistic portrayal of martial arts
are all considered under the umbrella term of wuxia.
12
Due to the xia’s established significance in
traditional literature, modernists and leftists considered the wuxia genre unfit for a population
that needed to modernize. While the Westernized modernists considered the genre as promoting
superstition and feudal attitudes, the genre was further unpopular under the Communist regime
because it did not promote proletarian ideologies. Even though some authors, such as Wang Dulu

11
Shi Nai'an 施耐庵, Outlaws of the Marsh 水滸傳, trans. Sidney Shapiro (Beijing: Foreign Languages, 2003).
Different translators have translated the title differently, Water Margin and All Men Are Brothers both refer to the
same novel.
12
Huanzhu Louzhu 還珠樓主, Legend of the Shu Mountains 蜀山劍俠傳 (Taiyuan 太原: Shanxi renmin chubanshe
山西人民出版社, 1998).
12

王度盧 (1909-1977) and Gu Mingdao 顧明道 (1887-1944), did cater to modernist trends in
writing about strong, independent female characters, their works were still judged according to
the standards of the wuxia genre.
13

After the wuxia genre’s banishment from Mainland China, the genre continued to thrive
outside of the homeland. Collectively known as the Four Great Writers 四大作家, Jin Yong,
Liang Yusheng, Gu Long, and Woon Swee Oan 溫瑞安 (Wen Rui’an, 1954- ) are all recognized
for their contributions to New School fiction in the last couple of decades. All four writers’
careers took place outside of China, in Hong Kong and Taiwan. These influential authors
actively shaped the wuxia genre from outside of the cultural center, which has a huge influence
on later writers in and outside of Mainland China. Jin Yong and Liang Yusheng’s style of
writing is more similar, with the use of traditional vernacular Chinese. Already mentioned above,
Gu Long uses modern Chinese, which is also Malaysian writer Woon Swee Oan’s preference. Of
the four, only Woon Swee Oan is still actively writing.
Huang Yi 黃易 (1952- ), also from Hong Kong, is sometimes compared to the four
authors listed above, as a fifth master. Huang is still actively writing, but a great portion of his
works do not fall within the loose borders of wuxia, whether by the Old or New School
standards. One of his landmark novels, The Search for Qin 尋秦記,
14
was adapted by Television

13
There are a number of sources that discusses the evolution of the xia figure throughout Chinese literary history in
detail, including Cao Zhengwen’s 曹正文 China’s Cultural History of the Xia 中國俠文化史 (Shanghai: Shanghai
wenyi chubanshe 上海文藝出版社, 1994), Chen Pingyuan’s 陳平原 The Literati's Chivalric Dreams 千古文人俠
客夢 (Beijing: Xinshijie chubanshe 新世界出版社, 2004), and Xu Sinian’s 徐斯年 The Traces of the Xia 俠的蹤跡
(Beijing: People’s Literature Publishing House 人民文學出版社, 1995), which are all in Chinese. In English there
is Roland Altenburger’s The Sword or the Needle (Bern: Peter Lang, 2009), and the aforementioned The Chinese
Knight-Errant by James Liu.
14
Huang Yi 黃易, The Search for Qin 尋秦記 (Taipei: China Times Publishing 時報出版, 2001).
13

Broadcast (TVB) 無線電視 into a drama in 2001.
15
This series’ huge popularity was the
beginning of “cut across time” 穿越 drama trends still fashionable in Chinese television today.
However, the many stories or dramas that adopt the “cut across time” trope all emphasize the
romantic relationships between the main characters, and lack Huang Yi’s sophistication in
embedding his characters in the development of historical events. For example, the reason
behind the First Emperor’s decision to burn the books and bury scholars was to erase all traces of
Xiang Shaolong 項少龍 (the main character of The Search for Qin) from official history, but
after Xiang escapes, we find out that his son is actually Xiang Yu 羽.
Since all New School writers are from, or wrote from outside of China, I propose to
examine Jin Yong’s fiction in the context of the Sinophone. With the cult-like following in China
and Taiwan after the bans were lifted in the 1980s, Jin Yong’s works began to draw more
academic attention, although a majority of it is limited to scholarship in Chinese. Yet the field is
still plagued by deadlocked discussions of whether the genre should be considered as a part of
modern Chinese literary history, despite its obvious popularity and cultural significance. Modern
Chinese literary history has always been a story of modernists with concrete ideas of the function
of literature, such as promoting science or class consciousness, but fiction with such agendas
failed to compete in popularity with wuxia fiction. It is still difficult for Chinese literary critics to
overcome this long established prejudice against the genre. The first international conference
dedicated to Jin Yong’s works, held at the University of Colorado Boulder in 1998, was solely
devoted to discussing the relationship between Jin Yong and modern Chinese literature.
16
The

15
A Step into the Past 尋秦記 (prod. Chong Wai-kin 莊偉建, perf. Louis Koo 古天樂 and Jessica Hsuen 宣萱,
TVB, 2001).
16
Proceedings from the International Conference on Jin Yong’s Fiction and Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature
金庸小說與二十世紀中國文學國際學術研討會論文集, ed. Lin Lijun 林麗君 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho Publications
明河社, 2000).
14

scholarship that examines Jin Yong’s fiction is also in a dead end. A majority of publications
only look at different elements within the stories, which range from characterization, to history,
to writing style. Liu Zaifu 劉再復 suggests that if Jin Yong’s works can ever be evaluated
outside of the wuxia genre context, it may one day be considered scholarly and professional,
implying that evaluating Jin Yong, or any other wuxia fiction writers’, works within the wuxia
genre context cannot be scholarly or professional.
17
But the removal of Jin Yong from the wuxia
context is impossible. It is not that he simply followed a literary tradition, he revolutionized it.
The contemporary concept of wuxia has been altered through Jin Yong’s reshaping of the xia
figure. He solidified the once multifarious xia figure into a man who is loyal to the Chinese
regime. For the novels that do have specified historical settings, it is at the end of a dynasty, or
the beginning of a new one, which calls for the xias’ protection of the Chinese state and people.
The novels never take place during the expansionist Han or Tang dynasties, but are limited to the
times of national weakness. Jin Yong’s choice of historical settings is a deliberate self-
victimization, always placing the Chinese state as the weaker party and at the verge of being
invaded by a non-Chinese enemy.
Although Jin Yong and other New School writers wrote in Chinese script, their fiction
was, and still is, consumed by people who speak different dialects and reside in different parts of
the world. Stephen Soong 宋淇 (1919-1996) compares Jin Yong’s popularity with the Song
Dynasty lyricist Liu Yong 柳永 (987-1053), whose creations were so well-known that “where
there are wells, there are people who know of Liu Yong’s ci” 只要有井水的地方, 就有人會唱
柳永的詞. When applied to Jin Yong, the geographical stage is immediately expanded to cover

17
Liu Zaifu 劉再復, “Afterword,” in The Jin Yong Phenomenon, ed. Anne Huss and Jianmei Liu (Amherst:
Cambria Press, 2007), 288-91.
15

the globe, “where there are Chinese people or China towns, there is Jin Yong’s wuxia fiction” 凡
是有中國人, 有唐人街的地方, 就有金庸的武俠小說.
18
It is more accurate to say that where
there are people who can read Chinese, there is Jin Yong’s fiction, but this changes with the
availability of translations and the internet. Even though there are few published English
translations of Jin Yong’s work thus far, there are a huge number of amateur translators online.
These amateur translators generally post their works on forums. Not all forums and websites
with translations are well-maintained. Wuxia Society is one of best maintained websites that
provides their translations in downloadable files.
19
When referring to “Chinese readers,” I do not
mean readers who are Chinese citizens or of ancestry, but people who can read Chinese,
regardless of their nationality and ethnicity. Other than English, Jin Yong’s works have been
translated into Korean, Japanese, Indonesian, and Vietnamese.
Unlike other Sinophone writers whose works reflect local culture, Jin Yong’s works are
all set in imperial China. My placement of Jin Yong’s novels into the context of the Sinophone is
not only because he wrote in Chinese script while outside of Mainland China, but also because of
the huge influence he has on overseas readers’ understanding of China and Chineseness. His
cultural impact first spread through the dissemination of Chinese newspapers that serialized his
works. Non-local Chinese newspapers around the world also serialized Jin Yong’s fiction.
Benedict Anderson’s explanation that printed newspapers unite individuals into imagined
communities can be applied to Jin Yong’s oeuvre, but the Jin Yong phenomenon is not limited to

18
Lin Yiliang 林以亮, “An Interview with Jin Yong” 金庸訪問記 in Collection of Essays by Lin Yiliang 林以亮佚
文集, ed. Chen Zishan 陳子善 (Hong Kong: Crown Pub. 皇冠, 2001), 413-28. Originally published in Pure
Literature 純文學 in October, 1969. The interview took place in August 22, 1969. Lin Yiliang is one of Stephen
Soong’s pennames.
19
URL for Wuxia Society: http://wuxiasociety.com/translations/.
16

a single nation, or colony in this case.
20
It covers a worldwide Chinese readership. This fictional
China and Chinese characters produced outside of the Mainland has since made its way into the
Mainland Chinese market. Even before the bans on Jin Yong were lifted in China and Taiwan in
the 1980s, there were bootleg versions widely available. Once the bans were officially lifted in
both locations, the novels and visual adaptations from abroad were quickly integrated into the
local culture. The importance of Jin Yong television series in the contemporary Chinese
television industry is the best example of how outside influences worked their way into the
cultural center to make a giant impact. Jin Yong’s redefinition of the xia figure is now the
contemporary standard of chivalry because his stories and their visual adaptations were
consumed by readers and audiences around the world. This exposure caused the general culture
to adopt this narrow definition of a xia as a man who is loyal to the Chinese state and its people.
In 1999, Beijing writer Wang Shuo 王朔 published an essay in China Youth Daily 中國
青年報 titled “Reading Jin Yong” 我看金庸.
21
He criticizes Jin Yong’s fiction for producing
misleading images of Chinese people to rest of the world. Wang Shuo does not provide a
definition of what being Chinese means, but bases his claims on the fact that he has lived
amongst Chinese people his whole life and Jin Yong has not. Jin Yong is part of a cluster of
public figures whom Wang Shuo stamps as “four great vulgarities” 四大俗, including Qiongyao
瓊瑤, Jackie Chan 成龍, and Hong Kong singers Four Heavenly Kings 四大天王 (Jackie
Cheung 張學友, Andy Lau 劉德華, Aaron Kwok 郭富城, and Leon Lai 黎明). Wang Shuo’s
essay reflects his jealousy of these Sinophone artists and authors’ popularity in China. He
disregards the figures’ contributions to the Sinophone/Chinese literary, music, film, and

20
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London:
Verso, 2006).
21
Wang Shuo 王朔, “Reading Jin Yong” 我看金庸 in China Youth Daily 中國青年報 (Beijing, Nov. 1, 1999).
17

television industries because they are not Mainlanders. The “four great vulgarities” are intruders
from the “outside world.” Now that Jin Yong’s fiction is only adapted in China, Jin Yong’s
Chinese characters that were born in British Hong Kong have been actively integrated into the
local market. There is no longer a bias against Jin Yong’s southern roots.
22

When the novels are adapted into films and television series, which has become the most
important media in promoting Jin Yong’s body of works, the Sinophone takes on another layer
of significance. Jin Yong created a fictional imperial Chinese world while writing in Hong Kong,
anachronistically applying a modern understanding of ethnicity and nationalism to his characters,
while at the same time defining Chineseness through juxtaposing Chinese characters against the
non-Chinese. When portrayed on screen, it then becomes a physical construction of this fictive
realm, when all the descriptions of gender and ethnicity take on a physical form and presentation.
The huge popularity of Jin Yong’s fiction can be attributed to his revolutionary portrayal
of the xia figure that is refashioned to fit in with modern themes. Unlike his predecessors, Jin
Yong narrows the xia figure to men only, with the requirement that they must be loyal to the
Chinese state, even if they are not of Chinese ancestry. This tightened interpretation of who
carries out chivalrous deeds conforms to the trends of heroism on screen in the 1960s through the
1970s. In Chinese cinema there were Chang Che’s 張徹 (Zhang Che in pinyin, 1923-2002) male-
centered kung fu films that generally featured youthful actors, and internationally there were the
James Bond films, which are still being produced today. Yet Jin Yong’s heroes do not conform
to the traditional Chinese scholarly or martial hero archetypes. Traditional male characters can be
regarded as being on either ends of a masculinity spectrum. On one end are the cultured young
men that represent the scholarly (wen 文) masculinity, who are always working towards passing

22
For more on the discussion of the Wang Shuo incident, see Hamm’s Paper Swordsmen.
18

the civil service exams and marrying a beautiful wife. On the other end is the martial (wu 武)
masculinity, and these characters are both misogynistic and unrefined, interested only in killing
and drinking alcohol. Jin Yong’s idealistic xia is balanced in wen and wu elements, in regards to
physical traits and their attitudes towards romantic love. In Cantonese theatre, there is a category
of characters called the scholar-martial male (wenwu sheng 文武生), that unites both archetypes
into one character.
Jin Yong’s fiction is important as a body of works that have revolutionized the wuxia
genre and the interpretation of chivalry. His impact on the Chinese entertainment industry adds
another dimension to his cultural significance. The continuous visual adaptions of Jin Yong’s
novels constantly reinforce the image of the nationalistic male xias over the last four decades.
TVB regularly produced Jin Yong series, and released one every two years. It was not until the
early 2000s that Jin Yong no longer sold TVB the rights to adapt his fiction. Since then, Jin
Yong television series have only been produced in Taiwan and China. Now, Jin Yong series are
typically released every other year in the Mainland. Jin Yong’s fiction has also been adapted into
comic books, computer games, and radio programs.
Other than being the only wuxia fiction writer who owned a newspaper, Jin Yong is
different from his contemporaries because of his revisions to his works. Even those writers who
have their works published as books, such as Liang Yusheng, never carried out extensive
revisions. Chen Shuo 陳碩 points out that the continuous revisions are a process of canonization
that elevates the novels to a higher quality, enabling them to become literary works worthy of
study in standardized curricula and higher education.
23
Jin Yong has revised all of his works

23
Chen Shuo 陳碩, Producing Classics: The Cultural Politics of Jinology 經典制造: 金庸研究的文化政治 (Guilin
桂林: Guangxi Normal University Press 廣西師范大學出版社, 2004), 5.
19

twice thus far. The newspaper version was revised and published in the 1980s by Ming Ho
(Minghe in pinyin) Publications 明河社 in Hong Kong, Vista Publishing Company 遠景 in
Taiwan, and Sanlian 三聯 in China. Vista has since been renamed Yuanliu 遠流. The second
version of his novels, also known as the edited version 修訂本, is still the most widely read so
far. Almost all the existing films, television series, and comic book adaptations are based on this
version. This is also the version I reference in this dissertation. In the 2000s, the third version
was published, which may also be the last, since Jin Yong is already over ninety years old.
The novels I choose to discuss in this dissertation are based on the the strong presence of
the xia and the importance of ethnicity in the story. Jin Yong wrote a few novels that feature
main characters that are less chivalric. The chivalric figure is the essence of the genre, although it
is still possible for various works to be considered as wuxia fiction when there is only martial
arts but no xia. It is always the xia figures that bring the martial arts techniques and battles to
life; it is never the other way around. I trace how Jin Yong constantly redefines the xia figure
through managing the elements of gender and ethnicity, which are the core elements that are
always addressed throughout his corpus. From the failed xias from The Book and the Sword
24
to
the anti-xia from The Deer and the Cauldron,
25
gender and ethnicity are Jin Yong’s main tools in
shaping his many chivalric figures. Because there is only one female xia in his oeuvre, a majority
of the focus of this dissertation is on the changes of Jin Yong’s male characters’ masculinities
and their relations to ethnicity. This female xia is also a Uighur general resisting against the
Manchus. This fits in with Jin Yong’s interpretation of chivalry as being loyal, except she is
loyal to the “wrong” people, especially because she does not get integrated into the Chinese

24
Jin Yong 金庸, The Book and the Sword 書劍恩仇錄 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1987).
25
Jin Yong, The Deer and the Cauldron 鹿鼎記 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1981.)
20

familial system. Both her chivalry and military power do not serve the Han Chinese state or its
people. She falls outside of the Chinese context when she is not affiliated with the Han Chinese
state or an enemy state, which causes her form of chivalry to be irrelevant to the construction of
Chinese ethnic identity. While Jin Yong creates a non-Chinese xia figure later in his career, he
never returns to explore the theme of female chivalry because this social and (semi-)military
responsibility takes away from the women’s devotions to their husbands and families.
There are a total of five chapters, with the first three focusing on Jin Yong’s construction
of the xia figure through manipulating the elements of gender and ethnicity in the novels. The
last two chapters are be on the cinematic and television adaptations of his works by the Shaw
Brothers 邵氏 and TVB, regarding their portrayal of gender and ethnicity on screen. In chapter
one, I examine the female and male protagonists from The Book and the Sword, Huo Qingtong
霍青桐 and Chen Jialuo 陳家洛. The Book and the Sword is Jin Yong’s first novel, and
experimental in portraying chivalric figures by attempting to fit them into the mold of traditional
Chinese archetypes. With an emphasis on Huo Qingtong’s Uighur ethnicity and Chen Jialuo’s
scholarly upbringing, both characters are examples of failed xias, and thus serve as a contrast to
Jin Yong’s later male xia figures. Huo Qingtong does not qualify as a xia because of her sex and
ethnicity. Chen Jialuo fails because his scholarly characterization contradicts with his goals in
overthrowing the Qing, and also because he has no Chinese state to swear loyalty to. In chapter
two, I focus on the two protagonists from the first two novels of the Condor Trilogy, Guo Jing 郭
靖 from The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄傳,
26
and Yang Guo 楊過 from The Return
of the Condor Heroes 神雕俠侶.
27
Both novels are set during the Southern Song Dynasty 南宋

26
Jin Yong, Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄傳 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1993).
27
Jin Yong, The Return of the Condor Heroes 神雕俠侶 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1993).
21

(1127-1279), when the Song court was in constant conflict with their northern neighbors, the
Jurchens 女真 and the Mongols. In this second chapter, I focus on the importance of a xia’s
loyalty to the Chinese regime, which is demonstrated through his antagonism towards the
invading party. In the third chapter, I look at two characters from two different novels; Xiao
Feng 蕭峰 from Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils 天龍八部,
28
and Wei Xiaobao 韋小寶 from The
Deer and the Cauldron. Xiao Feng’s wu masculinity is directly linked to his Khitan 契丹 ethnic
identity, but his temporary relationship with a female lover prevents him from completely fitting
into the mold of the traditional wu hero. He is caught in between competing powers and
ethnicities, and it becomes especially problematic when he is loyal to both Chinese and Khitan
courts. Chapter four examines the cinematic adaptations by the Shaw Brothers of Jin Yong’s
films from the 1970s through the 1980s, specifically examining the films that touch on the
portrayal of gender and ethnicity on screen. The films of focus are The Brave Archer series,
29

The Emperor and His Brother 書劍恩仇錄,
30
and Tales of a Eunuch 鹿鼎記.
31
In last chapter, I
focus on the television adaptations of Jin Yong’s Proud, Smiling Wanderer 笑傲江湖
32
produced
after the film Swordsman II 笑傲江湖之東方不敗 from 1992.
33
I concentrate on the portrayal of

28
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils 天龍八部 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1987.)
29
The Brave Archer series consists of four films that are sequential. The first film is The Brave Archer 射鵰英雄傳
(Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu 傅聲, Tien Niu 恬妞, Shaw Brothers, 1977), followed by The Brave Archer 2
射鵰英雄傳續集 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu, Niuniu 妞妞, Shaw Brothers, 1978), and The Brave Archer
3 射鵰英雄傳第三集 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu, Niuniu, Shaw Brothers, 1981). The last film is Brave
Archer and His Mate 神雕侠侶 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu, and Philip Kwok 郭追, Shaw Brothers 邵氏,
1982).
30
The Emperor and His Brother 書劍恩仇錄 (Dir. Chor Yuen 楚原, perf. Ti Lung 狄龍 and Jason Pai 白彪, Shaw
Brothers, 1981).
31
Tales of a Eunuch 鹿鼎記 (Dir. Huashan 華山, perf. Wong Yu 汪禹, and Gordon Liu Chia-Hui 劉家輝, Shaw
Brothers, 1983).
32
Jin Yong, Proud, Smiling Wanderer 笑傲江湖 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1991).
33
Swordsman II 笑傲江湖之東方不敗 (Dir. Ching Siu-tung 程小東, perf. Jet Li 李連杰 and Brigitte Lin 林青霞,
Golden Princess 金公主娛樂有限公司, 1992).
22

a character named Dongfang Bubai 東方不敗 in TVB’s State of Divinity from 1996,
34
and the
most recent version from 2013 named Swordsman, produced by Hunan Television 湖南衛視.
35

State of Divinity (1996) is the last television adaptation that casts a man to play the role of
Dongfang Bubai, and Swordsman (2013) completely reinterprets Dongfang Bubai to be a
biological woman. The “gender” change of Dongfang Bubai began with Swordsman II, and
extended into television adaptations that were produced in Singapore, Taiwan and China later on,
until the characters final “sex” change in 2013.
Wang Shuo claims in his essay that Jin Yong’s Chinese characters are inauthentic
because they were created by an author who resided in British colonial Hong Kong. Jin Yong
attempts to authenticate his fiction through his extensive presentations of Chinese culture, arts,
and history. Through the extensive newspaper network that connected Chinese readers across the
globe, these popular tales and characters become an important means to understanding China and
Chineseness. Wang Shuo is right to point out that Jin Yong’s works are not Chinese, meaning
they were not produced in Chinese territory. However, for those that consumed Jin Yong’s
fiction, the stories provided them with a window into Chinese culture that was not readily
available when overseas. It may not have been the most accurate portrayal of Chinese people, but
it was the most widely consumed image of Chinese people. These images have been adapted into
films, television series, comics, online games, and radio programs. References and citations of
Jin Yong’s works and characters are also constantly made in contemporary works, reflecting Jin
Yong’s influence on the imaginations of contemporary Chinese filmmakers and writers. This

34
State of Divinity 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Lee Tim-Sing 李添勝, perf. Jackie Lui 呂頌賢 and Fiona Leung 梁佩玲, TVB,
1996).
35
Swordsman 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Yu Zheng 于正, perf. Wallace Huo 霍建華 and Joe Chen 陳喬恩, Yu Zheng Studio
于正工作室, 2013).
23

also shows that various aspects of Jin Yong’s novels can be understood when removed from the
context of the fictional realm, like Chinese folklore that has infiltrated the media for decades, but
is still widely consumed. Most important of all, Jin Yong juxtaposes Chinese ethnic identity
against non-Chinese cultures. Unaffiliated with the weak and feminized Chinese government, the
physically strong male xias put forth the image of masculine Chinese fighters that actively resist
against foreign invaders. The inclusion of the non-Chinese is significant because interaction with
non-Chinese is part of the norm for the diasporic population, regardless of where one resides.
After his retirement from Ming Pao, Jin Yong/Louis Cha became a member of the Hong
Kong Basic Law 香港基本法 drafting committee. Hong Kong Basic Law is Hong Kong’s new
legal system after the handover in 1997. He resigned after the Tiananmen Incident in 1989, and
his initial proposals were never fully included into the law. It was not difficult to see at that time
that the PRC would never have allowed Hong Kong to conduct its own democratic elections. The
politicians who were pushing for democracy lacked foresight, and labeled Jin Yong/Cha a sellout
when he did not advocate for immediate universal suffrage after the handover. The issue of
democracy is still a cause of violence and unrest in Hong Kong today, as can be seen from the
Occupy Central/Umbrella Movement (2014-2015). In addition to receiving many honorary
degrees from various Chinese institutions, Jin Yong/Louis Cha earned his Ph.D. degree in history
from Cambridge University in 2010.
36

36
For more detailed information on Jin Yong’s life, there are a few biographies in Chinese, including Fu Guoyong
傅國湧’s A Biography of Jin Yong 金庸傳 (Beijing: Beijing shiuue wenyi chubanshe 北京十月文藝出版社, 2003),
Leng Xia’s 冷夏 A Biography of Jin Yong 金庸傳 (Hong Kong: Ming Pao Publications, 1994), and the
aforementioned Sun Yixue’s A Thousand Year’s Dream of Literary Sainthood. Leng Xia’s biography may be the
most well-known of thus far due to the conflict that has broken out between the author and the subject of his book.
Sun Yixue points out at the end of his biography that Leng Xia’s biography of Jin Yong is full of mistakes.
24

Ch. 1: The Book and the Sword: The Uighur Female Xia and the Chinese Scholar Rebel

Introduction
The Book and the Sword (hereafter Book)

is Jin Yong’s first work of fiction, originally
serialized in Hong Kong’s New Evening Post 新晚報 between 1955 to 1956. Book includes
many Old School wuxia elements in addition to characteristics from other traditional Chinese
genres. Book is also Jin Yong’s only novel that opens in modern day Xinjiang, which was not a
part of China yet. The novel can be separated into two halves. The first half focuses on the affairs
of the Red Flower Society 紅花會, a rebellious underground society, and the second half shifts
to the romantic and familial relationships between the major characters.
Book’s structure takes after two major works in Chinese literary history: Water Margin
水滸傳 and A Tale of Heroic Lovers 兒女英雄傳.
37
Water Margin is the less influential of the
two works. The one hundred and eight members of Mt. Liang 梁山 fighting against the Song
court is replicated in Book’s Red Flower Society fighting against the Qing court. The Red Flower
Society does not advocate for the restoration of the Ming Dynasty, only that a Han Chinese
emperor sit on the throne. This is significantly different from the other anti-Qing groups in Jin
Yong’s other works. The Society does not match the Mt. Liang good fellows in terms of
numbers, but is led by the Helmsman (zong duozhu 總舵主) and fifteen subleaders called
managers (dangjia 當家). Like the men from Mt. Liang, each of the managers has a distinct
background and physical attributes. The emulation of Water Margin is limited to the first half of
the novel, while the second half more closely resembles A Tale of Heroic Lovers. A Tale of

37
Wen Kang 文康, A Tale of Heroic Lovers 兒女英雄傳 (Taipei, Sanmin Shuju 三民書局, 1992).
25

Heroic Lovers features a young-scholar paired with two wives. One wife is a martial female, and
the other a daughter of a scholarly family. This is similar to the love triangle in Book.
In this chapter, I focus on of Book’s female and male protagonists, Huo Qingtong 霍青桐
and Chen Jialuo 陳家洛, as Jin Yong’s experimental and failed xia figures. Jin Yong shapes both
characters after traditional Chinese archetypes: one as a female xia and general, and the other as
a young-scholar. However, the use of these hybrid-traditional archetypes is a poor match for Jin
Yong’s addressing of modern issues. Huo Qingtong does not qualify as Jin Yong’s xia because
of her sex and her ethnicity. Chen Jialuo, who is closest to the wen end of the masculinity
spectrum in Jin Yong’s oeuvre, embodies the contradicting traits of being a young-scholar and
the leader of an underground rebel group. The Qing Dynasty is already well established when
Book begins, meaning the homeland that Chen Jialuo is supposed to protect has already been
lost. Thus, he fails to be a protector of the Chinese state and people. Through examining the
elements of ethnicity and gender of both characters, I show how each character takes after a
traditional archetype, and how that prevents him/her from successfully becoming Jin Yong’s
ideal xia, a protector of Chinese people.
Book is Jin Yong’s only novel that features xia figures that merge more than one
archetype into one character. I present Huo Qingtong and Chen Jialuo as a contrast to the later
male xias, who are all portrayed very differently because Jin Yong no longer follows traditional
models. Both characters are good examples of how traditional archetypes conflict with the
modern issues Jin Yong is addressing. Because Jin Yong’s focus shifts to men in his later works,
Huo Qingtong is Jin Yong’s first and last female xia who is also non-Chinese. A majority of the
post-Book xias are more neutral in terms of wen and wu attributes, with the only exception of
Xiao Feng. All the later female protagonists are more successful in terms of marriage and family,
26

but they do not have much social influence when they are limited to being their lovers or
husbands’ assistants. Ethnicity also no longer plays an important role in shaping these female
characters when they are no longer involved in national political struggles.

1.1 Chinese Femininity and Masculinity
Chinese masculinity is generally divided into two categories, the civil (wen 文) and the
martial (wu 武). This divide most likely took place during the Song 宋 Dynasty (960–1279),
when the civil service examinations were institutionalized, and archetypes of these masculinities
were reinforced through drama and fiction as time went on. Before this divide took place, much
earlier during the Shang 商 (c. 1600 B.C. – c. 1046 B.C.) and Zhou 周 (1046-256 B.C.)
Dynasties, wen and wu were attributes of nobility, and both qualities were manifested within one
body. The nobles were the only ones who were educated and engaged in warfare. The historical
epitome of a wen figure, Confucius 孔子 (551-479 B.C.), urged men to practice martial arts,
including archery and charioteering, in addition to learning poetry and history.
When the civil service exams became fully institutionalized during the Song, excelling in
the tests became a man’s opportunity for social advancement. There were many levels of exams,
and studying for them became a profession. It required one to fully dedicate both time and effort,
while other activities, such as exercise, were neglected.
38
Professor of Hong Kong University
Kam Louie points out the importance of masculinity in gender studies in Theorizing Chinese
Masculinity, and presents many classic examples from Chinese literature that have contributed to
the construction of Chinese masculinity over the centuries.
39
The civil masculine figure is

38
Song Geng, The Fragile Scholar (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2004), 83.
39
Kam Louie, Theorising Chinese Masculinity: Society and Gender in China (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2002), 5.
27

commonly associated with education, culture, and youth. The best examples are from the
scholar-beauty (caizi jiaren 才子佳人) stories that feature young and handsome scholars who
woo beautiful maidens through their literary creations. The martial masculine figure is associated
with the military and with physical strength. This figure is usually not involved in any romantic
relationships with women, but bound together by brotherhood to other men, which is best
depicted in Water Margin.
Keith McMahon points out that there is a difference between chaste and unchaste
scholar-beauty romances, and even the word order of scholar and beauty is a defining factor of
the stories’ content.
40
He does not elaborate on the differences between beauty-scholar versus
scholar-beauty romances, but mentions that the general characteristic of unchaste romances are
those where the man has more than two wives, in addition to maid-concubines and male or
female paramours. McMahon explains that when the husband has more than two wives, the focus
of the story is no longer on the literary or official achievements of the two sexes, but instead is
shifted to the bedroom activities. A majority of Jin Yong’s novels are chaste, with the only
exception being his last novel, The Deer and the Cauldron, which borders on the unchaste. The
male protagonist Wei Xiaobao engages in sexual activities with some of his wives before
marriage, but these unchaste activities are not portrayed explicitly before or after marriage
(discussed in the next chapter).
This gap between the wen and wu also became an indicator of social class during the
Song Dynasty. The elite scholar’s pale skin and effeminately weak body reflects that he has no
need to engage in physical labor or stay outdoors often. The physical attractiveness of the

40
Keith McMahon, Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists: Sexuality and Male-female Relations in Eighteenth-century
Chinese Fiction (Durham: Duke University Press, 1995), 104.
28

talented scholars is especially emphasized, and is analogized to the beauty of women. The more
beautiful the young man, the more talented and virtuous he is. Since the practice of foot binding
also most likely began in the Song, women’s bodies were also desired to be frail and delicate. In
contrast, the plebian wu male has a muscular physique, loves alcohol, and lacks interest in
women. Martin Huang, professor at University of California, Irvine, suggests that the martial
male’s disinterest in women was a reinterpretation of lower class men’s inability to marry during
the Ming Dynasty. In addition to the lack of wealth to pay for the bride price, there was a
shortage of marriageable women when wealthy men often took more than one wife.
41

The study of pre-modern Chinese femininity is very limited when compared to the huge
number of works dedicated to modern Chinese femininity and feminism. Studies of the pre-
modern periods generally focus on women’s roles within the family structure, as wives and
mothers,
42
or of life within the inner quarters.
43
Femininity was something very private, unlike
masculinity, which was on display in the public sphere. The sex of the wen figures in fiction and
drama is not absolute, since women can easily cross-dress to escape from the inner quarters.
These cross-dressing women typically transform into handsome, talented youth, making the wen
masculinity an alternate form of femininity.
While I agree with Kam Louie that there are two types of Chinese masculinity, this
dichotomy cannot be simply applied to Jin Yong’s male characters. Instead of either civil or
martial, I propose a spectrum of masculinity with the civil and the martial at each end. Most of
Jin Yong’s male characters would fall somewhere in the middle. Women rarely take center stage
in his novels, but many of them are integral to the plot and to the male heroes’ quests. The only

41
Martin Huang, Negotiating Masculinities in Late Imperial China (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i, 2006), 104-9.
42
Patricia Ebrey, Women and the Family in Chinese History (London: Routledge, 2003).
43
Dorothy Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in the Seventeenth-century China (Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 1994).
29

stories that feature female protagonists are two novelettes, “Sword of the Yue Maiden” 越女劍
and “White Horse Neighs in the Western Wind” 白馬嘯西風.
44

In regards to the secondary roles women play in his major works, Jin Yong explains that
he feels that women are more praiseworthy because they are “wholeheartedly devoted to love
and family, treating desires for fame, social status, prestige, power, etiquette, tradition, and social
responsibility as less important” 不把名譽, 地位, 面子, 財富, 權力, 禮法, 傳統, 社會責任看得
那麼重… 專注於愛情與家庭.
45
When a woman cannot split devotion, Jin Yong designates her
to always remain in the domestic realm. In contrast, when faced with ethnic conflicts, Jin Yong’s
male heroes almost always place their responsibilities to the country above those of the family.
This self-sacrificing attitude is not compatible with the author’s portrayal of the romance and
family-oriented women. When the female protagonist fails to conform to these standards, she
thus fails to secure her love interest.

1.2 Similarities to A Tale of Heroic Lovers
A Tale of Heroic Lovers was written by Wen Kang 文康 in the late Qing. Wen Kang is
the penname of a Bordered Red Bannerman surnamed Feimuo 费莫. A Tale of Heroic Lovers
was one of the earliest works of fiction that merged the genres of romance and martial arts. The
novel features a young scholar from a noble family, An Qi 安驥, on his way to taking the exams.
En route, he encounters bandits, and is rescued by the female xia Thirteenth Sister 十三妹, the

44
Both are included in A Deadly Secret 連城訣 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1987).
45
Jin Yong, “A Couple Points Worthy of Thought: Jin Yong’s Speech at the Closing Ceremony” 小說創作的幾點
思考: 金庸在閉幕式上的講話, in Proceedings from the International Conference on Jin Yong’s Fiction and
Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature 金庸小說與二十世紀中國文學國際學術研討會論文集, ed. Lin Lijun 林麗
君 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 2000, 23-8), 25.
30

nom de guerre of He Yufeng 何玉鳳. At the same time, she also rescues a damsel in distress
named Zhang Jinfeng 張金鳳, a young lady of noble heritage, whose family has been destroyed.
He Yufeng arranges for An Qi to marry Zhang Jinfeng, guaranteeing that Zhang Jinfeng will be
cared for in the future. Like the female xias from earlier works, He Yufeng is roaming in the
public realm because she is waiting for an opportunity to avenge her father, who was wrongly
executed after being framed by a colleague. An Qi’s father happens to be He senior’s good
friend. He thus arranges for an investigation, and urges He Yufeng to marry An Qi, so she can be
re-integrated into the familial structure. The second half of the novel focuses on He Yufeng’s
domestic life, and how she learns to be a virtuous wife, living in harmony with her husband and
sister wife.
The love triangle in Book is very similar to the setup in A Tale of Heroic Lovers. The
male protagonist, Chen Jialuo, is also a handsome young man of a scholarly family. He is an
accomplished martial artist at a young age, and also the leader of one of the most influential anti-
Qing organizations, the Red Flower Society. The two female protagonists are Uighur sisters, Huo
Qingtong is the elder, and Hasli 喀絲麗 is the younger sibling. Hasli is Earnshaw’s
transliteration of the given name. Hasli is also known as Princess Fragrance 香香公主 because of
her distinct body odor. Huo Qingtong is a martial artist, skilled with the long sword and
horsewhip, in addition to playing an important role in her father’s army. Hasli does not know any
martial arts, and is extremely sheltered and innocent. Despite the love between all the characters,
Chen Jialuo does not end up marrying either of them.

31

1.3 Huo Qingtong: Jin Yong’s Undomesticated Uighur Female Xia and Female General
Book begins with the Manchu and Uighur military conflicts during the reign of Emperor
Qianlong 乾隆 (r. 1735-1799). A majority of the story takes place in today’s Xinjiang 新疆
Province, the homeland of Muslim Uighurs. This location is referred to as the Hui region (huibu
回部) in the novel, since it takes place before the Qing gains full control over the area. Huo
Qingtong is the elder daughter of the local Hui leader, Muzhuolun 木卓倫. Her importance in the
Uighur army makes her a hybrid character that exhibits characteristics of a female xia (nüxia 女
俠) and female general (nüjiang 女將). Her martial arts teachers are Han Chinese residing in the
Southern Circuit, thus Huo Qingtong is fluent in speaking Chinese.
Hui was an umbrella term for all Muslims during the Qing and Republican period (1911-
1949), hence Huo Qingtong and her people are referred to as Hui in the novel. However, Hui
means Chinese Muslims, and Huo Qingtong and her people are not Chinese. They are Turkic-
speaking Muslims, meaning they are Uighurs. The Uighurs were living sedentarily when the
story takes place, but Huo Qingtong and her tribesmen seem to be nomadic, more closely
resembling their Mongol neighbors, reflecting the close relationship between the Dzungar 準噶
爾 Mongols and the Hodjas.
The Muslim Hodjas were responsible for administration and taxes, freeing the Buddhist
Mongols from having to interact directly with the people below their station.
46
Hodja is a term of
respect for a Muslim teacher or leader. The oases of southern Turkestan were ruled by
Makhdumzada Khojas. Peter Purdue describes them as “saintly families claiming descent from

46
Karl Heinrich Menges, The Turkic Languages and Peoples: An Introduction to Turkic Studies (Wiesbaden:
Harrassowitz, 1995), 46.
32

famous shaykhs of a Sufi brotherhood of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.”
47
In Earnshaw’s
glossary, he states that Muzhuolun is a historical figure, but he is most likely based on the two
Uighur leaders that rebelled during Qianlong’s reign, the Greater and Lesser Hodjas. The Greater
Hodja was the elder of the brothers named Burhan-al-Din 布拉尼敦/ 波羅尼都, and the younger
Lesser Hodja was named Khwaja-i-Jahan (Khozi Khan) 霍集占. The first Chinese character
Khwaja-i-Jahan’s name is huo 霍, which is transferred to the names of Muzhuolun’s two eldest
children, Huo Ayi 阿伊 and Huo Qingtong. Although their names begin with the Chinese
character huo, huo is not their surname. Both Hodjas’ capitals fell in 1759, and this region
became part of southern Xinjiang. The northern region was inhabited by Dzungar Mongols, but
their forces were depleted from war and diseas, and finally destroyed by the Qing in 1757.
48

In Graham Earnshaw’s English translation of Book, the Hui region is translated as
“border country.”
49
Jin Yong is rather vague about the specific location where a majority of the
story is set, and Earnshaw does not make an effort to clarify this. Modern day Xinjiang
encompasses both north and south of the Tianshan Mountains 天山. North of Tianshan was
where the Dzungar Mongols resided, and in the south side are the Uighurs. South of Tianshan is
generally referred to as the Tianshan Southern Circuit 天山南路, and it is where the Uighurs,
Chinese, and Manchus cross paths. The Manchus are not one single ethnic group, but many
different ethnicities that were organized into military banners, including Manchus, Mongols,
frontier-Chinese, Koreans, and even Russians.
50
The army led by Zhaohui 兆惠 (1708-1764), the

47
Peter Purdue, China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia (Cambridge, MA: Belknap of Harvard
University Press, 2005), 290.
48
Wenzhang Zhu, The Moslem Rebellion in Northwest China, 1862-1878 (The Hague: Mouton, 1966), 2.
49
Jin Yong, The Book and the Sword, trans. Graham Earnshaw (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).
50
Mark Elliott, The Manchu Way: The Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial China (Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press, 2001), 14.
33

commander responsible for quelling the Uighurs, was also very diverse, “with Mongol and
Manchu generals, Han supply commanders and even some surrendered Zunghar troops.”
51

Huo Qingtong’s nom de guerre is Yellow Robe with Jade Plume 翠羽黃衫. Yellow Robe
with Jade Plume is my translation, Earnshaw does not mention that Huo Qingtong has a nom de
guerre at all. Yellow Robe with Jade Plume is a literal description of her typical attire of bright
yellow robes and a headdress decorated with a green feather. Unlike other characters who have a
nom de guerre that reflect their martial arts techniques, Huo Qingtong’s nickname is simply a
reflection of her clothing. Huo Qingtong is first depicted through the perspective of Master Lu
Feiqing 陸菲青, when he sees some Muslim traders on the road, oddly traveling with a woman.
What was unusual was the dazzlingly beautiful young girl he saw in their midst, dressed
in yellow robes and riding a black horse. She was a truly poetic sight. Hers was the
pristine beauty of the plum-blossom in the first days of spring; her soulful gaze called to
mind the orchid flower chilled by the first frost of autumn. Her cheeks emanated the rosy
glow of sunset clouds reflected in a crystal pond; her eyes shone with the clear, piercing
light of the moon, casting its beams on the cold waters of the river…eighteen or nineteen
[years old], with a dagger at her waist and long braids hanging down her back. She wore
a full-length pale yellow gown, leather boots, and a small hat embroidered with gold silk,
on the side of which was fastened a turquoise feather.
52

Her attire is very similar to another well-known non-Chinese female general in fiction and
theatre, Fan Lihua 樊梨花.
Fan Lihua hails from Western Liang 西涼 (618-619), located in today’s Gansu 甘肅
Province. Western Liang was founded by a Sui 隋 (589-618) official, and was most likely under
the Sui’s sphere of cultural influence. Hence, Fan Lihua and her family are not necessarily
cultural others. Female generals from the genre of military romances are always attractive and
great leaders, and sometimes also skilled in magic. Fan Lihua is no different, and is described as:

51
Purdue, China Marches West, 291.
52
Earnshaw, Book, 12.
34

Wearing a crown of golden phoenix decorated with two pheasant feathers, her face
resembled Xizi [ 西子], her appearance, that of Zhaojun [ 昭君]. Her beauty would put to
shame the moon and all flowers; it even surpassed that of Chang O [Chang’e 嫦娥] in the
moon. Clad in a golden armor of knotted chains, and covered with an embroidered
dragon cloak, she wore a pair of tiny satin boots. She rode a cloud-ascending horse and
wielded a pair of knives.”
53

The similarities between Huo Qingtong and Fan Lihua are striking. It is very common for
Jin Yong’s female characters to be beautiful, regardless of age, but different authors’
imaginations and portrayals of women from beyond the western Chinese border have not
changed over the centuries. The headdresses are still decked with feathers, and particular
attention is still dedicated to the feet. In Fan Lihua’s case, her feet are underscored as being tiny
to conform to the Ming Dynasty’s standard of beauty. Jin Yong mentions Huo Qingtong’s boots,
but he does not touch on their size, or even hint at the feet within those boots. The daggers worn
by both characters indicate their choice of weapons are also phallic symbols.
The female general appeared in Chinese literature much later than the nüxia. The military
woman warrior was mostly popularized in fiction and in theatre through the military sagas.
These sagas generally feature a family with many members serving in the military, such as the
Yang Family 楊家將, the Xue Family 薛家將, and those involved in the conflicts in between the
Sui and Tang 唐 (618-907) Dynasties. Most of these fiction and plays were written in the Ming
明 Dynasty (1368-1644). Wilt Idema points out that the Ming court banned any dramatic
portrayals of emperors to eradicate the widely popular Chu-Han 楚漢 dramas, fearing that Han
漢 Dynasty founding emperor Liu Bang 劉邦 (r. 202 B.C.-195 B.C.) would be an easy analogy

53
Fan Pen Li Chen, “Female Warriors, Magic and the Supernatural in Traditional Chinese Novels,” in The Annual
Review of Women in World Religions Vol. II Heroic Women, Eds. Arvind Sharma and Katherine K. Young (Albany,
NY: SUNY Press, 1992, 91-109), 94. This is Chen’s translation of Rulian Jushi’s 如蓮居士 version of Shuotang
sanzhuan 說唐三傳 (Beijing: Baowentang shudian 寶文堂書店, 1987).
35

for Ming founding emperor Zhu Yuangzhang 朱元章 (r. 1368-1398).
54
The government’s
suppression of emperor-related sagas may also have opened up a niche for the emergence of the
military romances and scholar-beauty dramas. The female general may either be from the
Chinese state, or from a “barbarian” state that is at war with the Chinese. The women from the
Yang Family entered the battlefield after a majority of their men died in battle. They represented
the Song Dynasty against the Khitan Liao 遼 (907-1125). The other military family, the Xues, do
not produce any female generals. Instead, they accept Fan Lihua into the family.
Regardless of the female generals’ origins, they all exhibit the same behaviors when it
comes to meeting the Chinese men they desire to marry. These Chinese men are all initially
adamant in rejecting these women because of the women’s foreignness. The women must then
force or trick the men into marriage. C.T. Hsia points out that the women warriors in military
romances are bold in wooing men, especially those of “barbarian” backgrounds. They are
unashamed in their pursuit of love and “unhindered by the kind of moral scruples that would
beset a Chinese girl.”
55
Pan Fan Li Chen points out that it is the male writers’ fantasy to arrange
for all the foreign princesses to be lovely and irresistibly attracted to Chinese generals, but she
does not point out that these women are neutralizing factors in the genre of military romances.
56

The women warriors’ willingness to surrender to the Chinese men, both militarily and
romantically, are major forces to ending the wars, whether they are between two countries or
they are a multiple party conflict. In these stories, there would be no reconciliation without the

54
Wilt Idema, “The Founding of the Han Dynasty in Early Drama: The Autocratic Suppression of Popular
Debunking,” in Thought and Law in Qin and Han China, eds. W.L. Idema and E. Zurcher (New York: Brill, 1990,
183-207).
55
C.T. Hsia, “Military Romances,” in C.T. Hsia on Chinese Literature (New York: Columbia University Press,
2004, 135-70), 159.
56
Pan Fen Li Chen, Chinese Shadow Theatre: History, Popular Religion, and Women Warriors (Montreal, Canada:
McGill-Queen's University Press, 91-109), 99.
36

female general’s cooperation and willingness to make peace because of love. According C.T.
Hsia, the military romances most likely adopted the romantic elements after Fengshen Yanyi 封
神演義 was published

.
57

Fan Lihua is no different when forcing Tang general Xue Dingshan 薛丁山 into
marriage, but she is different from other lady generals in her fierceness. In one version of this
story, Fan Lihua defies her father by refusing to marry her betrothed. She accidentally kills her
father and elder brother in the midst of conflict.
58
There is no mention of her mother. While Fan
Lihua oedipally destroys her own family in Western Liang, she is reintegrated into the
patriarchal system once she marries Xue Dingshan. Later on, when the Xue men are executed by
the Tang government, Fan Lihua leads her son to rebel against the Tang. Fan Lihua embodies a
fierceness that is untamable by men, regardless of their ethnicity and status.
Huo Qingtong does not match Fan Lihua in terms of aggressiveness, but is untamable in a
different way. She is able to overpower her father and elder brother by assuming military
leadership, overturning the family and institutional hierarchy. Huo Qingtong’s military power is
the power that Chen Jialuo needs, but lacks. The role of leadership that is typically in the hands
of men is shared between a man and a woman in this case, which strains the relationship between
the potential lovers. When Huo Qingtong fails to adopt Chen Jialuo’s political goals, she loses
her potential mate to her younger sister. Huo Qingtong remains single when the story ends, and
she is never integrated into the Confucian Chinese patriarchy. “Barbarian” woman warriors that
marry the enemy Chinese commanders bridge the gap between two or more conflicting states.
59

Without marriage, Huo Qingtong does not gain entry into the domestic realm, thus she is able to

57
Hsia, “Military Romances,” 158.
58
Hsia, “Military Romances,” 161.
59
Chen, Shadow Theatre, 91-109.
37

remain independent in her military and political goals. Because she is not obligated to adopt a
husband’s enemy or fight for his people, she has undivided loyalty to her own people, which is
what qualifies her as a female xia. Her dedication to the Uighur people undermines her personal
life. With no family and no country, Huo Qingtong fails as a female general and as a woman.
None of Jin Yong’s later female protagonists ever achieve Huo Qingtong’s military prowess, but
they all successfully marry the hero to “live happily ever after.”
In Jin Yong’s fictional world, nationalism is a masculine attribute, as can be seen in later
male characters (discussed below). Huo Qingtong’s military leadership and her dedication to
Uighurs places her into the masculine territory, making her unfit for the domestic realm. While
traditional Chinese female generals’ masculine traits are greatly toned down with their lovely
faces and their obsession with romance, Huo Qingtong never lets her emotions run wild. This
sensibility and masculinity cause her to be unsuitable for marriage, because the husband would
have to share power with the wife.
Huo Qingtong’s military responsibilities keep her in the Southern Circuit. The only time
she departs from the region is after the death of her family. Unlike the female xia from the Tang
romances and the Republican period, Huo Qingtong does not wander in the martial grove, and is
not waiting to seek revenge for a male family member. The martial grove (wulin 武林), along
with the rivers and lakes (jianghu 江湖), are used interchangeably to describe the world of
martial artists, which encompasses all the martial arts schools and all individuals that practice
martial arts. The rivers and lakes can also refer to places outside of the government, where life
can be unrestrained by laws. John Minford provides a very good explanation for what the rivers
and lakes mean and encompass:
The expression for the whole underground culture of traditional China, the vagrant
outlaw fraternity, as opposed to the Confucian establishment…It was a world fraught
38

with danger, but with its own romance and mythology… Once individuals belonged to
this alterative Brotherhood, there existed between them a tacit understanding and bond.
They had their own code of conduct, their own concepts of honour and loyalty, their own
language and wisdom, their own hierarchy. In the broad sense River and Lake embraced
every “marginal” and dispossessed element in society: from the storyteller, the juggler,
and the acrobat to the medicine man selling patent plasters, the traveling barber, and the
fortune-teller consulting the Book of Changes; from the wandering Taoist monk selling
talismanic charms to the rebel-leader gathering together members of some religious
secret sect in his mountain lair. It included cripples, beggars, tramps, singsong-girls,
bawds, gangsters, and thieves.
60

According to Taiwanese literary critic Ye Hongsheng, martial grove was coined by Republican
era wuxia fiction writer Bai Yu 白羽 (1899-1966).
61

Earlier versions of nüxia are generally fearless women who master magic or martial arts
skills. There are typically two types of nüxia: those who serve the public, and those who act for
private reasons. The public-oriented nüxia operate outside of the law, but are upholders of
justice. This privatization of justice can be seen in stories like “Lady Jing Thirteenth” 荊十三娘
and “The Woman with the Incense Pill” 香丸女子, where the ladies with special abilities right
the wrongs that have fallen upon others.
62
In contrast, the women who turn to violence for
personal reasons almost always do it for revenge. They are either avenging a father or a husband,
but they must wait in hiding for many years before they succeed. There are a few short stories
that follow this model, the earliest were those from the Tang Dynasty, including “The
Merchant’s Wife” 賈人妻 by Xue Yongruo 薛用弱, and “Cui Shensi” 崔慎思 by Huangfu 皇甫.
Scholars are not sure which story was written first. Later on, there was “Moved by Justice” 義激
by Cui Li 崔蠡, and in the Qing Dynasty, Pu Songling’s 蒲松齡 (1640-1715) “The

60
John Minford, “General Glossary of Terms relating to kung fu, Chinese Culture, history, and society,” in The
Deer and the Cauldron (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997, xxv-xxxi), xxix.
61
Ye Hongsheng 葉洪生, A Record of Wuxia Xiaoshuo’s Artistic Discussion: Ye Hongsheng Discusses the Sword 武
俠小說談藝錄: 葉洪生論劍 (Taipei: Linking Publishing 聯經出版公司, 1994), 59.
62
For more information regarding nüxias, see Roland Altenburger’s The Sword or the Needle: The Female Knight-
errant (xia) in Traditional Chinese Narrative (Bern: Peter Lang, 2009).
39

Magnanimous Girl” 俠女 in Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio 聊齋志異.
63
The women from
these stories all serve a scholar as a concubine while waiting for their chance for revenge. After
marriage, these women all give birth to a son. In all versions, when these husband discovers that
the concubine leaves the house in the middle of the night, he suspects that she is unfaithful.
Spying on her one night, he finds that she enters through the roof, with the severed head of her
enemy in her hands. The nocturnal excursions are all attempts on her enemy’s life. After
successfully killing her enemy, she returns home with the trophy, revealing her true intentions to
her husband. And as if the ability to kill an enemy is not enough to underscore these female
characters’ nondomestic nature, the concubines even kill their own child to ensure they will not
have any entanglements after leaving the man’s house.
64
These nuxia move in between the
domestic and public realms with ease. Their missions in the public sphere do not bar them from
entering and leaving marriages casually, or hinder them from motherhood.
Huo Qingtong is a nüxia strictly in terms of Jin Yong’s standards of chivalry, which is
strictly related to the political loyalty to one’s own people by resisting against an invading
enemy. However, not only is Huo Qingtong of the wrong sex, she is also is of the wrong
ethnicity and protecting the “wrong” homeland. Jin Yong’s xia absolutely must be a male
protector of the Chinese state and people. Already mentioned above, Huo Qingtong is a
masculinized woman, which already disqualifies her from the entrance into the domestic domain,
but as a Uighur woman, she is further removed from achieving the status of xia. Jin Yong’s
female characters’ successes are limited to marrying the male protagonist; any other type of
ending is portrayed as failure. In order to attain such a success, these female characters must be

63
Pu Songling 蒲松齡, “The Magnanimous Girl” 俠女, in Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio 聊齋志異, trans.
Herbert Giles (Rutland, VT: Tuttle Publishing, 2010, 81-3).
64
Altenburger, Needle, 84-94.
40

willing to abandon their families and countries, regardless of their ethnicities. A clean cut from
the natal family is the only resolution to the complications between the women’s husbands and
the natal family. Marriage is portrayed as the ultimate form of happiness for both men and
women, because the women are rewarded with a family after abandoning their parents. Although
Huo Qingtong does not marry, she also does not exit the scene by retiring from the martial grove,
or by dying violently, which are the two types endings designated for Jin Yong’s main male
characters. She remains alive, and living in close proximity to Chen Jialuo.
Even at the end, she is a Uighur woman with family or homeland, but living outside the
reaches of the Chinese state and Confucian patriarchy. Book closes with the Red Flower
Society’s retreat to the Southern Circuit. When Chen Jialuo and Huo Qingtong appear about ten
years later in another novel (not a sequel), The Young Flying Fox 飛狐外傳, there is no
indication that they married.
65
Chen Jialuo is the only focus of attention. Huo Qingtong is
mentioned twice throughout this chapter in Flying Fox, and each time her name is paired with
Chen Jialuo and the Red Flower Society, as if she is an integral member of the group, yet still
different from everybody else. The first time she is mentioned, it is regarding her mentorship of a
young Buddhist nun in martial arts. The nun grew up in the Southern Circuit, and has learned
something “from Chen Jialuo, Huo Qingtong, even Xinyan, everybody from the Red Flower
Society has taught the girl a bit of their techniques” 而從陳家洛, 霍青桐直至心硯, 紅花會群雄
無人不是多多少少的傳過她一些功夫.
66
The second time Huo Qingtong’s name comes up, it is
again listed immediately after Chen Jialuo, “Chen Jialuo, Huo Qingtong, and the Red Flower
heroes all came to Peking from the Uighur region for the tenth anniversary of Princess

65
Jin Yong, The Young Flying Fox 飛狐外傳 (Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998).
66
Jin Yong, Young Flying Fox, 822. All translations of Young Flying Fox are mine.
41

Fragrance’s death” 陳家洛, 霍青桐等紅花會群雄自回疆來到北京, 卻為這日是香香公主逝世
十年的忌辰.
67
As Hasli’s sister, Huo Qingtong is mentioned nonchalantly, as if she traveled to
Peking to pay respects like all the others in the Red Flower Society, who are not related to
Princess Fragrance by blood. The constant pairing of Chen Jialuo and Huo Qingtong’s names
only indicates that they are still in contact.

1.4 Princess Fragrance Hasli
Huo Qingtong’s muted femininity is greatly contrasted by her younger sister. Hasli is
Huo Qingtong’s foil in many aspects; knowledge, martial skills, femininity, and attitude towards
romantic love. She is younger than Huo Qingtong by a few years, and unmatched in her beauty.
Unlike her elder siblings, Hasli does not play a role in her father’s army or in the government.
She is known as Princess Fragrance due to her distinct body odor, which she claims derives from
her consumption of flowers. Hasli appears halfway into the novel, and serves as the third corner
of two love triangles, one with Huo Qingtong and Chen Jialuo, the other with Chen Jialuo and
Emperor Qianlong.
In his initial meeting with Hasli, Chen Jialuo is dressed as a Uighur, and he introduces
himself with a fake Uighur name to hide his identity. There are many examples of the gender line
being crossed by dressing in clothes of the opposite sex in Jin Yong’s fiction, such as when Huo
Qingtong dresses as a man when hiding in Beijing. However, this “strategy” of dressing up in
different types of clothes to assume different ethnic identities only appears in Book. In his first
novel, Jin Yong already touches on an important aspect of ethnicity that it is relevant to
playacting. When Qianlong is abducted by the Red Flower brothers, they also force him to dress

67
Jin Yong, Young Flying Fox, 859.
42

in clothes from the Ming Dynasty as a way to acknowledge his Han Chinese identity. Later on,
Qianlong willingly dons Chinese opera costumes to try to please Hasli. The emperor assumes
that if she is in love with Chen Jialuo, who is a Han Chinese man, then dressing as a Han
Chinese may increase his chances of winning her heart. Like the clothes, ethnic identity can be
assumed and removed at will, and is irrelevant to one’s parentage, education, and location of
residence. The use of clothing only alters how others perceive an individual, but it does not
change the individual’s feelings about their self-perception, regardless of gender or ethnicity.
The act of dressing in order to alter ethnicity provides a counterexample to the constant
assumption throughout the novels that ethnicity is only defined through one’s father. Thus, in his
later works, Jin Yong’s male protagonists never slip in and out of different ethnic identities
through their attire. Instead, they experience a change in ethnic identity when they discover their
biological fathers.
In contrast to Huo Qingtong’s introduction and nom de guerre, Hasli is introduced
without any clothes on. When Chen Jialuo first sees Hasli bathing in a pond, he wondered “if
such things as water spirits and monsters existed after all.”
68
Even after she dresses, she wears a
white dress that does not carry any cultural symbols on it. Neither does she wear a headdress.
Other than Hasli speaking Uighur, there is no other indication of her ethnicity. Hasli’s ethnic
neutrality is rooted in her role as the object being fought over, and not an active participant in the
struggle for land and sovereignty. Within the rectangular relationship between Chen Jialuo, Huo
Qingtong, Qialong, and Hasli, Hasli is the only character that does not wield any political power.
This leaves her extremely limited in choices. Her most powerful action is taking her own life.

68
Earnshaw, Book, 305.
43

Chen Jialuo is not the only man who is taken by her godlike beauty. When she serves as a
messenger to the Qing camp, the Qing soldiers are captivated and lose their wits in her presence,
leading to their executions. When Qianlong sees Hasli’s portrait, he also desires her, and he
orders for her abduction from the Southern Circuit. Like Helen of Sparta, Hasli’s extraordinary
beauty is a curse to the men who have seen her, and it is also a curse to herself. The small battles
between the Uighurs and Manchus early in Book are small in scale, and not decisive in any way.
It is only after Qianlong sees Hasli’s portrait that he decides to crush the Uighurs and take over
the Southern Circuit. Instead of being the ambassador that brings peace between the parties,
Hasli is portrayed as the femme fatale that brings the demise of her homeland.
Hasli’s gentleness and extraordinary face contribute to her popularity amongst her
people. It is as if her physical attractiveness makes up for her feeble mindedness. There is no
mention of Hasli being mentally incompetent; her naiveté is simply excused by her youth. In
certain incidents, her actions and behaviors are closer to those of a young child rather than a
young adult. She first meets Chen Jialuo when she is bathing in a pond, but oddly she does not
take offense from this intrusion. She is very trusting of him from the beginning, and quickly
selects Chen Jialuo at the matchmaking party. She does not find it alarming that Chen Jialuo is
actually a Han Chinese and not a Uighur. When trapped in the abandoned city in the middle of
the desert, she also lacks a sense of danger. Unconcerned about the limited food and water
supply, Hasli announced, “I feel like singing a song.”
69
Chen Jialuo and Huo Qingtong
encourage her to act as she desires to protect her from a harsh reality.
Hasli’s femininity consists of her pleasant body odor and physical attractiveness, but
most important of all it is her physical and intellectual weaknesses that prevent her from moving

69
Earnshaw, Book, 408.
44

away from femininity. Constantly playing the weakest role, Hasli willingly subjects herself to be
an object of trade. Even when Chen Jialuo trades in Hasli for Qianlong to carry out his promise
to banish the Manchus, it does not come as a shock to Hasli, nor does she feel disappointment or
betrayal. She willingly agrees to Chen Jialuo’s plans, without questioning the logic and
practicalities behind it. Chen Jialuo does acknowledge that it is a great deal to ask her for,
especially when she is not Han Chinese.
Chen Jialuo said, “It is right that I should suffer for the sake of my people… But why
you? You have never even seen them, let alone loved them.”

“I love you,” she replied, “so they are my people too. You love all my Uighur brothers,
don’t you?”
70

It is not until her death that the immortality of Hasli is suggested. She dies outside of the
Forbidden Palace, thus her fellow countrymen bury her near a mosque in Beijing. When Huo
Qingtong and Chen Jialuo open up the grave to rebury her, they find that there is no trace of her
body left. Instead, only a piece of jade and a puff of aroma remain. The huge jade-colored
butterfly that hovers over the opened grave is no doubt a reference to the story of Liang Shanbo
梁山伯 and Zhu Yingtai 祝英台, except there is only one butterfly instead of two. Hasli’s
simple-mindedness can thus be explained through her supposed immortality. Jin Yong does not
include any supernatural elements in his fiction, and Hasli’s death is the closest to the
supernatural he ever gets. This small link to the supernatural and fantastic elements is a leftover
aspect from the Old School wuxia fiction, just like his attempt to fit into the female xia and
general and young-scholar archetypes.

70
Earnshaw, Book, 475-6.
45

1.5 Chen Jialuo the Scholarly Rebel
Chen Jialuo is the closest to the wen end of the masculinity spectrum in terms of family
background, education, and physical appearance. These scholarly traits are negated by Chen
Jialuo’s desire to rebel against the government and his lack of marriage. He also does not qualify
as a xia because there is never a homeland for him to protect. The Qing Dynasty is already well-
established when the story begins, and the Red Flower Society’s role is to resist against the alien
government instead of defending it. Chen Jialuo is the fictive third son of Chen Shiguan 陳世倌
(1680 -1758), the foster son of Yu Wanting 于萬亭, the new Helmsman of the Red Flower
Society, and the brother of Qianlong. Chen Shiguan was an important minister during Emperor
Yongzheng’s 雍正 reign (r. 1723-1735). Yu Wanting is the first Helmsman of the Society. After
his death, the position is passed onto Chen Jialuo. There is no clear explanation as to why Chen
Jialuo was removed from his family at a young age, and transformed from a nobleman’s son to
the foster son of a rebel leader. Luo Bing 駱冰, the Society’s eleventh manager, only provides a
bit of information regarding Chen Jialuo’s earlier life.
“He [Chen Jialuo] was the Old Helmsman’s foster son,” Luo Bing [ 駱冰] said. “Brother
Chen is the son of the Emperor’s former Chief Minister Chen from Haining. When he
was fifteen, he passed the provincial civil service examination. But soon after that, the
Old Helmsman took him to the border country, to live among the Uighurs, to learn the
Martial Arts from the Strange Knight of the Heavenly Pool, Master Yuan. As to why the
son of a Chief Minister, a young man from one of China’s noblest families, should
choose to enter the world of River and Lake, and honor a member of the fighting
community as his foster father, we don’t know.”
71

Chen Jialuo’s martial arts skills and leadership are generally questioned by others
because of his physical attractiveness and youth. Chen Jialuo does not appear in the novel until
the second chapter, and he is first presented to the reader through Master Lu’s perspective.

71
Earnshaw, Book, 89.
46

Earnshaw translates Master Lu as Hidden Needle Lu 綿裡針, which is his nom de guerre. It is
from Master Lu’s perspective that the reader is introduced to two major characters, but Master
Lu’s importance diminishes as the story progresses. Not a member of the Red Flower Society,
Master Lu presents Chen Jialuo from the perspective of an observer.
On one of the wooden walls a huge Go-board had been carved. Two men were sitting on a
couch about thirty feet away, fingering Go-pieces and throwing them at the vertical board,
each piece (or pebble) lodging itself in the lines which formed the squares. In all this wide
experience, Lu had never seen Go played in this extraordinary fashion. Playing white was
a young man with a refined face wearing a white gown who looked like the son of a
nobleman… Lu was surprised to find that this Helmsman gave every appearance of being
a pampered young man from a wealthy family, the complete opposite of the rest of the
bandit-like bunch.
72

The player with the higher social status usually plays the white pieces, but in this scene
Chen Jialuo uses the white pieces while the old man plays black. The identity of old man is never
mentioned, even though he is a skilled martial artist. Master Lu’s observation of Chen Jialuo’s
youth and attractiveness is only one of the many instances when Chen Jialuo’s physical
appearance is emphasized. All the other characters who meet the new Helmsman for the first
time register his attractiveness as if he was a woman, which is very similar to how young-scholar
characters are generally portrayed. While Master Lu provides the reader with Chen Jialuo’s
general aura, Huo Qingtong sees his face in greater detail.
He cut a graceful figure, dressed in a light gown tied loosely around the waist, and
fanning himself with a folding fan. Their eyes met, and he smiled at her. Blushing, she
lowered her head.
73

Earnshaw’s translation of this passage skips over a few details. In the original, Huo Qingtong
sees that Chen is “graceful as jade, with eyes that sparkle like the stars… He was both dashing
and elegant” 見這人丰姿如玉, 目朗似星…神采飛揚, 氣度閑雅.
74

72
Earnshaw, Book, 50-1.
73
Earnshaw, Book, 105.
74
Jin Yong, Book, 195. Translation mine.
47

Chen Jialuo’s attractiveness is thus a combination of a pretty face and his education. He
behaves as a cultivated gentleman, playing Go and the lute 琴 in his spare time. As Master Lu
observes, Chen’s aura differentiates him from the rest of his Red Flower brothers, who genrally
resemble the rough good fellows from Water Margin. The Society’s home base is in Southern
China, with thousands of men under the Helmsman’s command. There are even Red Flower men
who have infiltrated the Qing army. Yet Lu has never heard of Chen Jialuo before. Chen Jialuo is
eventually able to prove his worth by defeating other established martial artists. Youth and
beauty are positive characteristics of young-scholars in traditional fiction. When applied to Chen
Jialuo, these aspects become personal challenges as a leader and a martial artist. However, the
Go game that Master Lu observes is already telling of Chen’s martial abilities.
The Go board is usually placed on top of a table, but Chen’s board was carved into the
wall. The pieces are thrown against the wall. This means players must master great precision and
strength in order to lodge the pieces into the wall at the intersection of the lines. We never find
out who Chen plays against in this scene, since his opponent is just as skilled in the throwing
techniques as the Helmsman. Chen Jialuo’s first appearance with Go immediately establishes his
association with the game of a gentleman and the use of hidden weapons.
Unlike larger weapons like swords and staffs, hidden weapons 暗器 are usually
concealed in pockets until battle. Due to the invisibility of these smaller, sometimes tiny
weapons, martial artists that master such techniques are sometimes considered devious. There is
no such stigma attached to the young Helmsman, most likely because his hidden weapons of
choice are pieces that do not have sharp edges. The Go pieces are meant to be used as a form of
self-defense, those who are struck by the pieces would not suffer any serious injuries. Other
forms of hidden weapons can range from throwing knives to darts and needles. These forms of
48

hidden weapons can potentially cause significant damage if an important part of the body is hit,
and may even be lethal if dipped in poison. When Chen Jialuo rescues Huo Qingtong from an
ambush, he throws out three Go pieces to strike the attacker’s weapon off course. She then sees
Chen Jialuo’s pageboy come to scoop up the “three round white objects” from the ground.
75

Also, when he first encounters Hasli at the pond, thinking she might be an evil spirit, he “pulled
out three of his Go-piece missiles and held them ready in his palm.”
76
There is never a detailed
description of Chen Jialuo’s throwing techniques, but from these examples, he habitually throws
three pieces at a time.
Go is only one of the four arts that Chen Jialuo practices. While there are references to
calligraphy and painting, he never performs these two art forms in the novel. He does play the
lute once, when he meets Qianlong for the first time in Hangzhou 杭州. When drawn by the
sound of a lute and chanting by the lake, Chen Jialuo encounters a middle-aged man. The man
sat on a rock while playing the lute, with a guard standing beside him. Chen Jialuo immediately
feels a sense of familiarity, as if he has known this man for a long time. At that time, both
Qianlong and Chen Jialuo are unaware of their relationship, but the “knowing” of the sound 知音
and sense of familiarity all point to a supposed amiable relationship. Qianlong plays a tune he
composed, then asks Chen Jialuo to play something on his ancient lute. Chen Jialuo plays “The
Goose Lands on the Flat Sands” 平沙落雁, in which Qianlong comments on how Chen is able to
conjure the spirit of the vast desert through strumming the strings.
77

When Qianlong sees Chen Jialuo’s folding fan with Nalan Xingde’s 納蘭性德 (1655-
1685) calligraphy, he offers to buy it. Chen Jialuo politely offers it to Qianlong as a gift,

75
Earnshaw, Book, 104.
76
Earnshaw, Book, 305.
77
Earnshaw, Book, 305.
49

claiming he bought the fan at a bookstore for ten pieces of gold. Nalan Xingde is a famous Qing
Dynasty poet and calligrapher. Qianlong notices the other side of the fan was blank.
Dongfang Er [Qianlongs’s alias] pointed to the blank side and asked, “May I ask for you
to write me something on this side, in memory of our meeting here today. Where is your
residence? Shall I send a servant to collect it tomorrow?” Chen Jialuo said, “It is my
pleasure. I can write it right now.” He commanded Xinyan [ 心硯 his pageboy] to open up
his bag for brush and ink. He thought for a little bit, then wrote a poem on the fan, “On
the yellow sand I walk with book and sword, vast ocean or Heavenly Mountains can all
be home. Western desert winds raise green feathers, viewing August osmanthus flowers
in Jiangnan.” Since Chen carried brush and ink with him, and was quick to compose, the
elderly man who practices the eagle claw technique [Qianlong’s guard] did not suspect
that he is a martial artist.

東方耳指著空白的一面道: “ 此面還求兄台揮毫一書, 以為他日之思. 兄台寓所何在?
小弟明日差人來取如何?” 陳家洛道: “ 既蒙不嫌鄙陋, 小弟現在就寫便是.” 命心硯打
開包裹, 取出筆硯, 略加思索, 在扇面上題詩一絕, 詩云: “ 攜書彈劍走黃沙, 瀚海天山
處處家, 大漠西風飛翠羽, 江南八月看桂花.” 那會鷹爪功的老者見他隨身攜帶筆硯,
文思敏捷, 才不疑他身有武功.
78

Earnshaw did not include this passage in his translation, most likely because it does not
contribute to the plot. However, these few sentences are telling of Chen Jialuo’s character.
Although Qianlong’s guard saw Xinyan’s skills in throwing pebbles, he does not suspect that
Chen Jialuo also practices the same art. Seeing Chen Jialuo’s swiftness in composing a poem, the
guard assumes that Chen Jialuo is completely well practiced in composing poetry. Having
brought brush and ink along also indicates that Chen Jialuo was prepared to be inspired to write
or paint along the lakeside, since Hangzhou is known for its scenery. Yet Xinyan is not a simple
pageboy, he is also a martial artist. There is never any elaboration as to how skillful he is. The
master and servant bring brush and ink with them, as if they are a typical scholar and his servant,
and not the Red Flower Helmsman and his assistant.
The fan itself is an important accessory to the scholar. In addition to fanning oneself,
which Chen Jialuo does, even when in the Southern Circuit and sailing on the Yellow River,

78
Jin Yong, Book, 317. Translation mine.
50

folding fans are also pieces of art. The painting or calligraphy on the fan contributes to the item’s
value. Nalan Xingde’s calligraphy gives the fan cultural value, and Qianlong considers it a
collectible item. Chen Jialuo does not replace the fan after he gives it away, and no more
scholarly activities or art are presented after this point. This first meeting with Qianlong and
gifting of the fan is a turning point in the story. The focus then shifts from the Red Flower
Society centered plot to the personal relationships between Chen Jialuo, Huo Qingtong, Hasli,
and Qianlong.
In Book, Qianlong is the eldest child of the Chen family. This is popular folklore in Jin
Yong’s hometown of Haining. Soon after birth, the Chen infant was taken into Prince Yong’s 雍
(the future Emperor Yongzheng) palace for a “visit.” When a baby girl was returned to the
Chens, they did not dare speak up. Prince Yong switched his own daughter with Chen Shiguan’s
son, and this child later assumed the throne. The emperor’s secret is one of the reasons why Chen
Jialuo must assume leadership of the Red Flower Society. Yu Wanting capitalizes on Chen
Jialuo’s relationship with the emperor, and uses him as the initiator in the process of
overthrowing the Qing. Chen Jialuo’s responsibility is to blackmail the emperor into overturning
his own reign. Since Qianlong is a Han Chinese, Chen Jialuo promises that the throne will
remain in the same hands, as long as the Manchus are expelled.
It is rare for Jin Yong’s male protagonists to have siblings, and Chen Jialuo is one of
them. The other character with a twin brother is Shi Potian 石破天 from Ode to Gallantry.
However, it is common for female characters to have siblings, though they are mostly limited to
those of the same sex. The men who do have brothers do not grow up with each other. Brothers
are separated at birth for various reasons, and live completely different lives until they encounter
each other again in adulthood. Sworn-brotherhood, on the other hand, is much more important in
51

Jin Yong’s fiction. All male protagonists have sworn-brothers, almost always with older men
who fill in the void of the deceased father or the temporarily unavailable teacher. Having older,
more established sworn-brothers makes it possible for the protagonist to extend his connections
to different social circles. These male characters must establish fictive familial ties outside of
their biological families and schools in order to successfully navigate the world of the rivers and
lakes. This surrogate family plays a more supportive role than teachers and sword brothers. In
many of the novels with non-Chinese characters, the male protagonists always form sworn-
brotherhoods with these foreigners. This serves as an axis that connects the Han Chinese with the
surrounding ethnicities. For example, Xiao Feng from Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils is sworn-
brothers with a Khitan emperor, a Dali prince, and a Han Chinese Buddhist monk. Guo Jing from
The Legend of the Condor Heroes is sworn-brothers with a Mongol prince, a Han Chinese, and
Yang Kang 楊康, who was born a Jurchen prince. Wei Xiaobao, from The Deer and the
Cauldron, is sworn-brothers with a Tibetan llama, a Mongol prince, a Manchu minister, and six
Han Chinese. Some of the relationships are based on material gains, and some are based on
brotherly love. This ridicules how casually brotherhood is formed in the martial grove.
However, Chen Jialuo and Qianlong may only be half-brothers. Already mentioned
above, there is no detailed explanation as to why Chen Jialuo was placed under the care of his
foster father and teacher. It is briefly mentioned that Madame Chen decided to send him away
with Yu Wanting, unbeknownst to the rest of her family. The Chen family is still searching for
Chen Jialuo many years later, thinking he was abducted. From the hidden documents stored in
the Shaolin Temple 少林寺, a confession letter written by Yu Wanting holds clues to Chen
Jialuo’s parentage. He may be the illegitimate child of Madame Chen and Yu Wanting. In the
letter, Yu Wanting professes his love for Madame Chen since his youth, and confesses to visiting
52

her a few times after she married. After emperor Yongzheng’s death, Yu Wanting encounters
assassins in the Chen household, thus he decides to stay behind as a servant for five years to
protect the Chens. The time gap between Yu Wanting’s first visit to the Chen household and his
stay for five years also matches the age gap between Qianlong and Chen Jialuo, which ranges
between twelve to fifteen years.
79
If Chen Jialuo is indeed Yu Wanting’s son, it would explain
why he was removed from his family at a young age. Madame Chen eliminated all of Chen
Jialuo’s chances of pursing an official career in court, and chose for him to follow his biological
father’s path as a rebel. The patriline is not only important in identifying one’s ethnic identity,
but even dictates one’s political affiliation. The Chens, despite being a family of officials, were
not registered in the Manchu Banners, and were only elite Han Chinese.
Many of Jin Yong’s male characters go through the process of discovering that the father
who raised them is not their biological father. These discoveries are life changing events, and
they completely distort these men’s lives. For Chen Jialuo, this discovery takes place very late in
the novel, and nothing changes from this new knowledge about himself. However, for characters
such as Yang Kang and Xiao Feng (discussed below), the discovery of their “true” fathers alters
their self-perceived ethnicities and their social acceptance by others.
With most of his childhood spent in an elite southern Chinese household and most of his
youth amongst the Uighurs, Chen Jialuo does not have a deep understanding of the Qing court or
the lives of Chinese under Manchu rule. With his Chinese lifestyle in the Southern Circuit, his
Uighur cultural knowledge is limited to speaking the local language. Chen Jialuo’s “hatred” for
the Manchus is not a personal emotion, but something he imagines from what others have taught
him. Not only is he physically removed from his homeland, he is also out of touch with his new

79
Jin Yong, Book, Ch. 19, 936-9.
53

abode. While there is no true hatred towards the Manchus, there is no true love for the Han
Chinese either. His dedication to overthrowing the Qing and placing a Han Chinese emperor on
the throne does not originate from his own views. The Red Flower Society believes that the
Manchus are an oppressive regime that are abusing their Han Chinese. This claim is put forth
many times throughout the novel, but only two examples are ever presented. One is during the
flood, and the second time is when he sees the construction of the artificial desert in the
Forbidden Palace. The elite Chinese, like the Chen family, are never described to be suffering
under Manchu rule in the novel either. The path of rebellion is what Chen Jialuo’s mother and
(foster) father have chosen for him. When he fails, his life falls into ruins, and he is quick to
retreat to the Southern Circuit. Chen Jialuo and his Red Flower brothers never make another
attempt to rebel again. This failure is his only and his most significant catastrophe in life. Chen
Jialuo singlehandedly wrecks the Red Flower Society and its mission, at the same time
abandoning all the members left in China proper, and permanently relocates all the other Society
managers to the margins of the Qing Empire. Chen Jialuo’s swift disappearance from the
Chinese martial grove saves him the shame of having to acknowledge the fact that he cannot live
up to the image of an anti-Qing hero that others had painted for him. The Society thus becomes a
name only, and no longer poses as a threat to the court.
Chen Jialuo’s failure in politics is linked to his failure in romance. His emotional
entanglements with the Uighur sisters does not end in a marriage like that in A Tale of Heroic
Lovers. In the same way that Huo Qingtong is a female general and xia that fails to marry, and
thus fails to be domesticated, Chen Jialuo’s lack of marriage contributes to his failed young-
scholar character. He is also Jin Yong’s only male protagonist that is alive at the end, but has no
partner. The only other male character that dies unmarried is Xiao Feng.
54

Chen Jialuo first falls in love with Huo Qingtong during their first meeting.
Earlier, Helmsman Chen had concentrated on watching her [Huo Qingtong] sword style,
but now with her standing close to him, he found his heart beating fast. He wondered that
such a vision of a girl could exist in this world… He stared abstractedly at her, his heart a
prey to conflicting emotions.
80

While he admires both her swordsmanship and her beauty, he is not overwhelmed by physical
attraction until he meets Hasli.
A jade-white hand emerged from the water, followed by a dripping-wet head. The head
turned, caught sight of him, and with a shriek disappeared back under the water. In that
moment, Chen had been able to see that the head belonged to a young girl of
extraordinary beauty... There was a sudden splash, and the girl’s head re-emerged a little
further away, against the flowering trees and bushes. Through a gap in the leaves, he
could see her snow-white skin, her raven hair splayed out on the surface of the water, and
her eyes, bright as stars, gazing across at him.
81

Both women are also attracted to Chen Jialuo during their initial meetings, but Chen Jialuo’s
attention is quickly taken over by Hasli, who is the physically weaker and more beautiful of the
two women. She is very bold in expressing her affection for Chen Jialuo. After Hasli
successfully woos him, Chen Jialuo still has doubts about who he truly loves. He calculates what
he can gain or lose if he chooses either one of them. He understands that if he dies, Hasli will not
continue to live, but Huo Qingtong can.
82

Huo Qingtong’s military leadership and superb martial arts skills is the source of his
sense of inferiority. Hence, it is not a difficult choice to “fall in love” with Hasli when she
suddenly appears in his life. When he is alone with both sisters in the desert, he asks himself:
“Which one of them do I really love?” Over the past few days, this was the thought that
had been constantly on his mind. “Which one of them really loves me? If I were to die,
Hasli would not be able to go on living. Huo Qingtong would. But that doesn’t mean
Hasli loves me more...Hasli and I have declared our love for each other. But although
Huo Qingtong has never spoken a word, her feelings towards me are clear,” he thought.
“And why did I come so far to give her a message if it was not because I loved her? My
mission is to restore the Dragon Throne to the Chinese people. That will involve
immense trials and tribulations. Huo Qingtong is a superb strategist, better even than
Mastermind Xu. Her assistance would be invaluable.” He stopped himself, ashamed of

80
Earnshaw, Book, 105.
81
Earnshaw, Book, 305.
82
Earnshaw, Book, 407.
55

his own thoughts. Did he just want her because she might be useful to the cause? “Ah,
Chen Jialuo … are you really so calculating? … With her [Hasli], life would be pure
happiness, nothing but happiness.”
83

Earnshaw omitted some of Chen Jialuo’s thoughts about Huo Qingtong from the original
passage. After contemplating that he has never expressed his love towards Huo Qingtong, he
thought, “’Huo Qintong is such a capable woman, I respect her, and even a bit afraid of her… No
matter what she wants me to do, I would never hesitate to accomplish it’” 霍青桐是這般能幹,
我敬重她, 甚至有點怕她 ... 她不論要我做什麼事, 我都會去做的.
84
And after he pondered
about his own calculations, he asked himself,
“’Could it be that deep in my heart, I dislike her for being so capable?’ Once he thought
of this, he was rather shocked, and whispered to himself, ‘Chen Jialuo, Chen Jialuo, are
you indeed so very narrow in breadth of mind?’”
85

“’ 唉, 難道我心底深處, 是不喜歡她太能幹麼?’” 想到這裡, 矍然心驚, 輕輕說道,
“’ 陳家洛, 陳家洛, 你胸襟竟是這般小麼?’”

Chen Jialuo is unable to fully understand his own emotions towards Huo Qingtong, but
he is fully aware of his sense of inferiority and calculating nature. Huo Qingtong’s independence
mirrors Hasli’s dependence. Hasli is constantly passed around from one man to another
throughout the novel. After her male kin are all dead, she clings to Chen Jialuo, and then falls
into the hands of Qianlong. Always an accessory to men, Hasli is only independent after death.
Not only does the lack of remains eliminate the possibility of her being buried and tied to a
specific location, the transformation into a butterfly also releases her from the various types of
human conflict.

83
Earnshaw, Book, 407.
84
Jin Yong, Book, Ch. 17, 831.
85
Jin Yong, Book, Ch. 17, 831.
56

1.6 The Koran and the Swords
One of the earliest conflicts in the novel is the stolen Koran. It is a sacred copy that
originated from Mecca, and was passed down for generations until it came into the hands of
Muzhuolun. The Manchus, knowing how important this is to Muzhuolun and his people, order
some mercenaries to seize it, hoping they can blackmail the Uighurs into submission. Chen
Jialuo and his Red Flower brothers assist Huo Qingtong in retrieving the Koran. She thus gives
Chen Jialuo an ancient dagger (duanjian 短劍) to thank him for his assistance, and to express her
admiration. The background of the dagger is not presented until much later in the story, but it is
of non-Chinese origins, and originally owned by a non-Muslim king.
There is a great lack of Uighur culture in Book, even though Uighurs are one of the major
forces in the story. If the Uighurs were substituted by any other Muslim culture in West Asia, it
would not have made a significant difference on the plot. In Jin Yong’s later works, the non-
Chinese cultures of focus receive much more attention and discussion, especially the Mongols.
Other than the matchmaking (weilang 偎郎) party that allows young women to choose their
lovers, there are no other activities or objects that distinguish the Uighurs from any other Muslim
culture. Religion is the strongest defining factor between the Uighurs and the Chinese living in
the Southern Circuit.
At first glance, the novel’s title refers to Chen Jialuo’s scholarly and martial
achievements. Yet, when looking at the actual items that are presented in Book, the Koran and
the dagger are items of focus in different segments of the story. Both are irrelevant to Chinese
culture. Instead, both items directly relate to Huo Qingtong. The conflict over the Koran is one
point of intersection between the Uighurs, Manchus, and Han Chinese in the first part of the
novel, but the secret of the dagger is one center of focus in the second half. Both the book and
57

the sword serve as links between the Uighur and the Chinese, also linking together Huo
Qingtong and Chen Jialuo, but have little to do with the Qing state.
When Book was initially serialized in New Evening Post, the original title was Shujian
jiangshan 書劍江山, which literally translates to “the country of books and swords.” When Jin
Yong edited his works to be published as books, the title of this story was slightly altered to
Shujian enchou lu 書劍恩仇錄, the title still used today. This new title literally means “the
record of book and sword, love and hate.” The Book and the Sword is the official English title
when the novel was first published in Hong Kong. Even when the title is slightly altered from its
focus on China proper to the characters’ personal relationships, the Koran and the dagger’s
importance remains the same.
The actual country that is being fought over is the Uighur homeland and not China
proper. The Red Flower Society’s “grand plan” is something that merely takes place through
discussions and scheming, but they never engage in actual warfare. In contrast, the Uighurs and
Manchus do go to war for a short period of time, but the war does not involve the Han Chinese.
The decisive battle is fought and won by the Manchus because of Qianlong’s strong desire for
Hasli. The only triangle that links the Qing, the Uighurs, and the Red Flower Society together is
the love triangle between Qianlong, Chen Jialuo, and Hasli. However, the triangular conflict in
Book does not provide a clear structure like those in the military romances. Although the Red
Flower Society and the Uighurs share a common enemy, their political goals are not the same.
The Uighurs are not looking to overthrow the Qing like the Red Flower Society, but desire to
keep their lifestyle and sovereignty. The Red Flower brothers are not involved with the Qing-
Uighur conflict because they are assisting the Uighurs by overthrowing the Qing. This loftiness
is out of the sinocentric mindset that other ethnicities need assistance, while the Han Chinese are
58

the helpers. With none of the Uighur women married to Manchus or Han Chinese, both Huo
Qingtong and Hasli never serve as bridges between any of the competing forces.
Unlike the other male heroes of Jin Yong’s oeuvre, Chen Jialuo’s martial art skills does
not make a difference in the political scene. Just like the assassins from the Tang romances, Jin
Yong’s protagonists are typically integrated into the historical setting through assassinating
political figures. For example, Yuan Chengzhi 袁承志 assassinates Hong Taiji 皇太極 in Sword
Stained with Royal Blood 碧血劍,
86
and Yang Guo kills the Mongol khan. Jin Yong places Chen
Jialuo in the margins of historical development, just as he is placed at the margins of the Chinese
empire.
He is doubly displaced through his geographical relocation and the removal from the
scholarly environment. With most of his life in the Southern Circuit, Chen Jialuo’s Confucian
learning is useless without needing to serve as an official in the Chinese government, which at
this point is a Manchu government. The opening of the story in the Southern Circuit already
reflects that there is no Chinese homeland to protect. This geographical displacement thus further
removes him from the location of the civil service exams, which is the young-scholar figures’
measure of achievement. The young-scholars from the romances all resolve problems through
their learning. The young-scholar from “Story of Tsui Yingying” 崔鶯鶯傳 is able to rescue the
Tsui family from rebels by simply writing a letter to his friend, who happens to be the local
commander.
87
The scholar from “Story of Miss Li” 李娃傳 can even earn his father’s blessing
when marrying a courtesan after he earns first place in the exams.
88
When Chen Jialuo does not

86
Jin Yong, Sword Stained with Royal Blood 碧血劍 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1992).
87
Yuan Zhen 元稹, “Story of Ts’ui Ying-ying” 崔鶯鶯傳, in Anthology of Chinese Literature from Early Times to
the Fourteenth Century, trans. Arthur Waley, ed. Cyril Birch (New York: Grove, 1965), 290-9.
88
Bo Xingjian 白行簡, “Story of Miss Li” 李娃傳, in Anthology of Chinese Literature from Early Times to the
Fourteenth Century, ed. Cyril Birch (New York: Grove, 1965), 300-13.
59

aim to solve problems with his Confucian education, but with violence, he fails to resolve all
types of problems.
As a martial artist, Chen Jialuo never appears in the Chinese martial grove. All of his
experiences in China as an adult are related to personal affairs or to the Society’s affairs, and he
never participates in the greater martial arts community. This distance from the center of the
fighting community is part of the reason why Chen Jialuo is constantly perceived to be out of
place with other martial artists. The other reason is that he spent his first fifteen years in the
minister’s household, who has molded Chen Jialuo’s lifestyle and behaviors. This can be seen in
his air of gentility as an adult. All of the education that contributes to Chen Jialuo’s refined
manners originates from his childhood as a young nobleman, which is also part of the class he
wants to overthrow. The Qing is already well-established by the reign of Qianlong. Chen Jialuo
was not born in the Ming, but in the Qing, and into a Qing minister’s household. For Chen
Jialuo, there is never a Han Chinese homeland to begin with.
The double leadership roles in Book are shared between Huo Qingtong as the military
leader and Chen Jialuo as the Helmsman. Both characters are phallic-bearers through their
swords. Huo Qingtong is best known for her long sword techniques, which are demonstrated
very early in the novel. Her swordsmanship is praised by experienced martial artists like the Red
Flower managers and other elders. The swordswoman originates from the Tang romance “Nie
Yinniang” 聶隱娘 by Pei Xing 裴鉶. Nie Yinniang is a sword-wielding nüxia who also masters
different forms of magic. She can travel great distances in a short period of time, and she is able
to conceal a sword inside her body. Nie Yinniang’s husband is a mirror grinder, a man much
below her station. Wurzburg University professor Roland Altenburger suggests that a lowly man
must depend on his elite wife for his livelihood, thus he will not be able to restrain her from her
60

usual activities. There are even suggestions that Nie Yinniang and her superiors are involved in
intimate relationships.
89
Altenburger also interprets the sword hidden inside Nie Yinniang’s
body as possession of a phallus that has the power to kill men.
90
When Altenburger’s
interpretation is applied to Huo Qingtong, her original ownership of two swords, one long and
one short, means she has two phalluses. One of them, the shorter sword, is given to Chen Jialuo,
while Huo Qingtong continues to use the long sword as her primary weapon. In contrast, Chen
Jialuo’s primary martial arts techniques are his throwing techniques and fists. The dagger is kept
close, but he never uses in battle. The only time he uses it to kill is when they are surrounded by
wolves in the desert.

Conclusion
Two of Book’s main characters, Huo Qingtong and Chen Jialuo, are modeled after
traditional Chinese xia archetypes. However, the traditional archetypal characters conflict with
the modern sensibilities Jin Yong desires to portray in his fiction, and these hybrid characters fail
as chivalric heroes in different ways. Huo Qintong resembles the female xia and non-Chinese
general, but she fails to protect her people and fails to marry. Chen Jialuo is a martial artist
modeled after the young-scholar figure from the scholar-beauty romances. A successful wen hero
in these romances is marked by a double accomplishment in both the public and private realms
of life, but Chen Jialuo’s character is plagued by double failure, in revolt and in romance. He is
displaced from China proper, the location of potential success, and thus unable to put his two
forms of education into “proper” uses in their specified environment. The death of Hasli causes a

89
Alternburger, Needle, 68.
90
Alternburger, Needle, 70.
61

rift between Huo Qingtong and Chen Jialuo, and both end up not marrying each other, or
marrying at all.
With the two characters that most closely resemble the traditional archetypes failing in
their romantic and political aspects of life, Jin Yong’s later protagonists are all portrayed very
differently. While the wen male characters are beautiful, gentle, and sensitive, they are a poor fit
in the rivers and lakes, where the fist resolves conflict and not Confucian learning. On the other
hand, a wu hero’s insensitivity and disdain for women would make him an unpopular figure
when the demand for romantic developments was, and still is very high. Jin Yong’s later male
characters that do succeed in their romantic relationships are ones who have a balance between
wen and wu qualities. These men are able to appreciate and be delighted in the presence of a
romantic partner, they are also able leaders and skilled martial artists. Jin Yong’s attitude
towards female characters is very different. From Huo Qingtong’s example, females that are
physically strong and intelligent are poor matches for Jin Yong’s heroes. In order to allow the
male to take the roles of husband and leader, his partner must be accomplished but obedient,
especially when it comes to adopting the man’s values regarding loyalty and ethnicity.

62

Ch. 2: The Legend of the Condor Heroes and The Return of the Condor Heroes: Imagined
Loyalties

Introduction
The Condor Trilogy 射鵰三部曲 consists of The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄
傳,
91
The Return of the Condor Heroes 神雕俠侶,
92
and The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber.
93

The Legend of the Condor Heroes is Jin Yong’s third novel, and it was originally serialized in
Hong Kong Commercial Daily 香港商報 from 1957 to 1959. Its sequel Jin Yong’s fourth novel,
The Return of the Condor Heroes, was serialized in Ming Pao from 1959 to 1961. The Heaven
Sword and Dragon Saber, also originally serialized in Ming Pao from 1961 to 1963, is Jin
Yong’s sixth novel. It was also during the early 1960s when he wrote a majority of his
novelettes. The three novels together cover the span of the Southern Song 宋 Dynasty (1127-
1279) up to the fall of the Yuan 元 Dynasty (1271-1368). In this chapter, I do not include the
third novel of the Condor Trilogy, The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber 倚天屠龍記, since the
male protagonist Zhang Wuji 張無忌 is more involved as the leader of his school instead of
participating in the larger state affairs.
In this chapter, I only focus on the male protagonists from the first two novels: Guo Jing
郭靖 from The Legend of the Condor Heroes (hereafter Legend), and Yang Guo 楊過 from The
Return of the Condor Heroes (hereafter Return). I do not include the male protagonist from The
Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber (hereafter Saber) into my discussion because this novel is only

91
Jin Yong, Legend of the Condor Heroes (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1993).
92
Jin Yong, The Return of the Condor Heroes (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1993).
93
Jin Yong, The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber (Taipei, Yuanliu, 1998).
63

distantly related to the first two novels, and linked together by a few martial arts technique
manuals. Both Legend and Return are written in bildungsroman style, following the characters
from childhood to youth, and then into their middle ages. The majority of the stories take place
in the characters’ late teens and early twenties, in which romance plays a significant part in
shaping their adult lives. The female characters from both novels complement the male
characters’ in different ways. Both Guo Jing and Yang Guo’s masculinities fall within the middle
of the masculinity spectrum of wen and wu, and are not significant elements in shaping their
characterizations. Hence, I concentrate on ethnicity and the importance of loyalty of the xia
figure in this chapter. Both Guo Jing and Yang Guo achieve the reputation of great xia through
their engagement in activities that protect the Han Chinese state and its people from foreigners.
The first two novels are centered on the Guo and Yang families over the course of three
generations, tracing their fates during the Song’s struggle first with the Jurchen Jin (1115-1234),
and then against the Mongol Yuan. In addition to the historical background, the two families are
also weaved into the context of other literary works and popular culture. Guo Jing is the
descendant of Guo Sheng 郭盛, one of the good fellows of Mt. Liang from Water Margin, and
Yang Guo is the descendant of the Yang family of generals (Yangjia jiang 楊家將) that battled
the Khitans. The fiction and operas that revolve around the Yang generals originated from the
actual historical figures Yang Ye 業 (923-986) and his sons, eventually expanding to encompass
the women warriors of the family. This link to renowned characters from other fictional works
also establishes Guo Jing and Yang Guo as descendants of the loyal and righteous (zhongliang
zhihou 忠良之後), in addition to affirming their Han Chinese ancestry.
Legend and Return are the two novels that firmly establish the connection between
chivalry and loyalty. Because both Guo Jing and Yang Guo are in the middle of the masculinity
64

spectrum, their characters are not burdened by the need to exhibit specific types of masculine
traits. There are also no more strong female characters to share their power. There is undivided
attention dedicated to the characters’ process in overcoming hardship in order to remain loyal to
the Song. The importance of loyalty to one’s own people is touched upon in Jin Yong’s first two
novels, but the settings of both are not in a Chinese state that is on the verge of being invaded.
Although China proper was never fully invaded in modern times, the many conflicts with the
Western and Japanese powers were still very recent events when Jin Yong began to serialize his
fiction in 1955. These wars were one of the major contributors to the migration of Chinese
people to places outside of China proper. Hong Kong became the new home of many Chinese
that attempted to escape the Japanese invasion, and later also received many refugees that fled
from the PRC. Jin Yong’s fiction was initially consumed by those who were removed from their
homeland, but they eagerly bought into the values portrayed by in the stories regarding Chinese
ethnic identity. For the Sinophone readers, Jin Yong’s fiction is the “Chinese experience” that
places them in the Chinese heartland and in the center of Chinese premodern and modern
national struggles, which is a common history that impacted those residing inside and outside of
China proper. There is more sense of urgency in Legend and Return to paint the image of a
passive regime that is the home to men eager to fight on the state’s behalf. Guo Jing and Yang
Guo’s loyalty to the failing Song is portrayed as a noble but futile attempt to reverse the whole
country’s fate.

65

2.1 Loyalty and Ethnicity
There are few English sources thus far that discuss loyalty in pre-modern China. Naomi
Standen’s Unbounded Loyalty
94
and Jennifer Jay’s A Change in Dynasties
95
are two monographs
that address the theme of ministers’ loyalty during the founding and collapse of the Song
Dynasty. Despite the authors’ different approaches, the issue of ministers’ loyalty is inseparable
from the discussion of ethnicity during a time of political and cultural interaction with the non-
Chinese regimes.
Before the Song, loyalty changed easily because territories switched hands between
rulers. From the Spring and Autumn 春秋 period (771 B.C. - 476 B.C.) to the Warring States 戰
國 (475 B.C. -221 B.C.), a minister’s loyalty to his overlord was not absolute, but had to be
earned. The enormous number of political leaders during these time periods allowed a man of
talent a great amount of freedom in choosing his patron. Educated men did not select patrons
based on ancestry or geographical location; they selected on what the patron could provide.
96

Naomi Standen points out that the strict definition of loyalty defined through ethnicity was only
applied after the founding of the Song in 960. Jin Yong retroactively applies a modern
understanding of loyalty and ethnicity to his works set in premodern China. Since the last of the
Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms 五代十國 (897-979) collapsed, ministers could only choose
between two locations of power, the Chinese Song or the Khitan Liao. Later on, the Western Xia
plays an important role in the relations between the Song and the Liao. Since then, China proper
has alternated between foreign and native regimes over the course of a millennium. Although the

94
Naomi Standen, Unbounded Loyalty: Frontier Crossing in Liao China (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press,
2007).
95
Jennifer Jay, A Change in Dynasties: Loyalism in 13th-century China (Bellingham, WA: Western Washington
University, Center for East Asian Studies, 1991), 106-7.
96
Standen, Unbounded Loyalty, 41-8.
66

Tang 唐 Dynasty (618-907) is generally accepted as one of the greatest native regimes in
Chinese history, the Tang imperial family displayed many Turkic and other steppe customs. In
addition to the huge amount of political power imperial women were able to gather, the number
of imperial patricides, fratricides, and filicides reveal that the Tang imperial family did not
completely adopt a Confucian attitude in their family dealings. Instead, they retained a
significant amount of political ideals from steppe culture in choosing practicality over familial
duty.
97

Although ethnicity plays an important part in the interpretation of loyalty after the Song,
Jennifer Jay shows that paragons of loyalty were constructed through the literary works of
followers and admirers after the historical figures’ death. For example, Wen Tianxiang 文天祥
(1236-1283), known for his resistance against the Mongols, was actually held captive for three
years before he committed suicide. He was ordered to either serve the Yuan or to give up his life,
but he had attempted to negotiate with the Yuan court by proposing to become a Buddhist monk.
When the proposal was denied, he committed suicide and has since been considered a martyr.
98

Wen Tianxiang’s reputation was greatly promoted through the writings of his relatives and
students, who were no doubt loyal to the Song, but were also loyal to Wen Tianxiang as an
individual.
99
Jennifer Jay also discusses that the rebellions towards the end of the Yuan were not
based on ethnic differences, since there were Southern Chinese who were actually loyal to the
Yuan during the founding of the Ming. It was the Tumu Incident 土木之變 in 1449, when Ming

97
Chen Sanping, Multicultural China in the Early Middle Ages (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 2012),
17-25.
98
Jay, Change in Dynasties, 106-7.
99
Jay, Change in Dynasties, 114.
67

Emperor Yingzhong 英宗 (r. 1435-1457) was abducted by Oirats 瓦剌, that brought about
xenophobic sentiments. These anti-Mongol were then retroactively written into history.
100

There are two types of loyalty: relational and idealistic. Relational loyalty is best seen
through the relationships between patrons and their retainers of Medieval China. These were
personal relationships unrelated to the state.
101
Despite these relationships being only small
strands, they were part of a greater network of relationships that held together a political-military
system.
102
Whenever there was political turmoil and warlords became the major powers in a
broken empire, there was no central state power to adhere to In the Tang tale of “Nie Yinniang,”
Nie Yinniang serves one warlord after another, never mentioning any responsibility to the state.
On the other hand, idealistic loyalty is more wide-ranging and ambiguous. Instead of being
devoted to a lord, an individual’s loyalty is dedicated to the greater population. The concept of
the “altars of soil and grain” (sheji 社稷) and the ministers’ Dao 道 (chendao 臣道) placed the
ministers’ responsibilities in the interests of the people, and not the overlord.
103

The Mongol conquest was not simply another dynastic change, but a foreign invasion by
people who were not sinified. Previous non-Chinese dynasties only managed to push the Chinese
states south, but the Yuan was the first non-Chinese dynasty that had conquered all the territory
south of the Yellow River. This significantly impacted the later Ming-Qing transition and the
Ming loyalists’ reactions towards the Manchus. The non-Chinese regimes before the Yuan were
sinified to an extent, including the Xianbei of the Northern Wei 北魏 (386-536) and the Tang
Dynasty Turks. The later Khitan Liao and Jurchen Jin were also significantly sinified, as

100
Jay, Change in Dynasties, 258-62.
101
Jonathon Skaff, Sui-Tang China and its Turko-Mongol Neighbors: Culture, Power, and Connections, 580-800
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 100.
102
Standen, Unbounded Loyalty, 41-4.
103
Standen, Unbounded Loyalty, 45-6.
68

discussed above. The Jurchens even established Chinese-like institutions and relocated the
capital multiple times to be closer to the Chinese heartland. In contrast to Jin Yong’s portrayal of
an ambitious Jurchen Jin that is waiting for an opportunity to conquer the Southern Song, James
T.C. Liu points out the Jurchens were not interested in taking over the Song. The Jin did not have
enough man power to carry out a full scale invasion, and they had no military bases close to the
south to make an invasion logistically plausible.
104
The only attempt to conquer the Southern
Song was attempted by Prince Hailing 海陵王 Wanyan Liang 完顏亮 (1122-1161), but it ended
as a disastrous campaign.
105
Despite the Jingkang Incident 靖康事變 in 1127 and regular border
skirmishes, the Jin and Song were at peace for a majority of the time, and border trade
flourished.
106

Ethnic consciousness may be traced back to even earlier times, since northern China had
always been in contact with the steppe nomads. From Zhao Wuling Wang’s 趙武靈王 (r. 325
B.C. – 295 B.C.) adoption of “barbaric” dress to Sima Qian’s revolutionary description of the
Xiongnu in Records of the Grand Historian, there has always been an awareness of differences
in facets, such as styles of dress, lifestyles, and languages.
107
Sima Qian’s portrayal of the
Xiongnu as people and not monsters was a major step in Chinese historiography. Earlier works
portrayed non-Chinese as different types of beasts, like in Classic of Mountains and Seas 山海

104
James T.C. Liu, “The Jurchen-Sung Confrontation: Some Overlooked Points,” in China under Jurchen Rule:
Essays on Chin Intellectual and Cultural History, Eds. Hoyt Cleveland Tillman and Stephen H. West, SUNY:
Albany, 1995, 39-49).
105
Hok-lam Chan, “From Tribal Chieftain to Sinitic Emperor: Leadership Contests and Succession Crises in the
Jurchen-Jin State, 1115–1234,” in Journal of Asian History (33.2, 1999, 105–41).
106
Hok-lam Chan, “Commerce and Trade in Divided China: the case of Jurchen-Jin versus the Northern and
Southern Song,” in Journal of Asian History (36.2, Fall 2002, 135-83).
107
Sima Qian, “The Account of the Xiongnu” 匈奴列傳, in Records of the Grand Historian, ed. and trans. Burton
Watson (129-62).
69

經.
108
Non-Chinese people and cultures were eventually incorporated and sinified, and
contributed greatly in shaping Chinese culture throughout history. What was once considered
foreign eventually became native. Anthropologist Xu Jieshun describes this constant
incorporation of non-Chinese people and cultural elements as snowballing, when foreign
elements are rolled in and fused into one entity.
109

Pamela Crossley and Naomi Standen provide two examples of how loyalty is related to
ethnicity. Since loyalty cannot be quantified or observed, whether one was loyal or disloyal
depends on the historian’s interpretation. As Naomi Standen describes, “Loyalty is in the eye of
the beholder,”
110
citing Han Yanhui 韓延徽 (882-959) as an example. Han Yanhui was
considered loyal by Song historian Sima Guang 司馬光 (1019-1086) because the Khitan did not
pasture their horses in the South when Han Yanhui was the Liao minister. This overlooks the fact
that Han Yanhui served the Tang military leader Liu Rengong 劉仁恭 (? - 914) before he was
sent to the Liao as an ambassador.
111
Pamela Crossley’s A Translucent Mirror opens with the
case of Tong Bunian 佟卜年, who was charged with sedition towards the end of the Ming
Dynasty in 1622.
112
Two of Tong Bunian’s distant cousins had collaborated with the Jianzhou 建
州 Jurchens, and the surname Tong Bunian indicates that he was not Chinese, but Jurchen. After
an investigation, there was no evidence to confirm the charges. Yet Tong Bunian was still
executed, not because he was guilty, but because he was assumed to commit acts of disloyalty in

108
A Chinese Bestiary: Strange Creatures from the Guideways through Mountains and Sea 山海經, trans. Richard
E. Strassberg (Berkeley: University of California, 2002).
109
Xu Jieshun, “Understanding the Snowball Theory of the Han Nationality,” in Critical Han Studies, Ed. Thomas
S. Mullaney (Berkeley, CA: University of California, 2012, 113-27).
110
Standen, Unbounded Loyalty, 33.
111
Standen, Unbounded Loyalty, 115.
112
Pamela Crossley, A Translucent Mirror: History and Identity in Qing Imperial Ideology (Berkeley: University of
California, 1999), 60-70.
70

the future, given his “ethnicity.” This ethnicity label is stamped on him because of others’
perception of him. It is not that Tong Bunian has any physical traits that indicate his difference
from the judges.
Since the concept of ethnicity is considered a modern creation, it is a sensitive matter. It
may be even anachronistic when applied to discussions of history, especially pre-modern history.
People of the past may not have understood ethnicity as we do today, but from Song-Yuan
transition and Tong Bunian’s case, we can see that ethnicity has definitely shaped the cultural
and political atmosphere of imperial China, regardless of how it has been constructed and
understood. Ethnicity is an artificial concept that is based on people’s perceptions of difference.
This difference is not necessarily based on any concrete evidence, but on subjective opinions. In
Tong Bunian’s case, as long as others considered him a Jurchen, then he was a Jurchen.
Jin Yong never attempts to define the traits or characteristics of the Han Chinese people,
as if Han is a self-explanatory term that is universal and unchanging. To emphasize the
differences between native Chinese and foreigners, Jin Yong dedicates more attention to the non-
Chinese characters, regardless of their age and gender. But the definition of Han did indeed
change over time. The term originated from the Han Dynasty (206 B.C. – 220 A.D.), in which
the term meant a person of the Han Empire. But even then, the Han Empire had incorporated
many non-Chinese cultures, including the Man 蠻, Yi 夷, Rong 戎, and Di 狄 groups.
113
After
the Han’s collapse, people of the steppe attributed the name of the dynasty to those who resided
in the Central Plain.
114
Later, under the regimes of the Liao and Jurchen Jin, Han was the label

113
Xu, “Understanding the Snowball Theory of the Han Nationality,” 116.
114
Mark Elliot, “Hushuo: The Northern Other and the Naming of the Han Chinese” in Critical Han Studies (173-
90).
71

for inhabitants of northern China. The Mongols eventually adopted this label for people living in
what was northern China, and the Southern Song’s inhabitants were thus Southerners 南人.
In modern times, the term Han again took on new meaning. Kai-wing Chow attributes the
“new” concept of Han as a result of encounters with the British imperialists. The influence of
social Darwinism brought about a complete reconsideration of how the Chinese modernists
understood their own history.
115
Since then, the Han and the Manchus became different
ethnicities. Yet Kai-wing Chow does not mention that the Manchu’s Eight Banners once had
Chinese Banners. Known as the Hanjun 漢軍, Chinese Bannermen were an essential group in the
Qing’s founding and conquest of the Central Plain. Although the Chinese Bannermen were later
dismissed during Qianlong’s reign, their significance cannot be undermined. Letting the Han
Banners go was a way to reduce the costs of maintenance, since the Banner population increased
significantly as time went on. Chinese Bannermen were always considered less Manchu, so
dismissing them also “purified” the Banners of non-Manchu elements.
116
In the hands of the
Chinese modernists, Han was a recycled and renewed term, and it has since been frequently
paired with other Chinese characters, including zhong 種 and zu 族, meaning race and ethnicity.
The modern, newly imagined Han national identity of being weak and constantly invaded
by foreigners has also been adopted by Jin Yong, along with the assumption that one must be
loyal to one’s own ethnicity. This self-victimizing attitude is a direct influence from the Chinese
government’s weakness in the face of the foreign powers during the Qing and Republican
periods. Although the Han people are constantly mentioned throughout the novels, the people’s

115
Kai-wing Chow, “Narrating Nation, Race, and National Culture: Imagining the Hanzu Identity in Modern China”
in Constructing Nationhood in Modern East Asia (Eds. Kai-wing Chow, Kevin M. Doak, and Poshek Fu, Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan, 2001, 47-84), 48-56.
116
Elliot, Manchu Way, 333-43.
72

presence is mostly limited to being in the background. Jin Yong reduces a large and diverse
population into a monolingual body of people with a single culture, who are all impacted by the
same fate and history. This reduction, though overly simplified, becomes a convenient
explanation and justification for why the non-Chinese are a threat. Since the Han ethnicity is
assumed to be solidly homogenous in language, culture, and history, the arrival of non-Chinese
threatens to fracture this uniformity. By ignoring regional dialects and cultures in the historical
context and only focusing on the shared history of changing regimes, Jin Yong can call to
Chinese readers from across the globe through the Chinese written language.
Jin Yong does not provide a concise definition of what a Han Chinese person is like, but
it is clear that he determines ethnicity through one’s bloodline. Culture and education absolutely
cannot change one’s ethnicity, and it does not matter whether the individual was aware of his
“true” ethnicity all along. More specifically, one’s ethnic identity is defined through one’s father.
The fathers of Jin Yong’s heroes are almost always deceased when the story begins, or die soon
afterwards, but their influence is always present because they determine the sons’ ethnicity.
The Song-Yuan transition was a turning point for the interpretation and understanding of
loyalty, and setting the Condor Trilogy in this specific time period merges the historical
interpretation of ethnicity and loyalty with its modern understanding. Jin Yong relocates the
importance of loyalty from the government officials to the martial artists, shifting the
responsibility of emperors and ministers to the commoner. To Jin Yong, there is a certain
innocence to the Chinese regime’s inability to fight off the enemy. Since the Song is never the
oppressor, the blame is completely laid at the doorstep of the invaders. Those who are loyal to
the Chinese regime are portrayed positively as faithful and righteous individuals, like the
73

legendary Yue Fei 岳飛 (1103-1142). In contrast, those who place their loyalties with the non-
Chinese are portrayed negatively, and are traitors to their own people and lovers of riches.
The assumption that one should only be loyal to one’s ethnic group is introduced in Book,
but it is not widely expanded until Legend and Return, in which a Han Chinese’s loyalty to the
Chinese state is an absolute requirement in order to be considered a xia. The xia’s dedication to
the people is not influenced by the merit of the rulers, but based solely on ethnicity. Service to
the people is only an excuse, since it is possible to serve the people under alien regimes. Jin
Yong’s definition of the people is always equivalent to the Chinese government, which is
inseparable from the concept of ethnicity. This loyalty is exhibited through protecting the
Chinese people and state from foreign invaders, although not in conjunction with the Chinese
government. It is through the xia’s own means that he must fight against the invaders, which can
range from using one’s own superb martial arts skills to assassinate the opponents, or through
leading one’s own misfit army that consists of fellow Chinese martial artists. Instead of wielding
influence on an interpersonal level, Jin Yong’s xia is expected to make a difference on the
welfare of the state, greatly increasing the xia’s scale of impact from the traditional portrayal.
Like all targets of loyalty in Jin Yong’s works, the xia are loyal to “the people,” more
specifically the Han people. Both Guo Jing and Yang Guo dedicate themselves to protecting the
Song against the Jurchens and then against the Mongols. Transforming the xia into a
transnational figure gives the once inward-looking genre a modern twist. The martial grove is not
free from the events of the larger empire. As members of the Chinese martial grove, all martial
artists are threatened by potential invasions. The struggles of the Song government are blended
in with those of the martial arts world. The protagonists assume semi-military roles, and they
exert their influence in the martial arts realm to contribute to the state. Guo Jing and Yang Guo’s
74

loyalty to the Song is absolute, yet very vague and broad. They assume that the non-Chinese are
all cruel and aggressive, and are the source of all national conflicts. They further assume that the
foreign rulers will treat their Chinese subjects cruelly once they successfully conquer the land,
but they never question how the native regime, already known to be full of faults, is benefiting
the common people.

2.2 Guo Jing: Han Chinese and Mongol Hybridity
Guo Jing stands out as the only bicultural male protagonist in Jin Yong’s fiction. He is
familiar with both Chinese and Mongol languages and cultures. Other characters who have
multicultural backgrounds, such as Chen Jialuo and Xiao Feng, spend a majority of their lives in
China before relocating to a foreign land. The new culture and people become a significant part
of these characters’ lives, but is not an integral part of their formative years. Guo Jing and Zhang
Wuji from Saber are the only protagonists that are born outside of China proper, and “return” to
a homeland that is actually unfamiliar. Guo Jing is born in the steppes, and he lives with his
Chinese parent and teachers amongst the Mongols who have taken in this band of Chinese
people.
Guo Jing’s childhood and youth in the steppes is a direct consequence of his parents’
experiences in the Song homeland. The Guo and the Yang families originally resided in Niu
Family Village 牛家村, near the Southern Song capital Lin’an 臨安. Both families are expecting
their firstborns, but are attacked by soldiers for an unknown reason. This mysterious incident
alters the fate of both families over three generations, and eventually impacts three empires.
In the chaos of the attack, Guo Jing’s father is killed and his mother, Li Ping 李萍, is
captured by a low ranking Song military official named Duan Tiande 段天德. Li Ping is
75

separated from the Yangs as her captor forces her to blindly travel north, attempting to outrun the
rescue party coming after the pregnant woman. The duo accidentally falls captive to the Jurchen
soldiers in the Jin capital. The Jin soldiers march both of them along with their slaves up north,
but are then attacked by a small team of Mongols. During the attack, Duan Tiande casts Li Ping
aside. She faints in the midst of the violence. Mistaking her for being dead, she is not molested
by the soldiers. In the wilderness she gives birth to a boy. Continuing to wander after childbirth,
she eventually encounters Temujin's 鐵木真 people. When in reference to the historical figure, I
use the title Genghis Khan; when referring to the character in Legend, I use his personal name
Temujin. A few years later, the rescue party known as the Seven Oddities of Jiangnan 江南七怪
catches up with the mother and son. As agreed upon with her husband and the Yang family, Li
Ping names her son Jing.
The name is in memory of the Jingkang Incident. The Yang family’s child is thus named
Kang 康. The children’s names serve as a constant reminder that the two families are living in a
broken country. The Chinese characters of “jing” and “kang” are gender neutral names, and
could be given names for children of either sex. Guo Jing shares a name with a Song Dynasty
minor official who served in the Shaanxi 陝西 Province. The historical Guo Jing committed
suicide when the Jurchen Jin invaded.
117
Many of Jin Yong’s protagonists are named after
historical figures. Another example is Zhang Wuji from Saber, who shares a given name with
Tang Dynasty minister Zhangsun Wuji 長孫無忌 (594-659).

117
Lu Jin 呂進 and Han Yunbo 韓雲波, “Jin Yong’s ‘Anti-Xia’ and the Fate of the Wuxia Literary Genre” 金庸 “ 反
武俠” 與武侠小说的文類命運, in Proceedings of the International Beijing Jin Yong Conference 北京金庸小說國
際研討會論文集, eds. Wu Xiaodong 吳曉東 and Ji Birui 計壁瑞 (Beijing: Peking University Press 北京大學出版
社, 428-54).
76

During the Jingkang Incident, the Jurchens invaded the Song capital and abducted the
emperors Huizong 徽宗 (r. 1100-1126) and his son Qinzong 欽宗 (r. 1126-1127). About three
thousand imperial family members, officials, servants, and entertainers were captured and taken
north.
118
The Song lost the northern half of their empire when they fled to southern China,
marking the beginning of the Southern Song in Lin’an, which is modern day Hangzhou.
119

Marco Polo refers to the Southern Song capital as Kinsai, which is the transliteration of xingzai
行在, meaning an emperor’s temporary residence away from the capital.
The Niu Family Village attack replicates the Jingkang Incident, but in a much smaller
scale. The Niu Family Village attack breaks up the two families just like the Jurchens broke up
the Song imperial family and territory. The displacement of the pregnant women is only the
beginning of their children’s quests in searching for a home and an identity. The Yang child’s
attachment to his Jurchen identity and Guo Jing’s unwavering loyalty to the Song represents the
break of the Song Empire into two halves. With the eventual death of Yang Kang and his refusal
to fully recognize his Han Chinese identity, his failures represent the impossibility of ever
recovering the lost territory.
Guo Jing, although fatherless and living with the Mongols, never experiences any
paternal confusion or ethnic identity crises. The complete lack of a father eliminates any
possibilities of him misunderstanding his family history and where he truly belongs, unlike his
sworn-brother Yang Kang. There are various father figures in Guo Jing’s life, but they are never
mistaken to be his biological father. The presence of Li Ping and the Seven Oddities provides
Guo Jing with a basic Chinese education in addition to martial arts. He is able to read and write

118
Ari Daniel Levine, “The Reigns of Hui-tsung and Ch’in-tsung” in The Cambridge History of China (Eds. Denis
Twitchett and Paul Jakov Smith (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009, 556-643), 643.
119
Marco Polo calls the Southern Song capital Kinsai in his memoir The Travels of Marco Polo, trans. Ronald
Latham (London: Penguin, 1958).
77

simple Chinese, but never improves in the literary arts throughout the two novels. When Guo
Jing is held captive to write out the martial arts manual Nine Yin Veritable Scriptures 九陰真經
from memory, there are numerous characters that he does not know how to write. In addition to
the Seven Oddities, Guo Jing has some other formal and informal teachers.
Guo Jing’s learns archery from another teacher, Jebe 哲別 (? - 1225). The bow and arrow
lose importance and significance as Guo Jing learns newer and more powerful martial arts
techniques when in the Song, but his archery skills bring him a pair of lifelong companions. The
title of the novel literally translates to “the tale of the condor shooting hero,” attributed to Guo
Jing’s rescue of a pair of fledgling condors. He shoots down the full grown, attacking condors
and raises the fledglings that eventually become his lifelong companions. In regards to internal
energy (neili 內力 or neigong 內功), Guo Jing learns how to cultivate his qi from a Quanzhen 全
真 master, Abbot Ma Yu 馬鈺. In martial arts, there is a cultivation of the inner and outer
techniques. The outer techniques are related to the physical performance of martial arts, such as
form and strength. The inner cultivation relates to the qi, which Minford describes as “the vital
energy stored within the body, which the Martial Arts practitioner strives to conserve and
strengthen throughout various exercises.”
120
The Quanzhen School was a Daoist branch that
flourished during the Jin and Yuan, founded by Wang Chongyang 王重陽 (1113-1170). The
school was founded in Jurchen Jin territory, and was popular amongst Jin nobles. However, Jin
Yong portrays Wang Chongyang and his disciples as anti-Jurchen Daoists.
Guo Jing is one of the few characters whose mother is alive for a majority of the novel.

120
Minford, Deer, vol. 2, xxviii.
78

The presence of Li Ping keeps the Chineseness alive in the Guo family, despite being far away
from the cultural center. She is the most important figure in shaping Guo Jing’s worldview as he
grows up. She instills the hate for Jurchens in her son through telling of him stories, which most
likely are not her personal experiences. She is a native of Lin’an, and the capital is far from the
Jurchen border. Her stories are more like urban legends, with some truth and some exaggeration,
but they become the major shapers of Guo Jing’s understanding of Chinese ethnic identity and its
juxtaposition with the Jurchens.
Guo Jing hears about the Jurchens’ ruthlessness from his mother often. She tells him how
they rape and loot in China, killing innocent commoners, and schemed with the [Chinese]
traitors to kill the famous Yue Fei. He has felt a strong hostility towards Jurchens since a
very young age.

郭靖平時常聽母親講金人殘暴的故事, 在中國如何姦淫擄掠, 虐殺百姓, 如何與漢奸
勾結, 害死中國的名將岳飛等等, 小小的心靈中早深種下對金人的仇恨.
121

Guo Jing’s fictive kin is extensive in the steppes. It is made up of many teachers and his
sworn-brotherhood with Temujin's youngest son, Tolui 拖雷. Through Tolui, Guo Jing is close
to the khan’s family and is included in many military activities. Later, Guo Jing is betrothed to
Temujin’s youngest fictional daughter Huazheng 華箏. Huazheng’s character is based on
Khochen Bekhi, who is Genghis Khan’s eldest daughter with his first wife Borte. Khochen
Bekhi’s name is usually transliterated in Chinese as huozhen beqi 豁真別乞 or huozhen beji 火
真別姬, in which the first two characters are similar to the pronunciation of Huazheng. Like
Khochen Bekhi, Huazheng is originally betrothed to Wang 王 Khan’s grandson. After
Huazheng’s engagement is broke, her father betroths her to Guo Jing.
When Guo Jing meets Yang Tiexin, his father’s sworn-brother, he discovers that Yang
Tiexin has a foster daughter named Mu Nianci 穆念慈. According to the promise between the

121
Jin Yong, Legend, Ch. 3, 149. All translations of Legend are my own.
79

Guo and Yang families, Guo Jing should marry Mu Nianci to unite the two families. It is because
Li Ping learns that the Yangs had a son that she agrees to Temujin’s proposal for Guo Jing to
marry Huazheng. However, Mu Nianci also refuses to marry Guo Jing because she is in love
with Yang Kang. None of Jin Yong’s protagonists ever marry their childhood betrothals or
partners from matching backgrounds. Marrying for romantic love is a modern concept, and
anachronistic when applied to the historical settings of Jin Yong’s fiction. Yet it is exactly this
desire to choose a partner outside of parental arrangement that brings about a crises for the male
protagonists, because his elders often consider the chosen women inappropriate. The female
protagonists are almost always otherized through their ethnic backgrounds or shady family ties.
Jin Yong pairs many of his heroes with bewitching women (yaonü 妖女), including Huang Rong
黃蓉, Ren Yingying 任盈盈 from Proud, Smiling Wanderer, and Azi 阿紫 from Demi-Gods and
Semi-Devils. These bewitching women characters are all-powerful or resourceful ladies in a
martial grove dominated by men. Labeling them as yaonü is the author’s justification for these
women’s power or desire to interrupt the male order in the rivers and lakes; this intrusion into the
world of men can only be carried out by women who are somewhat abnormal. The female
characters that do not have any power or designs of their own are portrayed as pure but
feebleminded, such as Xiao Longnu 小龍女 from Return, Hasli, and Wang Yuyan 王語嫣 from
Demi-Gods and Semi Devils.
Guo Jing’s Chinese-Mongol hybridity does not take away from his adventures in the
Southern Song. There is no culture shock or dialect barrier when he travels south. Jin Yong
rarely touches on dialects and accents in his fiction. The dialects that do receive the most
attention are Cantonese and Suzhounese. Jin Yong was living in a Cantonese-speaking location
when he wrote the first version of his novels, and his second and third wives were also Hong
80

Kong locals. Suzhounese is his mother tongue. The Fuzhou 福州 accent is mentioned very
briefly in Proud, Smiling Wanderer, when Lin Pingzhi 林平之 relocates from his coastal home
to the inland Shaanxi province.
Guo Jing fits in perfectly with the people of the Chinese martial grove. His only
inconvenience is his slow-wittedness, which is greatly amended by the clever Huang Rong.
Although Huang Rong is more intelligent and skilled in martial arts early in the novel, Guo Jing
eventually surpasses her through learning new techniques. She remains Guo Jing’s sidekick
forever, in youth and later in life. Huang Rong proves to be a capable military strategist while
campaigning against Samarkand. She is also a successful leader during her tenure as the Beggar
Clan’s nineteenth generation leader. However, her lack of patriotic fervor keeps her from
enjoying the same status as her husband.
When Guo Jing is able to track down Duan Tiande, he discovers that the mastermind
behind the Niu Family Village attack was the Jurchen Prince Wanyan Honglie 完顏洪烈. This
revelation ties together Guo Jing’s personal vengeance and the country’s woes (guochou jiahen
國仇家恨). The Jurchen prince had desired the Yang wife, née Bao 包, and organized the attack
with his Song accomplices. Wanyan Honglie becomes the embodiment of Guo Jing’s learned
hatred towards Jurchens. He is the sole Jurchen representative throughout Legend. Instead of
tending to official duties, Wanyan Honglie spends most of his time interacting with martial
artists, attempting to use their strengths to take over the Song from the bottom up. Guo Jing’s
resistance against the Jurchens is then doubly justified due to his personal grievances. For a
majority of the novel, Guo Jing and Huang Rong’s adventures are results of foiling Wanyan
Honglie’s schemes.
81

A major item of dispute throughout the novel is Yue Fei’s military manual, Wumu’s
Posthumous Manual 武穆遺書. The importance of manuals in wuxia fiction is especially
prominent in Legend. In addition to the military tactics manual, there is the aforementioned
martial arts manual Nine Yin Scriptures. While the martial arts manuals are the cause of conflict
in the martial grove, the military manual is fought over by political leaders and martial artists.
Even though military men and martial artists are not necessarily scholarly men, they are still
expected to be literate and to learn from their forebears. Yue Fei is an extremely important figure
in the Chinese cultural imagination of what it means to be a loyal general, contrasted by his
nemesis Qin Hui 秦檜 (1090-1155), the infamously corrupt minister. Guo Jing’s loyalty to the
Song is greatly inspired by Yue Fei, and his behaviors model those of the general. The fictional
Manual, supposedly written by Yue Fei before his execution, records all of his military strategies
and various types of formations (zhen 陣). Guo Jing accidentally acquires the Manual, which
greatly contributes to his military career and personal development. The value of the Manual and
the constant references to Yue Fei are a continuous reminder of the military leaders’ struggle
against the Jurchens and Yue Fei’s tragic end. Although Yue Fei has become a paragon of
loyalty, his execution also points back to his inability to make a difference for the Song when he
was alive. On the other hand, Guo Jing is able to make a huge difference with the help of these
military strategies. With the assistance of the Manual, Guo Jing contributes to the Mongol
Empire with the conquest of Samarkand, and then holds Xiangyang 襄陽 for twenty years. Yue
Fei’s posthumous guidance elevates Guo Jing from a common Chinese martial artist to a military
leader, and promotes him to the status of the “great xia who serves the country and the people”
為國為民, 俠之大者.
82

After Guo Jing’s death, the Manual is hidden in the Dragon Saber (from Saber). When
paired with the Nine Yin Scriptures hidden in the Heavenly Sword 倚天劍, the owner of both
weapons becomes the most powerful person in the realm. The Guo couple expects that the
military and martial arts instructions would provide the individual with the skills to banish the
Mongols and reinstate the Song. Their hope is that there will be another Guo Jing-like individual
in the future who will be loyal to the Han Chinese, just like how Guo Jing is a close replica of
Yue Fei.
There are no ethnic or political contradictions regarding Guo Jing and Huang Rong’s
union, only the conflict that arises between Guo Jing’s teachers and Huang Rong’s father. The
major contradiction in the novel stems from Guo Jing’s filial piety and loyalty. Jennifer Jay
points out that filial piety and loyalty to the state have been portrayed as contradicting elements
since the Song Dynasty.
122
But this contradiction existed long before the Song, and continued to
be a literary trope into the Ming. From Nie Zheng 聶政
123
to The Romance of the Three
Kingdom’s 三國演義
124
Xu Shu 徐庶, there is an incompatibility in serving ones parents and
serving the state at the same time. Filial piety or loyalty to the state is not simply a choice, but
something that demands one’s complete dedication. Filial mourning of approximately three years
in imperial times is a good example of how the domestic and official duties do not mix. When
domestic filial piety clashes with stately loyalty, the domestic realm is always the one that is
sacrificed. Nie Zheng waits for his mother’s passing before he serves Lord Yan Zhongzi 嚴仲子

122
Jay, Change in Dynasties, 249.
123
Sima Qian, “Nie Zheng” 聶政 in An Anthology of Chinese Literature: Beginnings to 1911, ed. Stephen Owen
(New York: Norton, 1996, 152-4).
124
Luo Guanzhong 羅貫中, The Three Kingdoms 三國演義, trans. Sumei Yu, ed. Ronald C. Iverson (North
Clarendon, VT: Tuttle Publishing, 2014).

83

in carrying out an assassination, which is a suicidal mission. As for Xu Shu, his mother commits
suicide after finding out her son was duped to work for the enemy. It is because of his mother’s
death that Xu Shu remains unmoved by Cao Cao’s 曹操 (155-220) threats and lures. By refusing
to provide Cao Cao with any advice, Xu Shu remains politically pure, despite being in physical
captivity.
With the fall of the Jurchen Jin and the death of Wanyan Honglie, the Song and Guo
Jing’s primary enemies are eliminated. Although Guo Jing’s quest to avenge his father is
completed, the story is extended by another crisis. Towards the end of Legend, the focus shifts to
Temujin’s ambitions to expand south, which conflict with Guo Jing’s loyalty to the Song.
Temujin parallels Wanyan Honglie when Li Ping commits suicide, like with Xu Shu’s mother.
Her death releases Guo Jing from his filial burdens, and also cuts all of Guo Jing’s connections
from Temujin and his family. Guo Jing’s filial piety for his mother overrides all of Temujin’s
kindness to the Guo family over the years, and turns Temujin from benefactor and future father-
in-law into an enemy. Temujin, along with the Seven Oddities, are like Guo Jing’s surrogate
fathers. The khan provided the widow and child with protection, a means to live by, and the
equivalent of an extended family. Temujin’s benevolence is something Li Ping never received in
her home country. It is only from a non-Chinese leader that she is safe from the molestations of
both Chinese and Jurchen officials. When Huazheng is betrothed to Guo Jing, it is an opportunity
for the family to rise in social status, since Mongol imperial sons-in-law enjoyed great power in
court and family affairs.
Once again, the state and Guo Jing’s personal vengeance is intertwined when the
Mongols become the Song and Guo Jing’s new enemies. When he returns to the Song at the end
of Legend, he no longer has any affiliations with his past and with the enemy state. He is also
84

unburdened after the death of his mother. As mentioned above, Guo Jing is one of the few
characters whose mother is a significant part of his life. The only other character who is
significantly impacted by a maternal figure is Linghu Chong 令狐沖 from Proud, Smiling
Wanderer. The mothers that play important roles in their sons’ lives all die tragic deaths. These
mother figures all die after the surrogate father figure is removed from the position. It is only
when the overall family structure falls apart that the protagonists can start their own families, and
rise to become paternal figures. Legend ends with Guo Jing’s permanent relocation to the Song.
In the sequel, Guo Jing’s appearances are mostly limited to being in Xiangyang, He is middle
aged, and known as a great xia due to his service for the Song.

2.3 Wanyan or Yang Kang: The Link between Guo Jing and Yang Guo
Just as Hasli foils her elder sister, Yang Kang is a foil to Guo Jing. Yang Kang is only
one of Guo Jing’s three sworn-brothers. Like the other male protagonist with sworn-brothers,
this is also a border-crossing combination. Each of the brothers represents a major ethnic group
in the story. Tolui is from the Mongol steppes, Yang Kang represents the Jurchen Jin, and Zhou
Botong 周伯通 is a Han Chinese of the Song. Unlike Tolui and Zhou Botong, Guo Jing and
Yang Kang become sworn-brothers out of responsibility to fulfill their parents’ wishes. There is
almost no brotherly love between the two, and even less so from Yang Kang’s end. There are
many times when Yang Kang attempts to kill his “elder brother” because of their major
differences in their approaches to martial arts, ethnicity, and politics.
Yang Kang was born in a foreign country. After the attack on Niu Family Village, Bao
mistook her husband for being dead, and separated from the Guo family. She accepts the
assistance offered by the Jurchen prince, Wanyan Honglie. He pretends to rescue her from the
85

Song soldiers, and eventually persuades her to marry him. The Wanyan clan typically married
from eight Jurchen tribes, but Bao is addressed as principal princess (wangfei 王妃) by the
guards and servants.
125
There is no mention that Wanyan Honglie has any other wives or
concubines, and it is possible that Bao is his main and only wife. After she marries Wanyan
Honglie, he treats Bao’s child as his own, and she is able to keep the name Kang, as agreed upon
before the unexpected separation from her husband. Wanyan Honglie has no biological children.
Despite being born Wanyan Kang, it is impossible for Yang Kang to strip himself of his
Han Chinese identity because of his biological father’s ethnicity. Not only is his given name
firmly situated in the historical context of the Song’s military weakness and political failures, his
mother’s “abduction” also points to the weak status of the Han Chinese regime in the relation to
the Jin. Yang Kang, having been a Jurchen for a majority of his life, continues to cling on to this
identity even after he discovers that his father is not Wanyan Honglie. This desire to remain
within the circle of Jurchen power differentiates Yang Kang from Guo Jing in mindset and
political aspirations. It is because of his remaining connections to Wanyan Honglie that Yang
Kang becomes a tainted man and traitorous character, portrayed negatively for lacking a clear
sense of ethnic identity.
Both Yang Kang and Guo Jing's childhoods parallel each other. In addition to being born
and raised outside of China proper, they are also taught martial arts by Quanzhen masters. They
even encounter Mei Chaofeng 梅超風 in their childhood, who is an infamously powerful martial
artist that is hiding in the north. The major difference between the brothers is their attitudes
towards being Han Chinese. For Guo Jing, there is never any doubt about his cultural and ethnic

125
Herbert Franke, “The Chin Dynasty,” in The Cambridge History of China Volume 6: Alien Regimes and Border
States, 907-1376, eds. Herbert Franke and Denis Twitchett (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 215-320), 286.
86

roots. Being Han Chinese to him is empowering; his desire to protect his own people is portrayed
as one of the noblest aspects of his character. Liu Xiangan 劉祥安 considers Guo Jing’s embrace
of Chinese culture an active reshaping of himself through negating his old self to form a new self
while in a new place.
126
However, given the number of places Guo Jing travels to in Legend,
there are too many times that would call for him to form a “new” self. Instead of negating his old
self, Guo Jing’s new self emerges after the death of his mother, as discussed above. The sudden
loss of his only parent, most of his teachers, and even Huang Rong (mistaken to have died)
plunges him into an episode of depression and hopelessness. He considers his past martial arts
education a complete waste, since martial arts are only useful for killing others, but are helpless
against greater tragedies such as Temujin’s command to massacre conquered cities. It is not until
Guo Jing emerges from this period of self-doubt that he understands that he is capable of making
a difference on a larger scale, eventually leading to his decision to guard Xiangyang.
In contrast, Yang Kang sees being Han Chinese as a weakness. While Abbot Ma teaches
Guo Jing in the steppes, Abbot Qiu Chuji 丘處機 teaches Yang Kang in the Jin capital. Like Guo
Jing, Yang Kang has more than one teacher. He becomes Mei Chaofeng’s disciple for a short
period of time, then courts the non-Chinese martial artist Ouyang Feng 歐陽鋒. Ouyang Feng’s
origins are never specifically addressed throughout Legend. He is simply from a place beyond
the Chinese border in the western regions named White Camel Mountain (baituo shan 白駝山).
Although he has a high nose bridge and sunken eyes, Ouyang Feng speaks and reads Chinese
fluently. Abbot Qiu disowns Yang Kang from his school later on, and Yang Kang has no
consistent teachers for the rest of the novel.

126
Liu Xiangan 劉祥安, “Observing the Modern Public’s Expression of Individualism through the Xias’ Journeys”
從俠的歷程看現代大眾的個體表達, in Proceedings of the International Beijing Jin Yong Conference (118-28).
87

Yang Kang does not learn of his natural father, Yang Tiexin 楊鐵心, until he reaches
adulthood. The revelation leads to the death of both parents, leaving Yang Kang in a difficult
position. As an adopted son and not truly Jurchen, there is no reason for Yang Kang to remain in
the Wanyan household. Already a widower, Wanyang Honglie does not want to be childless, and
welcomes Yang Kang back with open arms. Yang Kang is portrayed unsympathetically because
he “considers the bandit his father” (renzei zuofu 認賊作父) and he refuses to acknowledge his
true father. Yang Kang’s denial of his biological father is the equivalent of his refusal to assume
his “true” ethnic identity. He continues pretending to be a Jurchen princeling with continual
service to his foster father. Wanyan Honglie is a steady source of wealth and prestige, and there
is even the possibility of him ascending the Jurchen throne one day. From Yang Kang’s
perspective, he feels that he has a choice in determining his own identity, and that he does not
necessarily have to be reduced to the weaker of the ethnicities in the power struggle between the
states.
The most recent television series adaptation of Legend from 2008 reinterprets Yang
Kang’s character significantly. Also titled The Legend of the Condor Heroes in English, this
version was the second time Legend was adapted and produced in Mainland China.
127
The
production was solely funded by Chinese Entertainment Shanghai Limited 上海唐人電影制作
有限公司, now renamed Tangren Media 唐人影視有限公司. This version portrays Yang Kang
very sympathetically. He is a recently orphaned youth who is lost in many aspects of life, from
parentage to ethnicity. Yang Kang’s character is transformed from the treacherous princeling to
the noble husband and father who dies while protecting his family at the end. Since Legend has a

127
The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄傳, prod. Karen Tsoi 蔡藝儂, perf. Hu Ge 胡歌 and Ariel Lin 林依
晨 (Chinese Entertainment Shanghai Limited 上海唐人電影制作有限公司, 2008).
88

good number of antagonists, the rehabilitation of Yang Kang would not alter the main focus of
the story.
There are numerous examples throughout the novel that reflect Yang Kang’s greediness
and opportunism, and show how he takes advantage of others’ misunderstandings or weaknesses.
When he first meets his biological father, he feels disdain for the haggard and miserly old man.
He could not help but look towards Yang Tiexin, only to see that his tattered his haggard
face. When he turned to look at his father, dressed in embroidered robes and decked with
jade ornaments, so dashing and refined; the two are complete opposites. Wanyan Kang
thought, “Could I really forsake riches and honor, to wander in the rivers and lakes with
this impoverished man? No, never!” He has made up his mind.

不由得向楊鐵心看去, 只見他衣衫破舊, 滿臉風塵, 再回頭看父親時, 卻是錦衣玉飾,
丰度俊雅, 兩人直有天淵之別. 完顏康心想: “ 難道我要捨卻榮華富貴, 跟這窮漢子浪
跡江湖, 不, 萬萬不能!” 他主意已定.
128

Later, Yang Kang temporarily assumes the position of the Beggar Clan leader while others are
caught in a misunderstanding. The Beggar Clan is subject to many imposter leaders in both
Legend and Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils. Unlike many other martial arts schools, the Beggar
Clan is a melting pot of martial artists from different disciplines. Clan members can rise in the
ranks to assume leadership, or the position can be passed from the former leader to nonmember.
For example, Huang Rong receives the position from her teacher Hong Qigong 洪七公, and her
primary martial arts techniques are her father’s inventions. In Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils,
before becoming the clan leader, Xiao Feng was a lay student (sujia dizi 俗家弟子) of the
Shaolin Temple. Later, Yang Kang murders Ouyang Feng’s son, attempting to become Ouyang
Feng’s only disciple.
Yang Kang’s experiences in the martial grove are not the most influential factors in
shaping his personality. The greatest corrupting factor is the father figure, Wanyan Honglie. Guo

128
Jin Yong, Legend, Ch. 11, 498.
89

Jing never experiences any ethnic or political confusion because he has no single father figure to
mislead him, but Yang Kang’s whole childhood and early adulthood is molded by a “fake” father
who has taught him the “wrong” values and behaviors. Even after the revelation of his parentage,
Yang Kang still clings to Wanyan Honglie, although not completely out of love for power and
wealth. After the death of Bao, Wanyan Honglie is Yang Kang’s only family member he has
ever known. A majority of Jin Yong’s male protagonists establish themselves in the martial
grove without the assistance of their fathers, which are usually dead or missing when the story
begins. However, Yang Kang is constantly influenced by the presence of Wanyan Honglie, and
he fails to break free from the patriarchy. He rejects his biological father partly because he is
bound to another man’s patriline. Yet when in times of need, he has no difficulty claiming he is
Yang Kang instead of Wanyan Kang, and easily slips in and out of different ethnic identities.
This name change is more out of convenience than acceptance of his “true” identity, but
this is also the name the narrator uses when referring to this character for the rest of Legend.
When Yang Kang takes leave of Wanyang Honglie after his mother’s death, he encounters Guo
Jing. Knowing how gullible Guo Jing is, Yang Kang tells Guo Jing:
“Elder Brother Guo, now I finally know that my … that Wanyan Honglie is both of our
enemies. Because I had not known before, I had acted wrongly in many ways, I deserve
to die many times…Now I know truly that my surname is Yang, the name of ‘Wanyan’
no longer has anything to do with me. From now on, my name is Yang Kang.”

“ 郭兄, 我今日才知我那… 那完顏洪烈原來是你我的大仇人. 小弟先前不知, 事事倒
行逆施, 真是罪該萬死… 小弟今日才知確是姓楊, ‘ 完顏’ 兩字, 跟小弟全無干係, 從
今而後,我是叫楊康的了.”
129

The switch to a Chinese surname allows him to camouflage into the Chinese martial grove; he
does not attract any unwanted attention as a Chinese martial artist. He presents himself as Yang
Kang when interacting with Han Chinese, yet he is still Princeling (xiao wangye 小王爺) to

129
Jin Yong, Legend, Ch. 11, 700.
90

those under Wanyan Honglie’s command. The ability to be both Han Chinese and Jurchen at the
same time allows him the freedom in passing between the intangible borders of the Jin court and
the Song martial grove. Not having participated in the affairs of the rivers and lakes before, his
anonymity also becomes his shield as a go-between for Wanyan Honglie and the pro-Jurchen
Chinese martial artists. This double ethnic identity is sometimes advantageous, but it is also
Yang Kang’s ultimate crime.
The deaths of both Li Ping and Bao mark the breaks of their sons’ connections to the
Mongol and Jurchen “fatherland,” the location where the foster and surrogate fathers reside. The
two Chinese mothers are their sons’ only anchors in the non-Chinese world, and when this link is
severed, the sons must return to the “motherland,” which is also their ancestral homeland.
Although Yang Kang’s break from the “fatherland” is not as clear cut as Guo Jing’s, his
temporary self-exile ejects him from the Jurchen court into the Song. Becoming sworn-brothers
with Guo Jing, though his intentions are not sincere, ties Yang Kang permanently to the Chinese
martial grove, where his family originated.
When Yang Kang dies, he leaves behind a son. Guo Jing and Huang Rong discover the
mother (Mu Nianci) and child (Yang Guo) towards the end of Legend. Guo Jing names the infant
Guo 過 and style Gaizhi 改之 to reflect the misdeeds of his father. Yang Kang’s lukewarm
attitudes towards his Han Chinese ancestry is never portrayed as a weakness, but as a sin that is
so great that it is passed on to his son because death cannot erase it. Because Yang Guo is
already burdened by this father's “crimes” at birth, his youth is plagued with an extreme
personality and misunderstandings with the Guo family.

91

2.4 Yang Guo: The Temporary Xia
Legend was thoroughly revised for book format publication, and Yang Guo’s parentage
was slightly altered. In the Hong Kong Commercial Daily serializations, Yang Guo’s birth
mother was Qin Nanqin 秦南琴, who was raped by Yang Kang. In the edited second version of
the novels, Qin Nanqin’s character was merged with Mu Nianci, Yang Tiexin’s foster daughter.
Mu Nianci then became Yang Guo’s mother. Qin Nanqin was the daughter of a snake catcher,
and in love with Guo Jing.
130
Mu Nianci’s background before her adoption is never provided,
and her surname Mu is from Yang Tiexin’s alias. While Yang Tiexin was on the run from the
authorities, he used the alias Mu Yi 穆易. The mu 穆 character, meaning solemn, is a homonym
for mu 木 as in wood, the radical of his surname. The name together is the character yang 楊. Mu
Nianci continues to go by her foster father’s fictitious surname for the rest of the novel.
Changing her surname would cause it to overlap with Yang Kang’s, making it unsuitable for
them to marry. Mu Nianci is in love with Yang Kang from their initial encounter in all versions
of Legend. Qin Nanqin’s love for Guo Jing is the reason why the Guo couple leaves the mother
and her newborn without any means of support. Huang Rong’s dislike of Yang Kang and her
jealousy of Qin Nanqin prevents Guo Jing from caring for his nephew. This part of the plot was
not altered during the revisions because Yang Guo’s characterization is built on the lack of adult
care and supervision very early in his life.
Whether Yang Guo’s mother is Qin Nanqin or Mu Nianci, he is orphaned at a very young
age. Later on, different mother figures come and go, but the only permanent woman in his life is
Xiao Longnu. The father figure also switches often. At first, Guo Jing teaches Yang Guo, along

130
Lin Baochun, “The Study of Different Versions of Jin Yong’s Novels” 金庸小說版本學, in Proceedings of the
International Conference on Jin Yong's Novels 金庸小說國際學術研討會論文集, ed. Wang Qiugui 王秋桂
(Taipei: Yuanliu, 1999, 401-24).
92

with his daughter and other students. He also briefly learns how to read and write under the
tutelage of Huang Rong. Yang Guo is then transferred to the Quanzhen School, where he stays
temporarily before running away to the Ancient Tomb School 古墓派, where his martial arts
training truly begins under the tutelage of a female teacher. Xiao Longnu is the leader of the
Ancient Tomb School, and she is a hermit that resides in the Tomb of the Living Dead 活死人
墓. The tomb is located near the Zhongnan Mountains 終南山, and still stands in Xi’an 西安
today.
Yang Guo’s former male teachers never fill in the void of the missing father, but Ouyang
Feng does. Both Guo Jing and Yang Guo’s Quanzhen teacher Zhao Zhijing 趙志敬 provide a
very limited martial arts education, and even less in terms of moral guidance. When Yang Guo
encounters Ouyang Feng, the martial arts master is already very advanced in age; he was never
able to return to White Camel Mountain after he lost his mind by practicing a fake version of the
Nine Yin Scriptures. Ouyang Feng has no idea who he is, but remembers that he had a son, which
Yang Kang killed. Yang Guo becomes Ouyang Feng’s replacement son, and learns some of
Ouyang Feng’s techniques. Ouyang Feng is an incomplete father figure due to his insanity, but it
is because of this insanity that he treats Yang Guo sincerely. Ouyang Feng’s madness causes him
to be oblivious to his surroundings, and does not judge Yang Guo based on Yang Kang’s past
behaviors. In contrast to Guo Jing and Zhao Zhijing, whose sanity is intact, both regard Yang
Guo with reservations. Like all the other paternal figures, Ouyang Feng does not stay in Yang
Guo’s life for long, and his impact on Yang Guo’s life is limited to early on in the novel.
The heavy emphasis on romantic love in Return is one contributor its wide popularity,
and its differentiation from Legend. The element of ethnicity is mostly limited to the background
in Return, and it does not gain importance until the end of the novel. Return features an atypical
93

romantic relationship that revolves around a teacher and her disciple, a taboo in the martial
grove. Although Xiao Longnu is Yang Guo’s teacher, she is only four years his senior. Yang
Guo and Xiao Longnu’s desire to marry leads to the couple’s persecution by other martial artists
who consider themselves upholders of social mores. Despite not actually spending much time
being physically together, the romantic relationship between Yang Guo and Xiao Longnu is the
major force in the novel. The attention on the couple’s private affairs serves as a strong contrast
to Guo Jing’s characterization as a public figure. Already mentioned above, Guo Jing and his
family eventually die in battle during the fall of Xiangyang, but Yang Guo and Xiao Longnu live
happily ever after in hiding. Yang Guo’s dedication to himself and to his wife leads to their exit
from the world of conflict.
To avoid any overlapping elements in Legend and Return, the characters from Legend are
portrayed very differently in the sequel. Huang Rong changes from the clever and lovable young
girl in Legend to a calculating and scheming middle-aged women in Return. Although there is
rarely any overlapping of plots throughout Jin Yong’s oeuvre, there are types of characters that
appear repeatedly. Hasli from Book is “reincarnated” as Xiao Longnu in Return, both with faces
of a goddess, gracefully clad in white robes, and blissfully naïve. Xiao Longnu’s
simplemindedness is justified because she spent her first eighteen years of life in the Tomb, and
has not been in touch with the outside world. Former Ming Pao editor Margaret Ng 吳靄儀 also
points out that there a few repeated love triangles between elderly minor characters. All of these
love triangles are between one woman and two men. Despite growing into old age, the man who
was passed over still longs for his childhood sweetheart, while the husband remains jealous and
spiteful of his wife’s longtime admirer. The first love triangle is from Book, between Guan
Mingmei 關明梅 (Huo Qingtong’s teacher), her husband Chen Zhengde 陳正德, and her former
94

lover Yuan Shixiao 袁士宵 (Chen Jialuo’s teacher). The second triangle appears in Demi-Gods
and Semi-Devils, between Mr. and Mrs. Tan 譚公譚婆, and Zhao Qiansun 趙錢孫. The last is
from Ode to Gallantry 俠客行, between Shi Xiaocui 史小翠, her husband Bai Zizai 白自在, and
her former lover Ding Busi 丁不四.
131

One aspect that sets Return apart from Jin Yong’s other works is the rape of Xiao
Longnu. She is the only female protagonist who has more than one sexual partner. The virgin
complex is very common in Jin Yong’s works. Other female characters that lose their virginity
before marriage always end up marrying their sexual partner, or pass away before marriage can
occur. Wei Xiaobao’s eldest wife, Su Quan 蘇荃, is already married when she appears in the
novel, but she is still a virgin because her husband can only retain his martial arts skills by
practicing abstinence. However, the rape is not a defining factor of Xiao Longnu’s character, but
of Yang Guo’s. The Quanzhen Daoist priest Yin Zhiping 尹志平 is the rapist. The historical Yin
Ziping (1169-1251) was the sixth generation leader of the Quanzhen School. Professor at Yale-
NUS Petrus Liu claims that there is one version of a television series adaption that does not
include the rape, and treats it as if it does not happen. However, Petrus Liu does not specify
which version omits this important development in the story.
132
In the third version of Jin Yong’s
fiction, Yin Zhiping is no longer the criminal, but a newly created fictional character named
Zhen Zhibing 甄志丙.
Even though Xiao Longnu’s naiveté is underscored throughout Return, she is still aware
of her own status as a “tainted woman” that is no longer suitable for marriage. She explains to

131
Margaret Ng 吳靄儀, Jin Yong’s Female Characters 金庸小說的女子 (Hong Kong: Ming Cheong Publications
明窗出版社), 258-60.
132
Petrus Liu, Stateless Subjects (Ithaca, NY: Cornell East Asia Program, 2011), 190.
95

Yang Guo that, “’this person [Yin Zhiping] has ruined me, even if I recover from my injuries, I
would not be able to remain by your side…After all, it is my horrible fate’” 我的清白已為此人
玷污, 縱然傷癒, 也不能和你長相廝守… 總之, 是我命苦.
133
Yang Guo responds with:
“All this talk about teacher and student and chastity, we will just treat it as nonsense!
They can all piss off! It does not matter if we live or die, because our fates are not
horrible, we are not alone. From now on, you are not my teacher, not my Auntie, you are
my wife!”

什麼師徒名分, 什麼名節清白, 咱們通通當是放屁! 通通滾他媽的蛋! 死也罷, 活也罷,
咱倆誰也沒命苦, 誰也不會孤苦伶仃. 從今而後, 你不是我師父, 不是我姑姑, 是我妻
子!
134

Yang Guo addresses Xiao Longnu as Auntie (gugu 姑姑) since she is very young when she
accepted Yang Guo to be her student. Those Yang Guo has called “teacher” in the past have
treated him poorly. The teacher-disciple relationship is already an obstacle for the Yang couple,
and now Xiao Longnu’s “impurities” are another factor that contributes to others’ objection of
their marriage.
The teacher-disciple union is frowned upon if the teacher is a man and the student is a
woman. When the teacher is a woman and the student is a man, the relationship is not only a
breakdown of social statuses, but also a toppling of gender roles. The Eastern Heretic 東邪
Huang Yaoshi (Huang Rong’s father) is an example of a failed attempt where a male teacher
tries to woo his female student. In the English subtitles of Ashes of Time 東邪西毒, Huang
Yaoshi’s nickname is translated as Malicious East.
135
There is no English equivalent to the
Chinese character xie 邪, but it definitely does not mean malicious when used on its own. Heretic
is the closest in meaning to his nickname, without an overly negative connotation. Huang Yaoshi

133
Jin Yong, Return, Ch. 27, 1281. All translations of Return are my own.
134
Jin Yong, Return, Ch. 28, 1285-6.
135
Ashes of Time 東邪西毒 (Dir. Wong Kar-wai 王家衛, perf. Leslie Cheung 張國榮, Tony Leung Ka-fai 粱家輝,
and Jacky Cheung 張學友, Jet Tone 澤東, 1994).
96

is known for being strange and he refuses to adopt mainstream values; thus he lives far from
civilization on Peach Blossom Island 桃花島. After his wife’s passing, he is accompanied by his
young daughter and his six students.

In Return, Cheng Ying 程英 becomes his seventh and last
student. There is never any explicit explanation of Huang Yaoshi’s feelings for his only female
disciple at the time, Mei Chaofeng. It is only from her flashbacks that hint at the possibility of
Huang Yaoshi’s infatuation with his student. Mei Chaofeng was in love with her eldest sword-
brother, Chen Xuangfeng 陳玄風. The couple knew that if their teacher discovered their secret
relationship, “not only would they lose their lives, but they would suffer immense torture when
being put to death” 情知如被師父發覺, 不但性命不保, 而且死時受刑必極盡慘酷.
136
They
thus decided to elope. As for why both of them would lose their lives for being in love is never
clarified. If Huang Yaoshi, who was already a widower at that time, was indeed in love with his
youthful student, his students’ affair would have enraged him. After Mei Chaofeng and Chen
Xuanfeng escaped, Huang Yaoshi expelled and disabled his remaining students. His anger was
not limited to betrayal from his two disciples. He was also infuriated because he was the jilted
lover. This fury spilled over and impacted the rest of his students. Even as the Eastern Heretic,
Huang Yaoshi never crossed the line to actively pursue his student. Mei Chaofeng’s feelings
towards Huang Yaoshi are also complicated. Despite abandoning her school, Mei Chaofeng is
extremely fearful of Huang Yaoshi, while strongly desiring to be his student again.
Yang Guo is able to cross the invisible boundary between teacher and student only
because he eventually becomes a much more powerful martial artist than Xiao Longnu. As the
more physically powerful one, he becomes her protector, and protector of the Song, rectifying
the previously “incorrect” gender roles. His social status as a great xia is also higher than Xiao

136
Jin Yong, Legend, Ch. 4, 201.
97

Longnu’s status as a minor school leader. Both are incomplete in terms of the body; Yang Guo
no longer has a right arm, and Xiao Longnu lost her virginity. When the next round of Mt. Hua
Discourse of Swords 華山論劍 takes place, Yang Guo replaces his foster father Ouyang Feng as
one of the five most powerful martial artists in the realm, nicknamed Mad West 西狂. Ouyang
Feng’s nickname is Venomous West 西毒, this is also the translation used in Ashes of Time.
Yang Guo's dedication to the Song does not occur until closer to the end of Return, when
he is separated from his wife. Spending sixteen years apart opens up a period of time that Yang
Guo has to himself. This is the first time in his life when he has complete freedom, but it is not
necessarily a time of self-discovery. During these sixteen years, he improves his martial arts
techniques and experiences his own influence through helping the weak. Yang Guo, having
grown up in the streets at a young age, is not a man of virtue or honor. His experiences have
molded him into being both shrewd and rebellious. Having always been the underdog, he is not
kind, but neither does he harbor ill will towards others for no reason. When he takes up the role
of protector of the Han Chinese from the Mongols, it is his benevolence mixed in with the true
understanding of his own supremacy. This psychological change suddenly alters his
understanding of ethnicity. Having never been conscientious of ethnicity, and only
differentiating people into two camps of those who treat him well and those who treat him
poorly, Yang Guo even temporarily works for the Mongol court. His decision to help the weak
and poor is the equivalent to being anti-Mongol only because the Mongols are portrayed as the
source to all suffering.
Yang Guo’s outstanding martial arts skills extricate him from all previous affiliations.
Without scrutiny from the elders, he becomes the master of other people’s fates. He helps those
who are vulnerable and powerless, common people with no connections to the martial grove. He
98

is careful to select the receivers of his assistance. He only helps those who are unaffiliated with
the martial grove, which ensures that Yang Guo’s benevolence would not be rejected. His
marriage to his former teacher never ceases to elicit negative judgement from fellow martial
artists. And with Yang Guo’s ego, he would never stoop to try to help those that would never
appreciate him.
The Great Condor Xia 神雕大俠 is first introduced through hearsay, picked up by Guo
Jing’s youngest daughter, Guo Xiang 郭襄. She provides the reader with a fresh perspective of a
young girl who is both curious and mesmerized by tall tales. The Great Condor Xia is said to be a
masked man with one arm, accompanied by a huge condor. Not only did he rescue the child of a
persecuted Song general, he also saved a woman who was forced to serve a Mongol lord.
137

None of Yang Guo’s acts of chivalry are ever presented in a direct fashion. With the missing arm
and huge condor, there is no mystery as to who this Great Condor Xia is, but after a gap of
sixteen years, the reader learns about Yang Guo as if he is a completely different man, who is
both noble and caring.
The sixteen years of separation is originally Xiao Longnu’s lie, hoping that Yang Guo
would forget about her after such a long time, and continue to live while she gives up her own
life by jumping off a cliff. It turns out that she does not die from this attempted suicide. She
becomes trapped in the valley for sixteen years, living a life of simplicity that is similar to her
days in the Tomb. Beijing University professor Chen Pingyuan 陳平原 points out that cliffs in
wuxia fiction are not necessarily a place of endings (zhongjie 終結), but are turning points

137
Jin Yong, Return, Ch. 33, 1525-46.
99

(zhongduan 中段).
138
Cliffs are indeed important locations in Jin Yong’s works, and they are
significant points in many other characters’ lives as well, including Xiao Feng, Zhang Wuji from
Saber, and Linghu Chong.
After Yang Guo discovers the reason behind his father’s death, he sees the world
differently, and he acknowledges the burden he inherited from his father. His actions can be
considered a form of redemption for Yang Kang. Helping Chinese commoners may not be as
significant as Guo Jing’s defense of Xiangyang. But through navigating the Central Plain, Yang
Guo remains mobile, which is significant in marking his status as an independent who does not
belong to a school anymore. His masked face conceals his identity and a handsome face that has
charmed too many young women. Disengaged from romance and martial arts competitions,
Yang Guo’s psyche is no longer ravaged by desire and wrath. His only companion throughout
the years is a huge male condor, who was also the companion of another legendary martial artist.
The large bird is somewhat skilled in martial arts, and apparently understands human speech and
emotions with ease. The condor acts as a nurse for Yang Guo when he is recuperating from
losing his arm. Later on, the condor tutors Yang Guo in martial arts. The condor is similar to a
sworn-brother, as Yang Guo calls it Elder Brother Condor (diaoxiong 雕兄). Yang Guo is one of
the few male protagonists that does not have any sworn-brothers. The other protagonists that do
not have sworn-brothers are Zhang Wuji and Di Yun 狄雲 from A Deadly Secret 連城訣.
139

Yang Guo has two younger sworn-sisters.
After Yang Guo befriends Guo Xiang, he gives her extravagant birthday presents that
reflect his anti-Mongol agenda. The first gift is simply for delight: a show of fireworks that form

138
Chen Pingyuan 陳平原, The Literati's Chivalric Dreams: Narrative models of Chinese Knight-Errant Literature
千古文人俠客夢 (Beijing: Beijing University Press 北京大學出版社, 2010), 219.
139
Jin Yong, A Deadly Secret 連城訣 (Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998).
100

the characters of “Wishing great happiness and longevity to Second Miss Guo” 恭祝郭二姑娘多
福多壽. The second and third are significant contributions to the defense of Xiangyang: five
sacks of left ears cut off from the Mongol soldiers nearby, and burning down the Mongol camp's
granary that would have fed two hundred thousand soldiers.
140

These gifts are insignificant when compared to Yang Guo's ultimate contribution to the
Song, the assassination of Mongke 蒙哥 Khan (r. 1251-1259). Historically, Mongke died near
modern-day Chongqing 重慶 due to illness, but in Return his death is the result of his encounter
with Yang Guo on the battlefield.
While on horseback, Mongke turned his head and saw that his distance from Yang Guo
was increasing. Feeling reassured, he rode towards the team of soldiers on the west side.
The soldiers cheered loudly and ran up to welcome him. If Mongke unites with his men,
it would not matter how skilled Yang Guo was, he would not be able to hurt the khan.

Yang Guo saw that he was about to fail, and was very dismayed. Suddenly, he thought,
“The spear is long and heavy, so it cannot cover great distances, what if I use pebbles?”
He then picked up two pebbles from the road side and threw them out with the use of qi.
He only heard the sound of “chichi,” and both pebbles had hit Mongke’s horse’s rump.
The horse neighed when pained, and rose up on its hind legs.

Although Mongke was the khan of the largest empire in history, he had been adept on
horseback and skilled with the bow and arrow since childhood. He had accompanied his
grandfather Genghis Khan and his father Tolui on numerous expeditions. During Batu
Khan’s conquest of Western Europe, he had accomplished many meritorious military
tasks. He has spent his whole life on horseback and in between swords and spears. When
he encountered such a sudden change of events, he did not panic, but pulled out an arrow
and set it on his bow. With his legs tightening their grip on the horse, he turns and shoots
the arrow towards Yang Guo.

Yang Guo lowered his head to dodge the arrow, and moved forth rapidly. He had already
picked up a rock the size of a fist with his left hand, and with a “swoosh” he threw it. The
rock hit Mongke’s back. Yang Guo’s strength cannot be underestimated, hence Mongke’s
muscles severed and his bones fractured instantaneously, and fell off the horse. He died
immediately.

蒙哥在馬背上回頭一望, 見將楊過越拋越遠, 心下放寬, 縱馬向西首一個萬人隊馳去.
那萬人隊齊聲發喊, 迎了上來, 只要兩下裡一會合. 楊過本領再高. 也傷不著大汗了.

140
Jing Yong, Return, Ch. 36, 1683-1713.
101

楊過眼見功敗垂成, 好生沮喪, 突然間心念一動: “ 長矛大重難以及遠, 何不用石子?”
拾起兩旁枚石子, 運功擲了出去. 但聽得嗤嗤聲響, 兩粒石子都擊在飛雲騅的臀上. 那
馬吃痛, 一聲長嘶, 前足提起, 人立起來.

蒙哥雖貴為有史以來最大帝國的大汗, 但自幼弓馬嫻熟, 曾跟隨祖父成吉思汗, 父親
拖雷數次出征, 於拔都西征歐洲之役中, 他更建立殊勳, 畢生長於馬背之上, 刀槍之
中, 這時變出非常, 卻並不慌亂, 挽雕弓, 搭長箭, 雙腿緊緊夾住馬腹, 回身向楊過便是
一箭.

楊過低頭避過, 飛步搶上, 左手早已拾了一塊拳頭大小的石塊, 呼的一聲擲出, 正中蒙
哥後心. 楊過這一擲勁力何等剛猛, 蒙哥筋折骨斷, 倒撞下馬, 登時斃命.
141

The Khan's military might is useless when fighting one on one against a Han Chinese martial
artist. This assassination greatly magnifies the role of the individual Chinese martial artist.
Although insignificant to the state, these individuals are able to make huge differences in altering
the landscape of both regimes. Mongke’s sudden death brings a halt to the siege on Xiangyang,
and buys the Song some time.
Guo Jing and his family remain in Xiangyang when Yang Guo retires from the martial
grove after reuniting with Xiao Longnu. They leave behind all their friends, enemies, and
country. Of the Guo family, only Guo Xiang survives the fall of Xiangyang. When she appears
many years later in Saber, she is wandering alone. She later becomes a Buddhist nun and founds
the Emei School 蛾眉派. The Guo family ends with Guo Xiang. As for the Yang family, they
remain in hiding throughout the Mongol conquest, and their descendant makes a brief
appearance at the end of Saber, known only as the Maiden in Yellow 黃衫女子.
Yang Guo's chivalric and patriotic behaviors are only temporary, a pastime to fill the void
after the disappearance of his wife. After their reunion, they permanently depart from the
mundane world. The lives and deaths of Chinese people, which once motivated Yang Guo to
travel great distances and dedicate huge amounts of time, are no longer a concern to either of

141
Jin Yong, Return, Ch. 39, 1865.
102

them. Yang Guo’s ultimate concern is his wife and him, but he remains the Great Condor Xia
because of his temporary efforts to curb the Mongol invasion. One does not have to sacrifice his
life for the sake of others in order to qualify to be a xia, but his abrupt abandonment of his
chivalric activities indicates that there was never sincere dedication to begin with.
Both Yang Kang and Yang Guo are portrayed as selfish individuals, especially in contrast
to the Guo family. Unlike Yang Kang, Yang Guo’s selfishness is limited to his desire to find
happiness through being with Xiao Longnu. Though this is a breach to the martial grove custom
for a teacher and disciple to marry, this relationship is not problematic for the state or for the
Chinese people as a whole. Yet Yang Kang’s desire for wealth and honor endangers the Song
Dynasty. Jin Yong’s form of happy endings is always a couple’s retreat from the affairs of the
rivers and lakes, to live in some unknown place that is untouched by Chinese politics and martial
arts rivalries. The Yang couple’s retirement into the Tomb is no doubt a happy ending, even
though the Tomb is situated in the middle of a war when the novel closes. In Jin Yong’s works, it
is acceptable to be selfish in terms of seeking personal happiness through marriage and
retirement, but it is not acceptable to pursue personal happiness if it jeopardizes the Chinese
regimes.
Towards the end of Return, a few non-Chinese characters are integrated into the Guo
family through marriage. Guo Jing’s eldest daughter, Guo Fu 芙, marries a Khitan named Yelu
Qi 耶律齊. He is the fictional son of Jurchen minister Yelu Chucai 楚材 (1190-1244), the
student of Zhou Botong, and the new Beggar Clan leader. Guo Jing’s eldest student Wu Dunru
武敦儒 marries Yelu Qi’s younger sister, Yan 燕. The younger disciple Wu Xiuwen 修文
marries a Jurchen woman named Wanyan Ping 萍, who is a descendent of the imperial Jurchen
family. The Jin Dynasty had already fallen to the Mongols during Return, and is no longer a
103

threat to the Song. The same explanation can be applied to the Yelus, who are descendants of the
Liao imperial family.
The marriages of the younger generation take place during the elided sixteen years when
Xiao Longnu is missing. There is no description of their courting processes, they simply appear
as married couples. It is briefly mentioned that the two Wu couples have some children, and their
descendants appear in Saber. Yelu Qi and Guo Fu are childless. These younger non-Chinese
characters are all introduced fairly late in the novel, while all along there is a hint that Guo Fu
would marry Yang Guo or one of the Wu brothers. A marriage between Yang Guo and Guo Fu
would once again unite the Guo and Yang families, finally fulfilling the promise between Guo
Xiaotian and Yang Tiexin two generations later. However, Guo Fu and Yang Guo never got
along since childhood, and she is the one who cuts off his right arm. The Wu brothers, who were
infatuated with Guo Fu since the beginning of their discipleship, also seemed like promising
candidates for the maiden from an illustrious family.
The integration of the Khitans and Jurchens into the Guo family reflects that the Khitans
and Jurchens were merged into the long history of China, even though the Mongols are still
antagonized at this point of the story. The Khitans and Jurchens become a part of the effort to
protect Xiangyang, along with the Han Chinese. The incorporation of the non-Chinese does not
take place at the larger level of the state, but only in the lower levels of society. Even when Guo
Jing is the de facto governor of Xiangyang, he never receives any official titles or appointments,
and the Guo family is never elevated from commoner status. Guo Jing’s loyalty to the Song
remains intact through continuously antagonizing the Mongols, while the Song’s past enemies
are considered neutral.

104

Conclusion
Legend and Return are set in the Southern Song Dynasty, when the Chinese regime was
consecutively threatened by the Jurchens and then by the Mongols. It is in this dire situation that
Jin Yong connects chivalry to the importance of loyalty to the Chinese regime. This chivalric-
loyalty is demonstrated by Guo Jing guarding Xiangyang against the Mongols for two decades,
and by Yang Guo’s efforts to curb the Mongol troops and assassinate their leader. Both
characters’ masculinities fall in the middle of the masculinity spectrum, not particularly leaning
to either the wen or the wu end. Their female partners all play significant roles in molding the
men’s psychological growth as the stories progress. Guo Jing and Yang Guo are the last of Jin
Yong’s xia figures in which the Han ethnic identity plays a role in shaping their
characterizations. While both characters’ loyalties are based on their own ethnicity, Jin Yong’s
view of chivalry and ethnicity changed towards the end of his writing career because there was a
change in how the writer perceived his own identity. It is possible to loyal to the Chinese people
when one is non-Chinese and residing outside of China proper. Jin Yong was labeled a traitor
during the Cultural Revolution because he was a not supporter of the PRC. His efforts to assist
the Chinese refugees in Hong Kong at the time was one way to serve the country and the people
without serving the government. It is not essential for chivalry to manifest from within China
proper, it is also possible for it to grow outside and protect the Chinese people from the
periphery.

105

Ch. 3: Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils and The Deer and the Cauldron: Two Different Types of
Masculinities

Introduction
Towards the end of Jin Yong’s writing career, he reconsidered the concept of the xia and
the wuxia genre. In this chapter, I concentrate on Jin Yong’s eighth and eleventh novels, Demi-
Gods and Semi-Devils (hereafter Demi-Gods) and The Deer and the Cauldron (hereafter Deer).
Demi-Gods was originally serialized in Ming Pao between 1963 and 1966. It features a xia figure
who is not Chinese, but Khitan. Deer was also serialized in the same newspaper from 1969 to
1972, and features an anti-xia who has no regard for ethnicity at all.
The two male protagonists exhibit different types of masculinities. One of Demi-Gods’
protagonists, Xiao Feng 蕭峰, is Jin Yong’s closest creation of a wu hero, and the only non-
Chinese xia. The roughness in Xiao Feng’s character is directly related to him being a Khitan.
His dedication to the Chinese Song still qualifies him as a xia, regardless of his non-Chinese
ancestry. However, his romantic relationship with Azhu 阿朱 prevents Xiao Feng from fitting
into the wu masculine model perfectly. Through examining different stages of Xiao Feng’s life, I
show how Azhu impacts Xiao Feng’s established wu masculinity. In contrast, Wei Xiaobao 韋小
寶 from Deer is an outlier in terms of masculinity, and he does not fit into the masculinity
spectrum of wen and wu. Instead, Wei Xiaobao’s masculinity is expressed through his high
regard of friendship and through his lechery. Jin Yong’s last novel mocks the wuxia genre
through the creation of an anti-xia. Wei Xiaobao is a corrupt government official that is illiterate,
but most important of all he barely knows any martial arts. In times of need, he has no shame
using dirty tricks against his enemies. All of these negative traits and vices are critical to Wei
106

Xiaobao’s success as an official, and they help him survive the conflicts of the martial grove.
Despite his lack of education and low birth, Wei Xiaobao becomes a duke during Kangxi’s reign,
marries seven women, and becomes extremely wealthy. These are not all desirable
accomplishments in the martial grove, but they are desired achievements from a modern
perspective.
As Jin Yong’s spent more time away from China, his interpretation of ethnicity and
chivalry became more fluid. Like how Xiao Feng sees himself differently after discovering his
Khitan parentage, Jin Yong also saw himself differently later in life. This change was triggered
by the Cultural Revolution. Attacked and marginalized by the mainstream Chinese media in
Hong Kong and leftists at that time, Jin Yong suddenly became an “outsider” in terms of politics,
cultural and ethnic identity. This marginalization brought about a different perspective in
interpreting the relationship between chivalry and Chinese ethnic identity.
While the xias are still transnational figures, chivalry is no longer limited to being
manifested through the Chinese male body, as exhibited by Xiao Feng. Chivarly can even take
place outside of Chinese territory. Chivalry can also play important roles amongst political
struggles. Jin Yong’s last novel goes further in subverting the wuxia genre as a whole by
questioning the importance of ethnicity and chivalry. Wei Xiaobao’s form of masculinity does
not fit into the spectrum. His obsession with wealth and women better reflects the contemporary
world, or more specifically, the fast paced life and commercialized world of Hong Kong in the
1970s. The value for chivalry and ethnic awareness is portrayed as foolish and impractical. Like
Huo Qingtong, who also does not fit within the masculinity spectrum, Wei Xiaobao is unrelated
to Chinese oriented form of chivarly. Wen and wu characters are always portrayed as upright and
noble, but Wei Xiaobao is flexible and willing to adjust his morals in different situations. While
107

Wei Xiaobao mocks chivalry and ethnicity within the novel, Deer pokes fun of the genre outside
of the novel.

3.1 Demi-Gods’ Xiao Feng and Wu Masculinity
The appearance of over two hundred characters makes Demi-Gods’ structure is
drastically different from Jin Yong’s other works. The title refers to the eight types of nonhuman
guardian deities in Buddhist mythology. Jin Yong originally intented to focus on eight characters
that reflect the characteristics of each guardian deity, but the development of the plot strayed
afar. Instead, the novel features three male protagonists: the young prince of Dali 大理 Duan Yu
段譽, Beggar Clan 丐幫 leader Xiao Feng, and Shaolin Temple monk Xuzhu 虛竹. In this
section, I focus on Xiao Feng only. He is initially introduced as Qiao 喬 Feng. Qiao is the
surname of his foster parents. After discovering that he was adopted, he assumes the surname of
his biological parents, which is used for the rest of the novel. I only use the surname Xiao to
avoid confusion.
Demi-Gods is the only work that includes the contributions of a “ghostwriter.” During the
mid-1960s, it was rumored that Jin Yong was one of the top targets on the Communist hit list for
being critical of leftists in Hong Kong and China. This “unpatriotic” attitude earned him the
nickname Jackal Cha 豺狼庸. When he traveled abroad for safety reasons, it is no secret that Ni
Kuang temporarily took over writing for the newspaper. Instead of being a ghostwriter, Ni
Kuang might be better described as a substitute. Most of Ni Kuang’s Demi-Gods segments have
been omitted by Jin Yong in later revisions, except for one important part regarding one of the
female protagonists, Azi 阿紫. During Ni Kuang’s substitution, he wrote that Azi is blinded from
poison. Azi is the namesake to a fox spirit from a Six Dynasties strange tales (zhiguai 誌怪)
108

story of unknown authorship, in which the fox lures the man into the tomb and transforms him
into a fox. This somewhat resembles Azi's power over You Tanzhi 游坦之, the temporary leader
of the Beggar Clan, who becomes very beastly while being her puppet.
142
Ni Kuang is a
renowned writer as well, having written in various fields from fantasy, sci-fi, wuxia, to film
scripts. He is one of the most important scriptwriters in Chinese cinema from the 1960s through
the 1970s, and he wrote over three hundred films. Many of the Shaw Brothers’ Jin Yong and Gu
Long adaptations were written by Ni Kuang, but the most well-known of his scripts may be
Bruce Lee’s Fist of Fury 精武門.
143

Xiao Feng is the second male protagonist that appears in Demi-Gods, following the
appearance of Duan Yu. Xiao Feng’s characterization is unique in many aspects to Jin Yong’s
novels. The story is typically written in bildungsroman style. The narrator follows the male
characters from their childhood into their youth, then into adulthood, but never into old age. The
reader never sees the protagonists after their middle ages, even though many supporting
characters are able to survive into their eighties and nineties. The protagonists that do not die
young, exit the scene through moving away from China proper, or by retiring from the martial
grove for good. Xiao Feng is the only male character who is already an established martial arts
master when he initially appears. Already in his thirties, Xiao Feng is the leader of the Beggar
Clan. Known together as “North Xiao Feng, South Murong” 北喬峰, 南慕容, Xiao Feng and
Murong Fu 復 are considered to be the two greatest martial arts masters of the Song. Xiao Feng
is also the only xia figure that is not of non-Chinese ancestry and that protects the Chinese state
and people from outside of China proper. Although he takes up an official position in the Liao

142
Daniel Hsieh, Love and Women in Early Chinese Fiction (Chinese University Pres, 2008), 36.
143
Fist of Fury 精武門 (Dir. Lo Wei 羅維, perf. Bruce Lee 李小龍, Golden Harvest 嘉禾, 1972).
109

court, he does not engage in military activities like Guo Jing. He is assigned a powerful position
mainly because of his personal relationship with the Liao emperor. Xiao Feng remains a
figurehead in the post, leaving his subordinates to attend to most of the official duties.
In this section, I examine Xiao Feng’s wu characteristics in relation to the three stages of
his life, and how these characteristics are expressed or suppressed with the presence of his lover,
Azhu 阿朱. The first stage is when he is still the Beggar Clan leader and a respected Han-
Chinese martial artist. The second stage is when he leaves the Beggar Clan. As a Khitan,
searches for his enemies in Azhu’s company. Azhu’s death marks the end of the second stage
and the beginning of the third, where Azi 阿紫 (Azhu’s younger sister) is his companion, and he
relocates to the north in the Jurchen and Khitan territories.
Xiao Feng’s ethnicity and wu masculinity are inseparable elements of his
characterization. Xiao Feng’s physical appearance and behaviors all fall into the wu masculinity
model. The fierce and militant portrayal of the Khitans does not allow for Xiao Feng to exhibit a
gentle appearance. This is greatly contrasted by dashing appearances of the Dali Duan Yu and
the descendant of the Yan 燕 imperial clan, Murong Fu. However, his romantic involvement
with Azhu prevents him from being a complete wu hero. Unlike the misogynistic wu heroes from
Water Margin, Xiao Feng does not consider women or romance to be a polluting element. Since
he is already an established and powerful martial artist, dedication to a woman does not ruin his
skills. Xiao Feng is the only male protagonist who does not acquire new techniques as the story
develops. His departure from the Beggar Clan removes any close brotherly bonds, especially
when he is shunned by others because he is a not a Han Chinese. The time Xiao Feng is able to
spend with Azhu is very brief. It is sandwiched in between his life in the martial grove and being
an official in the Liao Empire. While leading the Beggars, Xiao Feng is surrounded by men only;
110

there are no female members. There is also no mention of him ever having been involved with
other women before Azhu’s appearance. From Madame Ma’s perspective, Xiao Feng does not
even seem to be interested in women at all. After Azhu’s death, he is once again in a position of
power in the Liao, as Lord of the South 南苑大王. He is again surrounded by other men,
including ministers, soldiers, and servants. Despite Azi’s constant presence, he never develops a
romantic interest for her, and he only treats her like a younger sister. Xiao Feng’s wu masculinity
is suppressed in the presence of a lover, but manifests when romantic involvement ceases.

3.1.1 The First Stage of Life: The Beggar Clan Leader
Demi-Gods opens with the Duan Yu’s adventures. Duan Yu’s name is very similar to the
name of Dali Emperor Xianzong 憲宗, Duan Heyu 段和譽, but Jin Yong’s Dali prince is a
fictional character. He is the first male protagonist to appear in the novel, and it is through his
perspective that Xiao Feng

and Xuzhu are introduced. Duan Yu is the epitome of a wen
masculine character. He is young, handsome, and devoted to the Confucian classics and Buddhist
teachings. Although his family is renowned for their martial arts, he refuses to learn any for fear
that he must take part in fights. After his accidental voyage to the Song, he meets the love of his
life. From that point on, most of Duan Yu’s appearances are of him stalking the young maiden.
Although Duan Yu is a very good example of wen masculinity, he does not display much heroic
or xia qualities, and he never dedicates himself to a greater cause. His only devotion is to cater to
his personal desires of being able to see the woman that he loves. Like Yang Guo, this selfish
lifestyle and attitude earns him a happy ending. Despite his importance in the novel, Duan Yu is
a silly character, especially in contrast to Xiao Feng’s solemnity.
111

After the establishment of a wen male character, Xiao Feng’s initial appearance provides
a stark contrast to Duan Yu’s gentleness. He first meets Xiao Feng at an inn in Jiangnan 江南.
Jiangnan literally translates as “south of the river,” meaning they are in the region south of the
Yangtze River.
The huge man who sat on the west end turned his head, and with lightning-speed, he took
quick glances at Duan Yu’s face. Duan Yu saw that the man was of great stature in his
thirties. His grey robe was quite worn and tattered. The man has thick brows and large eyes,
yet while gazing at him, Duan felt his might.
Duan Yu could not help but silently praise the man, “What a great man! He must be a man
of the North, such solemnity. People like him do not exist South of the Yangtze or in Dali.”
Other than a pan of plain beef, a large bowl of soup, and two jugs of wine, there was nothing
else on that man’s table. One can see that even when it came to food and drink, he was very
humble and at ease.
西首座上一條大漢回過頭來, 兩道冷電似的目光霍地在他臉上轉了兩轉.段譽見這人
身材甚是魁偉, 三十來歲年紀, 身穿灰色舊布袍, 已微有破爛, 濃眉大眼, 高鼻闊口, 一
張四方的國字臉, 頗有風霜之色, 顧盼之際, 極有威勢.
段譽心底暗暗喝了聲采: 「好一條大漢! 這定是燕趙北國的悲歌慷慨之士. 不論江南
或是大理, 都不會有這等人物.」
那大漢桌上放著一盤熟牛肉, 一大碗湯, 兩大壺酒, 此外更無別貨.可見他便是吃喝,
也是十分的豪邁自在.
144

Duan Yu is enchanted by Xiao Feng’s aura just by seeing him from afar. In addition to
pointing out the man’s differences from himself, Duan Yu also notices Xiao Feng’s difference
from the locals. The first feature that Duan Yu takes into account is Xiao Feng’s physique.
Northerners are commonly thought of as tall and strong. In contrast, Southern Chinese are
typically assumed to be shorter in stature and physically weak, likely due to the concentration of
the educated elite in the region. Unlike Duan Yu, Xiao Feng is not described as being physically
attractive at all. His facial features are common, his dress is plain, and even his food and drink is

144
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 14, 577. All translations from Demi-Gods are my own.
112

simple. It is his solemnity that commands Duan Yu’s attention from afar, and hence the young
prince desires to befriend this stranger.
Xiao Feng invites Duan Yu to join his table, mistaking him for Murong Fu. Xiao Feng is
in Jiangnan to investigate the death of his second-in-command, Ma Dayuan 馬大元, suspecting
that Murong Fu was the murderer. Although Murong Fu is famous, he is seldom seen in public.
Xiao Feng and Duan Yu then have a drinking contest. Duan Yu, who is not used to consuming
alcohol, cheats by pushing the alcohol out through his pinky with qi 氣. The qi is “a fundamental
concept in traditional Chinese philosophy, medicine, and kungfu. It is the energy, breath, or inner
life-force cultivated by Taoists and kungfu practitioners through meditation and self-
cultivation.”
145
Xiao Feng, however, drinks bowl after bowl, and his face does not even turn red.
The contest comes to an end when Duan Yu presents his half-empty bag of silver, showing proof
that he is too poor to pay for any more wine.
The love of alcohol and high alchohol tolerance are typical traits associated with heroic
wu figures, like Wu Song 武松 from Water Margin. Wu Song is best known for tiger slaying, an
indicator of his superb physical strength. Before slaying the tiger, he has a few bowls of strong
wine. He is tipsy, but not drunk, since he is still able to walk and acknowledge the presence of
the beast.
146
This association with alcohol is related to the wu hero’s robust health and self-
control. The ability to consume a huge amount of alcohol and not become intoxicated shows that
the hero is physically superior to the common man.
147
The love for alcohol, unlike the love for
women, can be overcome and contained within one’s body. On the other hand, the wu heroes
typically consider women a contaminating force that can only be overcome by killing them.

145
Minford, “General Glossary,” in vol. 1, xxviii.
146
Shi, Water Margin, 350-7.
147
Huang, Negotiating Masculinities, 106-7.
113

Perfect examples of such misogynistic attitudes can be seen multiple times in Water Margin. Wu
Song kills his sister-in-law Pan Jinlian 潘金蓮, Song Jiang 宋江 kills his concubine Yan Poxi 閻
婆惜, and Shi Xiu 石秀 kills Yang Xiong’s 楊雄 wife Pan Qiaoyun 潘巧雲. Echoing this trend,
Xiao Feng unintentionally kills Azhu (discussed below). After the drinking contest, Xiao Feng
and Duan Yu join paths, ending the first segment of the novel from Duan Yu’s perspective. Xiao
Feng then becomes the central figure in the next segments, and the story is presented through his
perspective. In the next scene, Duan Yu accompanies Xiao Feng to a Beggar Clan meeting,
where the secret to Xiao Feng’s past and ethnicity is revealed, “justifying” his wu masculinity.
Ma Dayuan’s widow accuses Xiao Feng of murdering of her husband because of his
desire to keep his “true” identity hidden. Madame Ma presents a letter that tells of Xiao Feng’s
background, revealing that he was a foundling, and that his biological parents were Khitans who
were murdered by Chinese martial artists in a surprise attack. He was brought to the Song after
his parents’ death, and he was raised by foster parents who were unaware of the infant’s
background. The men who eventually became Xiao Feng’s teachers had known all along. They
took him under their tutelage to observe his conduct, as a form of compensation for having
deprived Xiao Feng of his true family. His teachers did not expect him to mature into such a
powerful martial artist or to rise to the top of the Beggar Clan. The elders worry that Xiao Feng’s
“barbaric” nature of brutality and violence will one day manifest because he is so powerful both
physically and socially. How could the Beggar Clan accept the leadership of a Khitan when the
Liao Empire is constantly threatening threatening to invade their homeland?
Thomas Barfield argues that steppe empires like the Liao were not interested in taking
over the remnants of the Chinese state when steppe regimes relied heavily on Chinese tribute.
Thomas Barfield also points out that the steppe empires all emerged out of the chaos of the
114

Central Plain, which is exactly how the Xiongnu 匈奴, Xianbei 鮮卑, and Khitans rose to power.

148
Despite the label of being non-Chinese, the Liao were sinicized through the incorporation of
Chinese officials and literature. An educated Khitan is one who knew how to read and write
Chinese. The Khitans did not invent their own written script, which was based on Chinese
characters, until the year 920.
The elders’ mentality is that nature trumps culture, and that ethnicity is grounded in
blood, not culture and education. Because Xiao Feng was born of non-Chinese parents, the elders
assume that he naturally embodies non-Chinese vices. They assume these vices cannot be
overcome with his years of Chinese education and martial arts training, despite the fact that he
was an able leader and respected hero in the past when he “was Chinese.” The elders’ claim Xiao
Feng must embody Khitan people’s blood thirst and destructive nature, just like the Liao soldiers
that raid the northern border. Although Xiao Feng did not know about his natural parents, his
Khitan parentage means he can only be Khitan. In Xiao Feng’s case, it is only a label. He does
not speak or read Khitan, or know anything about the culture. He is as far removed from Khitan
culture as his fellow Beggar brothers are, but that does not allow him to strip himself of this
identity. There is no way to wash away his Khitan blood. Xiao Feng willingly resigns from his
position, and travels to the north in search of the truth regarding his parents’ deaths.

3.1.2 The Second Stage of Life: Wandering with Azhu
The Yanmen Pass 雁門關 borders the Liao Empire, where Xiao Feng encounters Song
soldiers with captured Khitan commoners. Xiao Feng rescues the captives from the Chinese

148
Thomas J. Barfield, The Perilous Frontier: Nomadic Empires and China, 221 BC –AD 1757 (Cambridge, MA:
Blackwell, 1992), 9, 85-9, 104.
115

soldiers. One of the rescued old men has a wolf head tattoo on his chest. The tattoo is almost
identical to the one on Xiao Feng’s chest, confirming his Khitan identity.
149
Tattooing during
imperial China was a form of punishment. Those who have tattoos on their faces or other parts of
the body were lesser criminals. Once they were punished, the government had them tattooed and
released, which permanently categorized them as criminals. W.J.F. Jenner points out that six
leading figures of the one hundred and eight men from Water Margin are tattooed to differentiate
them from the lesser men in the group.
150
Tattoos in this case are not markers of social outcasts,
but of social prestige. Independent scholar Chen Sanping suggests that a major dividing line
between Chinese and non-Chinese societies was their attitudes towards dogs. They were either
cynophobic (afraid of dogs) or cynophilic (likes dogs).
151

Before the revelation of Madame Ma’s letter, there was never any doubt about Xiao
Feng’s ethnic identity. Duan Yu’s observation does not note any noticeable non-Chinese
physical features. Xiao Feng was able to “pass” as a Han Chinese all the way into adulthood
because his appearance does not set him apart from those around him. The tattoos on the old man
and Xiao Feng’s chests are the only proof that Xiao Feng is a Khitan. The tattoo is not on an
obvious part of the body, such as the face or the arm. It is on the chest, which is almost always
concealed by clothing. The clothing used to conceal the tattoo can be modified to cater to
different environments and cultures, but the tattoo is etched in the skin. It serves as a permanent
symbol of Xiao Feng’s Khitan origins. The tattoo itself is also telling of Jin Yong’s portrayal of
the Khitans. While the wolf is a revered animal in Turkish and Mongol cultures, placing the wolf
head tattoo near the heart of Khitan infants closely resembles the Chinese proverb wolf’s heart

149
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 20, 862.
150
W.J.F. Jenner, “A Knife in my Ribs for a Mate: Reflections on another Chinese Tradition” in The Fifty-fourth
George Ernest Morrison Lecture in Ethnology 1993 (Central Printery, Canberra, 1993, 1-52).
151
Chen, Multicultural China, 78-80.
116

and dog’s lungs (langxin goufei 狼心狗肺), which is typically used to describe cold-bloodedness
or ungratefulness. There are other Chinese proverbs that link wolves to negative behaviors,
including wolfish ambition (langzi yexin 狼子野心), wicked people in power (chailang dangdao
豺狼當道), and acting in collusion (langbei wejian 狼狽為奸). Even though the wolf is an
intelligent animal, in Chinese culture it is symbol of negativity. Xiao Feng is not the only
character with a tattoo, Azhu and Azi also have tattoos on their shoulders, which is also an
identifier of parentage and ethnicity.
Xiao Feng encounters Azhu at Yanmen Pass. There is limited background information
provided about her: she is one of Murong Fu’s maidservants, and is a skilled impersonator. Like
Duan Yu, she meets Xiao Feng at the Beggar Clan meeting, and falls in love with him after he
endangers himself in order to save her. Xiao Feng brings her to a doctor, where other martial
artists have laid a trap to capture Xiao Feng. Instead of being delighted that Xiao Feng turns
himself in, the martial artists are fearful. When the battle takes place, Xiao Feng accidentally
kills one of the men. He temporarily loses his rationality, and begins to kill in a frenzy.
After Xiao Feng made the first kill, he moved even faster. His saber danced in his left
hand, making horizontal crosscuts and vertical hacks, while his right hand swiftly
switched from fist to palm. He seemed unstoppable! There were many specks of blood on
the white wall, and the hall filled with bodies. Some had their heads severed, some had
severed limbs. He had already lost track of who he was fighting, and was not able to
refrain from killing his former Beggar brothers. His eyes were bloodshot, and he killed
whoever was in front of him. Even Elder Xi died under Xiao Feng’s saber.
喬峰殺人之後, 更是出手如狂, 單刀飛舞, 右手忽拳忽掌, 左手鋼刀橫砍直劈, 威勢直
不可當, 但見白牆上點點滴滴的濺滿了鮮血, 大廳中倒下了不少屍骸, 有的身首異處,
有的膛破肢斷. 這時他已顧不得對丐幫舊人留情, 更無餘暇分辨對手面目, 紅了眼睛,
逢人便殺. 奚長老竟也死於他的刀下.
152

This is the only episode when Xiao Feng displays his ability to destroy through his
immensely powerful martial arts skills. W.J.F. Jenner points out that it is essential for good

152
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 19, 835.
117

fellow type characters to carry out massacres.
153
Xiao Feng’s massacre is not carried out with
sadistic desires, like those in Water Margin are. It is portrayed as a situation where he loses self-
control when cornered. The killing of others is out of self-protection from unreasonable
accusations. There is no follow-up on exactly how many people Xiao Feng kills. This episode
contributes to Xiao Feng’s notoriety in the Song, and this eruption of violence is interpreted as a
result of his uncontainable barbarian blood, finally manifested through his physical training. The
various sadistic behaviors of the men from Water Margin are presented in an exaggerated and
unrealistic fashion, where the “heroes” kill for sport, and those who die are unworthy because
they are too weak to defend themselves. In Water Margin, killing is an act of valor and an
expression of manliness, but when Xiao Feng kills Chinese martial artists, it is a Khitan
massacring Chinese men. This blood thirst is still an expression of the wu masculinity in Demi-
Gods, but it is exoticized, just like Xiao Feng’s other wu masculinity-related attributes, such as
his physique and strength. Being Khitan is not a psychological or cultural difference, but a
physical difference.
Despite witnessing this bloody episode of Xiao Feng’s violent eruption, Azhu’s love does
not change. She travels north alone to wait for him at Yanmen Pass, confessing her love and
willingness to serve him, whether he is a Han Chinese or a Khitan. Xiao Feng is reluctant to
accept her, and claims that “I am a barbaric brute, I do not deserve your service” 我是個胡人蠻
夷, 怎能用什麼丫鬟.
154
As a non-Chinese, he does not consider himself deserving to own a
Chinese woman servant, especially one who has served in a luxurious household in Jiangnan.
But after rescuing the Khitan commoners, Xiao Feng acknowledges that the Khitan are not the

153
W.J.F. Jenner, “A Knife in My Ribs for a Mate,” 20.
154
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 20, 864.
118

only perpetuators of violence. He then declares, “I am Khitan. From now on, I will not be
ashamed of being Khitan, neither will I be proud of the Song” 我是契丹人, 從今而後, 不再以
契丹人為恥, 也不以大宋為榮.
155
The two then journey together to investigate the deaths of his
parents. Xiao Feng never voices his acceptance of her love, or expresses any delight or
appreciation for her dedication. Azhu merely tags along, serving as his companion and sidekick.
Their first goal is to find out the name of the person who led the attack at Yanman Pass.
Those who know of his identity only refer to him as “The Leader” 帶頭大哥, but refuse to
divulge his name. As Xiao Feng and Azhu travel from one location to another in search of the
people who were part of the ambush, they only arrive to find that these people were killed one
after another. When they finally reach Madame Ma, she claims that it was the Prince of Dali
Duan Zhengchun 段正淳 (Duan Yu’s father) who led the attack.
156
She explains that Duan
Zhengchun was afraid that once the Liao conquers the Song, Dali would soon fall, so he gathered
together a group of martial artists to fend off the Khitan “army.”
Duan Zhengchun was not The Leader. It is Madame Ma’s scheme to turn Xiao Feng
against her former lover. Madame Ma was jilted by the prince twenty years ago, before she
married Ma Dayuan. Xiao Feng, on the other hand, had never been emotionally involved with
Madame Ma, but she felt wronged when he did not pay her any attention at the Flower Festival
two years ago. Xiao Feng does not remember seeing her there, but Madame Ma considered this a
great insult. When Xiao Feng discovers that she had lied to him, he demands an explanation for
her hatred towards him.
Madame Ma snapped, “Who do you think you are? You were just the leader of some stinky
beggars! That day at the festival, I stood beside the yellow Chinese peonies, all the heroes
and good fellows at the festival took a good look at me. If you really had not seen me, it

155
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 220, 865.
156
Duan Zhengchun is the name of Dali Emperor Zhongzong 中宗 (r. 1096-1108).
119

would have been fine, I wouldn’t blame you. But you did see me, but it was as if you didn’t.
You glanced at my face, but it did not stop for a moment, as if I was no different from those
mediocre women. What a hypocrite! You are so shameless!”
Xiao Feng eventually understood a bit, and said, “Oh yes, I remember now. That day, there
were a few women standing beside the Chinese peonies. At that time, I was too busy
drinking, I had no time to look at those whatever flowers, or if there were men or women
standing next to the flowers. If it was an elder heroine, I definitely would have went up to
greet her. But you are my sister-in-law, if I didn’t see you, it was not because I was
disrespectful. Why do you hold such a grudge?’
Madame Ma responded with great hatred, “Do you not have eyes? All those men at the
festival, no matter how great or heroic, they all eyed me from head to toe. Some of the
more respected ones did not dare observe me openly, but stole glances when others were
not looking. Only you, only you… oh! Only you out of the thousand men at the festival did
not look at me at all. Yes, you are the most powerful in the Beggar Clan, and you are a
famous hero. Out of the one thousand men who attended the festival, you were the greatest
of them all, but in terms of women, of course I was the leading figure. But you did not even
look at me! I take great pride in my beauty, but what use is it? Even when those one
thousand men were smitten with me, it did not ease the pain in my heart.”
馬夫人罵道: “ 你是什麼東西? 你不過是一群臭叫化的頭兒, 有什麼神氣了? 那天百花
會中, 我在那黃芍葯旁這麼一站, 會中的英雄好漢, 那一個不向我瞧上一眼. 倘若你當
真沒見到我, 那也罷了, 我也不怪你. 你明明見到我的, 可就是視而不見, 眼光在我臉
上掃過, 居然沒停留片刻, 就當我跟庸脂俗粉沒絲毫分別. 偽君子, 不要臉的無恥之徒.”
蕭峰漸明端倪, 道: “ 是了, 我記起來了, 那日芍葯花旁, 好像確有幾個女子, 那時我只
管顧著喝酒, 沒功夫去瞧什麼牡丹芍葯, 男人女人. 倘若是前輩的女流英俠, 我當然會
上前拜見. 但你是我嫂子, 我沒瞧見你, 又有什麼大不了的失禮?
馬夫人惡狠狠地道: “ 你難道沒生眼珠子麼? 恁他是多出名的英雄好漢, 都要從頭至腳
向我細細打量. 有些德高望重之人, 就算不敢向我正視, 乘旁人不覺, 總還是向我偷偷
的瞧上幾眼. 只有你, 只有你……哼, 百花會中一千多個男人, 就只你自始至終沒瞧我.
你是丐幫的大頭腦, 天下聞名的英雄好漢. 洛陽百花會中, 男子漢以你居首, 女子自然
以我為第一. 你竟不向我好好的瞧上幾眼, 我再自負美貌, 又有什麼用? 那一千多人便
再為我神魂顛倒, 我心裡又怎能舒服?”
157

When Xiao Feng and Azhu seek out Duan Zhengchun, the prince is in the company of
one of his many mistresses, Ruan Xingzhu 阮星竹 and a young girl named Azi. Through the
tattoo on Azi’s shoulder, the Duan couple identity Azi as their younger daughter that was given
away. Ruan Xingzhu had two children out of wedlock, and gave them away before her parents
found out. She tattooed their father’s surname on the children’s shoulders before sending them

157
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 24, 1208.
120

off. Azhu literally translates as scarlet, and Azi translates as violet. The sisters are not introduced
with surnames, unlike Duan Zhengchun’s other illegitimate children. Xiao Feng, Azhu, and Azi
all have tattoos on their bodies as indicators of their non-Han status. The tattoos serve as a
marker of children of non-Chinese fathers that were raised in China proper. Azhu discovers her
own parentage through Azi’s tattoo, which is identical to her own.
She decides to let Xiao Feng take his revenge on Duan Zhengchun, but a fake one. Using
her expertise, Azhu impersonates her father, and schedules the duel with Xiao Feng on a stormy
evening, using the darkness and rain as her cover. It does not take Xiao Feng many strikes before
“Duan Zhengchun” falls to the ground. Before she dies, Azhu reveals to Xiao Feng the reason for
her actions. She hopes that with her own death, she can resolve the feud between the Duan and
the Xiao families. Lastly, she asks Xiao Feng to take care of her younger sister.
As a non-Chinese and as a rough wu character, Xiao Feng only earns the dedication of
non-Chinese women. Azhu and Azi are of Dali ancestry when their father is the prince of Dali.
Whether it is Han Chinese or non-Chinese male characters, Jin Yong’s portrayal of the ideal
male lover is a gentle-man sincerely dedicated to women, which is something that Xiao Feng
does not resemble. Duan Yu is able to marry the Han Chinese woman because of his persistency
and dedication. Zhang Wuji from Saber wins the love of a Persian woman and a Mongol
princess because of his gentleness and kindheartedness. When the man strays from these model
traits, he either has no partner at the end, like Chen Jialuo and Xiao Feng, or he has unions that
are not portrayed as true love, like Wei Xiaobao.

121

3.1.3 The Last Stage of Life: In the North with the Jurchens and Khitans
Azi immediately replaces her sister as Xiao Feng’s female companion, but Xiao Feng
never develops any deep feelings for her. She is constantly present in his life, but the focus of
Xiao Feng’s life is once again in the martial world. This is no longer the martial arts realm of the
Song Chinese, but the rustic and military life beyond the Song’s northern border. After he
accidentally injures Azi, he manages to keep her alive with the use of ginseng. Azi’s health
requires a huge amount of ginseng, which cannot be found easily or cheaply in the Song. He
travels north with his patient to the Changbai Mountain 長白山 area where ginseng grows. He he
struggles in the wilderness because he is unfamiliar with the area and the plant.
Xiao Feng has a change of luck when he meets Wanyan Aguda 完颜阿骨打,
158
the future
founder of the Jurchen Jin 金 Dynasty (1115-1234). Wanyan Aguda takes Xiao Feng and Azi
into his tribe, where Xiao Feng learns the Jurchen and Khitan languages through an interpreter.
With the assistance of the Jurchen leader and his people, Xiao Feng is able to nurse Azi back to
health. Under the care of Wanyan Aguda, Xiao Feng meets the Liao Emperor, Yelu Hongji 耶律
洪基,
159
who later becomes his sworn-brother. Xiao Feng becomes a minister in Yelu Hongji’s
court. Again, he is in a position of power and surrounded by men.
Although Xiao Feng and Azi’s stay with the Jurchens is very brief, it plays an important
role in bridging Xiao Feng with “his own people.” Before the founding of the Jin Dynasty, the
Jurchens were mainly hunter-gatherers. Xiao Feng first meets Wanyan Aguda deep in the
wilderness. There is no mention of women in the Jurchen tribes. The hunters, elders, and even
the interpreters are all men, and the only woman in the tribe is the sickly Azi. All of Xiao Feng’s

158
Jin Taizu 太祖 (r. 1115-1123).
159
Liao Daozong 道宗 (r. 1032-110)1.
122

activities while in the company of the Jurchens and Khitans are male-dominated, and directly
connected to physical strength and military activity. The wu and primitive nature of the “foreign”
lands are a reflection of the stereotypes of the non-Chinese, which Jin Yong builds upon. In the
scene when Wanyan Aguda slays the tiger, his strength is underscored. Wanyan Aguda is
chasing a pair of tigers. They run into Xiao Feng’s camp.
The hunter was very quick, he immediately turned his fork around and struck the tiger with
the handle. The tiger suffered a great pain, and immediately ran off with its tail in between
its legs. The other tiger also turned to run. Xiao Feng saw the hunter’s agility and the
strength of his arms, but he did not seem to know any martial arts. He was only familiar
with the behavior of animals… The hunter raised his fork, with a “pok” sound, he stabbed
it into the tiger’s neck. He then raised the fork. The tiger wailed in pain, then died. The
man nailed the tiger to the floor with his fork. Xiao Feng heard the sound of something
splitting, something being ripped apart. The back of the hunter’s animal skin clothing had
split open from his motions, revealing his bare back muscles, knotted and bulging… quite
majestic. Xiao Feng saw it and could not help but praised the hunter silently, “What a man!”
那獵人身手極快, 倒轉鐵叉, 拍的一聲, 叉柄在猛虎腰間重重打了一下. 那猛虎吃痛大
吼一聲, 挾著尾巴, 掉頭便奔. 另一頭老慮也不再戀戰, 跟著走了. 蕭峰見這獵人身手
矯健, 膂力難強, 但不似會什麼武功, 只是熟知野獸習性… 那獵人側身避開, 鐵叉磺
戮, 噗的一聲, 剌剌入猛虎的頭頸, 雙手往上一抬, 那猛虎慘號一聲中, 翻倒在地. 那人
雙臂使力, 將猛虎牢牢的釘在雪地之中. 但聽得客喇喇一聲一響, 他上身的獸皮衣服
背上裂開一條大縫, 露出光禿禿的背脊, 肌肉虯結, 甚是雄偉. 蕭峰看了暗讚一聲: “ 好
漢子!”
160

Despite not having had any martial arts training, Wanyan Aguda is able to yield great
strength in order to subdue the tiger. The emphasis remains on his animal skin clothing and
upper body. The animal skins, though practical for the cold weather in the Changbai Mountains,
are also a reflection of how primitive the Jurchens are. The animal skins on Wanyan Aguda’s
body are simply “animal skin clothing,” not dyed or fashioned in any specific way. Hok-lam
Chan points out that the Jurchens mainly traded amongst themselves for daily necessities, and
did not have commercial interactions with outsiders until the late tenth to early eleventh

160
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 26, 1099-1100.
123

centuries.
161
There is also no mention of what type of animal skins Wanyan Aguda wears. The
most important factor in these skins is that, despite their toughness, Wanyan Aguda is able to
split them open while killing the tiger. In regards to his upper body, there are his strong arms and
his knotted back muscles, but very little is mentioned about his facial features. The back muscles
are especially significant because they earn Xiao Feng’s admiration. The appreciation of strength
is returned when Xiao Feng tears down the tiger to cook at their camp fire.
[Xiao Feng] tore out both tiger legs, and began to roast them on the camp fire. Wanyan Aguda saw
that he ripped apart the tiger with his bare hands as if he was ripping apart a chicken. He has never
seen anybody with such strong hands. He stared at Xiao Feng’s hands dumbly, then after a while,
he reached out to lightly touch Xiao Feng’s wrists and arms. All the respect he felt was shown on
his face.
撕下兩隻虎腳, 便在火堆上烤了起來. 阿骨打見他空手撕爛虎身, 如撕熟雞, 這等手勁
實是見所未見, 聞所未聞, 呆呆的瞧著他一雙手, 看了半晌, 伸手出掌去輕輕撫摸他手
腕手臂, 滿臉敬仰之色.
162

From the subduing of tigers up to the preparation of tiger meat, Wanyan Aguda and Xiao
Feng both display great admiration for each other’s physical strength and muscular bodies. They
become fast friends over their mutual appreciation for physical prowess. The descriptions of how
both men look at each other are even erotic to a certain extent, although there is never any
mention of emotional or physical desire for each other.
The Jurchens serve as a bridge between the Song and Liao societies. The simple lifestyle
of the Jurchens provides a stark contrast to the “civilized” Song, placing Xiao Feng and Azi into
a realm of wilderness and meeting a group of “uncivilized” people who only hunt and gather for
a living. It is in this “unsophisticated” environment that Xiao Feng encounters other heroic
figures who accept him for his physical strength and sincere friendship, regardless of his ethnic

161
Hok-lam Chan, “Commerce and Trade in Divided China: The Case of Jurchen-Jin versus the Northern and
Southern Song,” in Journal of Asian History 36.2, 2002, 135–83.
162
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 26, 1101.
124

background. This is a stark contrast from Xiao Feng’s life in the Song after his departure from
the Beggar Clan. His strength became a source of fear, and those who were once friends
immediately became enemies. Xiao Feng’s move from the Jurchen tribal setting to the Liao court
is a great change of environment, but he is still surrounded by men.
There was not a clear divide that only Khitan people lived in the Liao and only Han
Chinese lived in the Song. The Liao was a multi-ethnic empire. In addition to Khitans, there
were also a great number of Han’er who served in court. Noble Liao figures of Han ancestry
include minister Han Derang 韓德讓 (941-1011), and Empress Zhen 甄 (? – 951) from the Later
Tang 後唐.
163
Empress Zhen was one of Liao Shizong’s 世宗 (919-951) empresses, and was the
only empress that is not of the Xiao clan. The Liao had allowed for more than one woman to be
empress at the same time while the emperor was still alive. The Yelu men typically took Xiao
wives to ensure that power remains in the hands of only two families. Empress Zhen shared the
position of empress with a Xiao Empress Huaijie 懷節 (? – 951). Daniel Kane points out that so
far, there is no Khitan character found for the surname Xiao.
164

Historians such as Thomas Barfield
165
and Karl Heinrich Menges
166
argue that the Xiaos
were a Uighur clan. Cai Meibiao 蔡美彪 points out that within the Xiao clan, there were actually
two competing branches.
167
Cai Meibiao explains that many banners and clans were grouped
together to form the consort clan that is united under one surname. The Shulu 述律 branch of the

163
Linda Cook Johnson, Women of the Conquest Dynasties: Gender and Identity in Liao and Jin China (Honolulu:
University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2011).
164
Daniel Kane, The Kitan Language and Script (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 5.
165
Barfield, Perilous Frontiers, 169.
166
Karl Heinrich Menges, The Turkic Languages and Peoples: An Introduction to Turkic Studies (Wiesbaden,
Germany: Harrassowitz, 1995, 24).
167
Cai Meibiao 蔡美彪, “Liao Dynasty’s Consort Clan and Three Cases of Empresses and Concubines” 遼代后族
與遼季后妃三案, in Lishi Yanjiu 歷史研究 (vol. 2, 1994, 43-61).
125

Xiao clan is of Uighur descent, which began with the founding emperor Abaoji’s 阿保機
Empress Chunqing 淳欽 (~879-953, also known as dowager Empress Dowager Yingtian 應天).
Empress Dowager Yingtian’s father was of Uighur descent, and her mother was of Khitan
descent. The other line of the Xiaos, the Shenmibali 審密拔里, consisted of the Khitan’s original
eight banners before the founding of the dynasty, and were not of Uighur descent. The two
lineages contested for power throughout the whole dynasty, causing the regime to collapse from
within. The frequent granting of imperial surnames to important officials and military leaders
also brought many “outsiders” into the center of power, and many times these receivers of
imperial surnames were not necessarily of Khitan ancestry.
168
With the surname Xiao, Xiao
Feng’s lineage may be that of the Liao consort clan, but this relation is never clarified. If he is a
descendent of the Shulu Xiaos, the Uighur descent would add another layer of complication to
Xiao Feng’s identity.
As Lord of the South in the Liao, Xiao Feng is housed in luxury and surrounded by
women, but none of these aspects are ever mentioned. In charge of the Han’ersi 漢兒司, Lord of
the South is a civil and martial position that governs of the Liao Empire’s southern territories,
those that were once a part of China proper.
169
These include the Sixteen Prefectures of Yan and
Yun 燕雲十六州 that were handed over to the Liao from the Later Tang (923-936). Contrary to
popular belief, this territory was never fought over.
170
The Song-Liao border was a permeable
boundary, where military and cultural interactions took place. Similar to the way that Song

168
Cai Meibiao, “Liao Dynasty’s Consort Clan and Three Cases of Empresses and Concubines,” 43-61.
169
Denis Twitchett and Klaus-Peter Tietze, “The Liao” in The Cambridge History of China Volume 6: Alien
Regimes and Border States, 907-1368, Eds. Herbert Franke and Denis Twitchett (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2008, 154-214).
170
Standen, Unbounded Loyalty, 7.
126

soldiers took Liao commoners captive at Yanman Pass, Xiao Feng also witnesses his own
subordinates take Chinese captives.
Xiao Feng’s prefers his military responsibilities over the civil aspect.
Xiao Feng rarely cares for the administration, and detests the paperwork and documents,
therefore there is no study in his mansion. Usually, he sits on the floor with his subordinates,
passing around the wine jug and carving the meat as a group, quite similar to his carefree
days in the Beggar Clan. The Khitan soldiers had always behaved this way in their tents in
the past, so when they saw that their lord was such a hearty man, they immediately felt
close to him, and all were cheerful.
蕭峰甚少親理政務, 文物書籍, 更是不喜, 因此王府中也沒什麼書房, 平時便在大廳中
和諸將坐地, 傳酒而飲, 割肉而食, 不失當年與群丐縱飲的豪習. 契丹諸將在大漠氈帳
中本來也是這般, 見大王隨和豪邁, 遇下親厚, 盡皆歡喜.
171

When Yelu Hongji feels that it is time to invade the Song, he calls on Xiao Feng to lead the
invasion. In addition to Xiao Feng’s original position, Yelu Hongji adds on the title of supreme
commander 平南大元帥. Xiao Feng may be a skilled martial artist, but he has never led any
campaigns, and he is completely ignorant regarding military strategies. Xiao Feng refuses to lead
the invasion, which eventually leads to his suicide.

3.1.4 Inability to Overcome the Wu Archetype
Xiao Feng dies at Yanmen Pass by stabbing two arrows into his own chest. Seeing that
Xiao Feng is dead, Azi takes his body and hurls herself down the cliff. Even in death, Xiao Feng
is still caught in between the Song and the Liao. Dying at Yanmen Pass means that he can never
be only one ethnicity. He is wedged between Chinese and Khitan identity, unable to find a space
for someone of his hybrid cultural background. His final home is where his natural mother died,
thus reuniting him with the mother he never knew, and with his motherland.

171
Jin Yong, Demi-Gods, Ch. 49, 2068.
127

On the other hand, his other permanent companion is Azi, the woman that he never loved.
Xiao Feng claims that he does not marry because of his dedication to Azhu, but this may only be
an excuse to not have to be further involved with other women. Even though Azhu is willing to
give up her life for Xiao Feng and her father, there is no sign that Xiao Feng is in love with her.
His promise that they will live a simple farming life far away from the Chinese and Khitan only
reflects his desire to remove himself from the complicated situation of being Chinese and Khitan.
Xiao Feng’s willingness to take care of Azi is partly out of guilt for accidentally killing Azhu,
which also compensates for almost killing Azi. Other than drinking, Xiao Feng simply does not
know how else to bond with others. This deep love of alcohol does not earn him many
meaningful relationships. It is an easy way to make friends without deep ties since the friends of
meat and wine come and go, as can be seen through the quick break of relationships from his
Beggar brothers and other Han Chinese martial artists.
Azhu’s death shows Jin Yong’s inability to overcome the wu hero’s misogynistic
predispositions. The brief romance Xiao Feng experiences cannot trump his martial-oriented
attitudes and lifestyle. A lover’s death adds a touch of sadness to his already miserable life, but it
is also a convenient removal of a roadblock. The couple’s original plan is to live the simple life
outside of China proper, raising livestock and living off the land. Azhu’s death steers Xiao
Feng’s life back into civilization, even though it is no longer Chinese civilization. Without a
lover or a wife, Xiao Feng is able to take up the life of wandering again, drinking, and
associating with men without any hindrance.
When Yelu Hongji urges Xiao Feng to marry Azi, Xiao Feng explains that Azhu is his
only love, and that he does not plan to marry in honor of her memory. However, from Madame
Ma’s description of Xiao Feng during the Flower Festival, he does not take much interest in
128

women at all. He did not take notice of Madame Ma because he was too occupied with drinking
and socializing with other men. When other men are present, they always take the foreground in
Xiao Feng’s perception. He never would have accepted Azhu if he was still in the Beggar Clan.
His displacement from the Beggar brotherhood opens up a niche that Azhu can temporarily fill,
even though their relationship is never consummated. This niche is also possible due to the quest
at the time, an investigation that requires constant mobility and costuming. The couple is only
together when semi-removed from the martial grove and not quite themselves (in costume). They
never appear in a domestic setting. When both are close to a family setting, such as with Duan
Zhengchun and Ruan Xingzhu, Azhu disappears from the scene, showing that the wu hero can
never be domesticated; this form of masculinity can only appear in the public domain. There is
never any mention of continuing the family line, for the Qiao or the Xiao family. His sole
interest in socializing with men removes Xiao Feng from the traditional familial roles and
responsibilities.
When Azi begins to be Xiao Feng’s companion, she becomes Xiao Feng’s redemption.
Even though he wants to care for Azi as promised, he almost kills her. She barely survives the
attack, but her eventual recuperation indicates that Xiao Feng is able to overcome a past mistake.
This accomplishment is only attained because he never falls in love with Azi. He treats her like a
younger sister, but never develops any deep emotional attachment. He quickly offers to return
Azi to her parents after she regains her health. The reason for this lack of romantic development
between Xiao Feng and Azi can be attributed to Azi’s sinister nature. She takes human life
lightly, and when she is granted the title of princess by Yelu Hongji, she tortures Han Chinese
people without mercy, even though her mother is Han Chinese. She is also talented at devising
torturous activities, like melding an iron mask into You Tanzhi’s face, and using him as a subject
129

in her many poison and martial arts experiments. It is difficult for Xiao Feng to develop any
affection for the troubled maiden, and he fails to understand Azi’s affections for him.
Xiao Feng’s lack of romantic understanding is compensated by his magnificent martial
arts skills and desire to protect the Chinese state and people, even though he is a Khitan. He
stands out from other Jin Yong male protagonists by being closest to the wu standards of
masculinity. His non-Chinese background is a major factor in pushing Xiao Feng towards the wu
end of the masculinity spectrum. He is a projection of the author’s imagination of what a Khitan
man must have been like. As a descendant of a strong northern people, Xiao Feng cannot be
portrayed as having the same gentle qualities as a Han Chinese man, whether it is in education or
in emotional sensitivity.

3.2 Deer’s Scoundrel Duke Wei Xiaobao
Wei Xiaobao is a stark contrast to Xiao Feng in many aspects, but the most significant
points are Wei Xiaobao’s indifference towards ethnicity and his obsession with women. Deer is
a lighthearted novel about the adventures of an anti-xia. Deer is often compared to Don Quixote
by Miguel de Cervantes as a parody of an established literary genre.
172
Unlike Jin Yong’s other
novels with a specific historical background, Wei Xiaobao’s role is not located on the peripheries
of the government. He is integrated into playing an active role in court and he has agency in
many historical events. In comparison, characters like Guo Jing, Yang Guo, and Xiao Feng only
play marginal roles in the military and in the court. Wei Xiaobao is an integral member in the
arrest of Oboi 鰲拜 (1610-1669), the signing of the Treaty of Nerchinsk 尼布楚條約 (1689), the

172
Tian Yuying 田毓英, The Spanish Knight and the Chinese Xia 西班牙騎士與中國俠 (New Taipei City: The
Commercial Press 台灣商務印書館, 1983).
130

suppression of Wu Sangui’s 吳三桂 rebellion, and the conquest and governance of Taiwan. He is
constantly assuming different identities during his many adventures and assignments.
Throughout Deer, Wei Xiaobao transforms from the lowly son of an unpopular prostitute to
become a palace eunuch, a general of the imperial palace guards, a Buddhist monk, a division
leader of two different rebel groups, a Russian adviser and earl, and he eventually earns a
dukedom in the Qing. He is able to work for the various rivalling parties because he is not
invested in the struggle between ethnicities and regimes. Wei Xiaobao has no predetermined
ethnic identity and prejudices because he does not have an identifiable biological father. As a
fatherless individual, Wei Xiaobao is free to pursue his own goals without any emotional
burdens. His objectives are limited to materialistic ambitions such as wealth and women.
Wei Xiaobao is not a martial artist when the novel begins, and he does not become one
throughout the story either. The only skill he manages to master is a lightweight (qinggong 輕功)
technique that is lifesaving when he cannot defeat his opponents. Without being permanently
attached to any martial arts schools, the primary relationship in Deer is the friendship between
the young emperor Kangxi and Wei Xiaobao. This friendship between the two unlikely figures
forms during their early teenage years, and develops into a lifelong bond. Despite Wei Xiaobao’s
failure to conform to typical heroic traits, such as being physically strong, educated, honorable,
or kindhearted, he has the trait of valuing friendship. This is his most distinguishing quality, and
it is the cause of conflict between Wei Xiaobao and Kangxi towards the end of the novel.
Having spent his childhood in a brothel, Wei Xiaobao’s understanding of romantic love
and sexual relationships is significantly different from Jin Yong’s other male characters. Part of
his masculinity is not exhibited in wen or wu traits, but through his lechery and lust. In addition
to balancing his life as a triple agent between various powers, Wei Xiaobao’s adventures also
131

include those of chasing after women. As the only male protagonist who marries more than one
woman in the second edition of the novels, Wei Xiaobao’s wives all hail from extremely diverse
backgrounds. Along with Wei Xiaobao’s nine sworn-brothers, and seven wives, Wei Xiaobao is
the axis that connects the various parties that are represented by each brother or wife.

3.2.1 The Political Chameleon
Throughout the novel, Wei Xiaobao assumes many different identities in the court and in
the martial grove, and he plays different roles while representing conflicting parties. With the
development of various events, these groups are not always at odds with each other. For
example, when facing the possibility of a Russian invasion, the rebel group Heaven and Earth
Society sides with the Qing court. Wei Xiaobao navigates the complicated situations with ease
because he is not emotionally attached to any of these parties’ causes, which is a result of his
lack of education and lack of a father.
Wei Xiaobao is the son of a low ranking prostitute Wei Chunhua 春花 (Spring Fragrance
in Minford’s translation) from the Lovely Spring Court 麗春院 (Vernal Delights in Minford’s
translation) of Yangzhou 揚州. Wei is his mother’ surname. Before his interactions with people
outside of Yangzhou, he is simply known as Xiaobao. As the son of a prostitute and unknown
paternity, the question of a surname never comes up early in life. For those who do not know of
Xiaobao from Lovely Spring Court, he must present himself with a full name, in which Xiaobao
automatically adopts his mother’s surname. Wei Xiaobao is one of two male protagonists with
no known biological fathers, with the other being Linghu Chong 令狐沖 from The Proud,
Smiling Wanderer, discussed in Chapter 5. Wei Xiaobao’s ethnicity is never questioned
throughout the novel until the very end. His mother lists the various men she remembers serving
132

near the time she became pregnant. In addition to Han Chinese patrons, there were also Manchu
officials, Mongol officials, a Tibetan monk, and even a Hui, but never any Russians.
173

According to her account, it is not that her child lacks a father, but all these men are potentially
his father. When Wei Xiaobao could be any ethnicity, he is not dictated to be loyal to his father’s
ethnicity, which allows him to be only loyal to himself.
Wei Xiaobao’s contributions to Kangxi’s reign can be roughly categorized into those of
the domestic realm and those of international affairs, despite the overlapping of both as the plot
develops. Wei Xiaobao’s change in fate begins with his departure from Yangzhou and arrival in
Beijing, accidentally entering the palace and assuming the identity of a young eunuch named
Xiao Guizi 小桂子 (Laurel in Minford’s translation). It is not until after Oboi’s arrest that his
identity is “restored” to Wei Xiaobao. Knowing that Wei Xiaobao is not actually a eunuch,
Kangxi keeps Wei Xiaobao nearby by assigning him to be the assistant director of the imperial
guards (yuqian shiwei fu zhongguan 御前侍衛副總管). Wei Xiaobao continues to rise in
officialdom, mainly through the military tract in leading the imperial guards, and later leading an
army. He reaches the highest rank of dukedom by the end of the novel, titled the First Rank Duke
of Mt. Luding 一等鹿鼎公. His title is also the Chinese title of the novel, which literally
translates as the story of the deer and the cauldron. Luding is not only a geographical location,
but deer and cauldron are symbols of imperial power. Deer are like the people of a country,
chased by those who have come to herd them. Cauldrons are icons of emperors; theoretically,
they are the only ones who can own them.
Like Yang Kang and Xiao Feng, Wei Xiaobao also goes through a change of ethnicity.
Kangxi bestows a Plain Yellow Banner membership on Wei Xiaobao, making him a Bannerman.

173
Jin Yong, Deer, Ch. 50, 2120.
133

This change does not bring about an identity crises, but it is taken lightly. This rise in social and
political status does not change all the privileges he has enjoyed thus far, and it is especially
meaningless to a person whose concept of ethnicity is vague. This Banner membership is
bestowed right before Wei Xiaobao’s next assignment, which is to be a Buddhist monk at the
Shaolin Temple. In comparison to becoming a Bannerman, this ordination is the life changing
event.
This is a temporary ordination, in which Wei Xiaobao is the substitute of the emperor in
serving the Buddha, accumulating good karma for the country. As the emperor’s substitute, the
leading abbot does not take Wei Xiaobao under his tutelage. Insteadm the abbot accepts a student
on behalf of his deceased teacher, making Wei Xiaobao one of the highest ranking monks in the
Temple. The stay at Shaolin is short, and he is later transferred to lead the Qingliang Temple 清
涼寺. The real purpose behind Wei Xiaobao’s peculiar mission is actually to protect the former
emperor, Shunzhi 順治, who is not dead, but a Buddhist monk in a temple on Mt. Wutai 五台山.
It is more convenient for another monk to protect the former emperor than for a general of the
imperial guards. Shunzhi’s ordination is exposed through the fake Empress Dowager’s
investigation. She is a member of the Divine Dragon Sect (Mystic Dragon in Minford’s
translation), which is an ally of Wu Sangui, Mongols, Tibetans, and Russians (discussed below).
When the secret is passed onto the other parties, Tibetan lamas come for the former emperor,
attempting to blackmail Kangxi by taking his father hostage.
The Shaolin Temple occupies a high status in Jin Yong’s fictive realm, typically playing
leadership roles in the martial grove. The Temple’s importance can be seen in different novels,
including Demi-Gods and Proud. Unlike the previous novels, the focus of Deer is not on how the
court and martial grove are intricately connected and inseparable. The brief appearance of Wei
134

Xiaobao in the renowned Temple relocates him outside of the palace and Beijing, placing him
into the middle of the martial grove. Kangxi’s inclusion of the Shaolin Temple into the struggle
between states shows that when the most established martial arts school is not immune from the
state’s affairs, no other schools can be either. Wei Xiaobao’s mission at the Temple is his first
time being outside of the palace and capital since his departure from Yangzhou. His first formal
roaming of the rivers and lakes does not end in performing any chivalric deeds. Instead, Wei
Xiaobao becomes obsessed with pursuing a woman, and becomes the student of another teacher.
Wei Xiaobao has a number of teachers throughout the novel. Some are formal and others
informal. Chen Jinnan 陳近南 is one of his formal teachers. The other is the Buddhist nun Jiunan
九難, who was Princess Changping 長平 of the Ming, daughter for the last Ming emperor
Chongzheng 崇禎. Both teachers serve as temporary father and mother figures while Wei
Xiaobao is roaming different parts of the land. With Wei Chunhua still alive, but far off in
Yangzhou, Jiunan only serves as a semi-mother figure. As a Buddhist nun, she is removed from
the familial context and stripped of her femininity. Jiunan is not motherly to her students. She
also does not attempt to guide them in life. She is only an empty figure of authority with no real
contributions to her students’ lives. Her most important function within the novel is that she is
the teacher of both Wei Xiaobao and one of his future wives named A’ke 阿珂 (Ah Kor in
Minford’s translation, also known as Green because she likes to wear green dresses). Jiunan’s
lasting impact on Wei Xiaobao is very minimal, which is a huge contrast when compared to the
significance of Chen Jinnan.
In contrast to the minimal role of female elders in Wei Xiaobao’s life, the role of the
father figure weighs more heavily. Chen Jinnan is the only figure that most closely resembles a
father figure to Wei Xiaobao. Chen Jinnan is the helmsman of the Heaven and Earth Society. In
135

Deer, Chen Jinnan is the alias of Chen Yonghua 陳永華 (1634-1680), one of Zheng Chenggong
鄭成功 (1624-1662) and Zheng Jing’s 鄭經 (1642-1681) confidantes while ruling Taiwan. Chen
Jinnan is a grand figure in the novel, with a proverb attached to his name: “Those who do not
know Chen Jinnan, even if they are called heroes it is meaningless” 平生不識陳近南, 就稱英雄
也枉然. The aura surrounding Chen Jinnan is larger than life, mainly attributed to his
contributions towards rebelling against the Qing and restoring the Ming 反清復明. The only
reason Chen Jinnan takes Wei Xiaobao under his wing is to appease the Green Wood Lodge 青
木堂 (Minford’s translation) of the Heaven and Earth Society. Because Oboi caused the death of
the previous Green Wood leader, the members of the Hall agreed that whoever kills Oboi will
assume the role of the Incense Leader (xiangzhu 香主). When a nonmember kills Oboi, the Hall
members have a dilemma. Chen Jinnan thus offers to take Wei Xiaobao as his student, inducting
him into the Society. With Wei Xiaobao’s status and connections in court, he will serve as a
good spy.
The fatherly void is filled in only in spirit, since the teacher and student’s meetings are
always brief. Unlike the other father figures that have great emotional and political influence on
the male protagonists, Chen Jinnan’s physical absence leads to a disconnection between the him
and his student, in which the father’s morals and prejudices are not imposed onto the disciple.
Chen Jinnan’s teachings are limited to handing his student a manual on how to cultivate qi. Wei
Xiaobao is free from Chen Jinnan’s political influences, but the emotional bond still exists.
When Chen Jinnan is killed, Wei Xiabao painfully acknowledges that he “is a fatherless wild
child after all” 原來自己終究是個沒父親的野孩子.
174

174
Jin Yong, Deer, Ch. 44, 1864.
136

The relationship between Wei Xiaobao and Chen Jinnan does not end with the teacher’s
death. After all the other identities peel away, Wei Xiaobao is left with two positions: a Qing
official, and an unofficial leader of the Society as the late Helmsman’s only living disciple.
Kangxi does not persecute Wei Xiaobao due to their friendship, but he forces Wei Xiaobao to
help destroy the last of the Society’s members. When Wei Xiaobao refuses, his decision results
in a decade long self-exile on a remote island. After the navy discovers his whereabouts, Wei
Xiaobao and his family are “protected” by troops while on the island. The standoff between the
emperor and Wei Xiaobao only ends when Kangxi calls his friend back to capital, attempting to
corner him into eliminating the Society members again. Wei Xiaobao then leaves for good,
retiring with his family somewhere in Yunnan. Wei Xiaobao is accustomed to the luxury and
liveliness of his complicated life, but because of his deep emotional attachments for both the
emperor and for the Society’s brothers, he subjects himself to self-exile on a remote island that
barely contains the basic necessities. While he has his family on the island, he is lacking in
friends and entertainment.
The other rebel group Wei Xiaobao is a part of is the Divine Dragon Sect 神龍教. Like
his induction into the Heaven and Earth Society, he enters the Sect by accident, but he is
bounded to it temporarily by poison. Wei Xiaobao is the one of the five Dragon Envoys of the
Sect, leading the White Dragon branch 白龍門. The Divine Dragon Sect is very similar to the
Sun Moon Sect in The Proud, Smiling Wanderer in desiring to conquer the world. This Sect is
based on a remote island in the northeast, and its only connections to the mainland martial grove
is through sending out scouts. The fake Empress Dowager is one of their scouts. The scouts are
controlled through the use of poison, in which they are bestowed an annual antidote if they
perform well. The difference between the two sects is that the Sun Moon Sect remains a power
137

within the martial grove only, but the Divine Dragon Sect attempts to take over a part of China
by partnering up with Wu Sangui, the Mongols, the Tibetans, and the Russians. Also like the Sun
Moon Sect leader, the Divine Dragon Sect leader is a parody of Mao Zedong and the Cultural
Revolution.
Wei Xiaobao has a friendship with the Society brothers, he is not emotionally invested in
the Divine Dragon Sect. Wei Xiaobao does not have strong feelings for the causes of the court or
the Society. He does not relish the possibility of being ruled over by Wu Sangui and his Russian
partners. Wei Xiaobao’s knowledge of the Divine Dragon headquarters and the Sect’s political
connections becomes his strongest weapon in rooting out the Dragon influence in the palace to
rescue the real Empress Dowager, and in destroying the Sect by blasting the island with canons.
Wei Xiaobao is responsible for breaking up the other powers in this alliance as well. He
becomes sworn-brothers with the Mongol Prince Galdan 噶爾丹 and the Tibetan lama Desi
Sangye Gyatso 桑結嘉錯, successfully bringing over both powers to side with Kangxi. The
emperor rewards both by recognizing them as the regent and as leaders of Tibet and of the
Dzungar 準噶爾 Mongols. When Wei Xiaobao accidentally ends up in Russia, he encounters the
Russian Princess Sofia Alekseyevna, who is in Albazino (Yakesa 雅克薩 in Chinese) to meet
with her lover. Wei Xiaobao conveniently becomes the princess’s lover, advising her on how to
gain power in the Russian court. He applies the model of Chinese and Manchu imperial regents
to the Russians, urging Princess Sofia to fight her way back to the capital and to become the de
facto ruler of Russia through overseeing her two younger brothers, Ivan V and Peter I (Peter the
Great). When his plans for Princess Sofia succeed, she allies with Kangxi through the persuasion
of Russian earl Wei Xiaobao, causing Wu Sangui to lose the last of his foreign partners. Jin
Yong continues to portray his male protagonists as transnational figures, even though Wei
138

Xiaobao is not a hero or a xia. Wei Xiaobao singlehandedly undoes Wu Sangui’s alliance
through different forms of negotiation. In addition to shaping the Qing’s internal affairs, Wei
Xiaobao is also the key figure in re-forming of the Russian center of political power, and the
most important figure in the Qing-Russian negotiations, successfully bringing about the first
treaty between the two empires, the Treaty of Nerchinsk.

3.2.2 Sworn-brothers and Wives
Wei Xiaobao’s masculinity does not fit in with the wen or wu models described above,
but is expressed in a very different way, through his view of friendship and through his lechery.
The importance of friendship in Wei Xiaobao’s life is a direct influence from his of obsession
with the storytellers’ tales of heroes, ranging from the three brothers of The Romance of the
Three Kingdoms to The Legend of the Ming Dynasty Heroes 大明英烈傳. In contrast, his
attitude towards women stems directly from his personal experiences of growing up in a brothel.
Wei Xiaobao is Jin Yong’s only main character that has nine sworn-brothers, and more than one
wife. This great amount of brothers mostly mocks the ease in forming such relationships. The
seven wives of Wei Xiaobao are also not all marriages of love, but lust. Due to the number of
brothers and wives Wei Xiaobao “collects” throughout his adventures, almost all of these
characters are representative of a certain party of power within the novel, contrasted through the
male and female versions as a brother and a wife. The male protagonist is the axis that connects
the Chinese characters with their foreign neighbors. This can also be applied to Deer, but not all
of the represented parties are foreign. A majority of these brothers are actually Han Chinese.
While there are many good translations to the term yi 義, such as righteousness and
justice, there is no English equivalent for the term yiqi 義氣. This can be roughly translated as
139

brotherly bond or affection, which I translate as friendship. This is typically applied to the
relationships between men that are on public display, limiting these bonds within the public
domain. Wei Xiaobao treats some of his sworn-brothers with sincerity. He also has high regard
for other male friends that are not his sworn-brothers. For example, Mao Shiba 茅十八
(Whiskers in Minford’s translation), the friend who delivers Wei Xiaobao from Yangzhou to
Beijing, is not a sworn-brother. When forced to execute Mao Shiba towards the end of the novel,
Wei Xiaobao comes up with a plan to save his life. The friendship bond is extended to the whole
of the Heaven and Earth Society, as can be seen through Wei Xiaobao’s self-exile in order to
avoid having to execute Kangxi’s orders. As an anti-xia, Wei Xiaobao has no shame in stealing,
lying, killing, and raping. However, his high regard of friendship is his most honorable quality.
This redeeming quality is only limited to the public realm of male relationships, as he barely
treats women with respect, even his own mother.
The typical oath when swearing to become brothers is usually that although they were not
born on the same day, they wish to die on the same year, same month, and same day 不願同年同
月同日生, 但願同年同月同日死. None of Jin Yong’s groups of sworn brothers ever completely
fulfill their promises. Duan Yu and Xuzhu do not commit suicide after Xiao Feng dies, and Wei
Xiaobao does not either when some of his sworn-brothers pass away. Of Wei Xiaobao’s nine
brotherhoods, some are formed casually, some are out of genuine affection, and some are along
the lines of profit. In addition to Galdan and Sangye Gyatso, his other sworn brothers include
Songgotu 索額圖, Yang Yizhi 楊溢之, Hu Yizhi 胡逸之, Zhang Yong 張勇, Sun Sike 孫思克,
Wang Jinbao 王進寶, and Zhao Liangdong 趙良棟. A majority of these men are actual historical
figures, and many of them played important roles during Kangxi’s reign. With so many sworn-
brothers, there is no particular focus on Wei Xiaobao’s relationship with any one of them.
140

Wei Xiaobao’s first brother, also the one who appears most often, is Songgotu, an iconic
minister during Kangxi’s reign. The sworn-brotherhood with Songgotu marks the beginning of
Wei Xiaobao’s career as an official, which takes place soon after the arrest of Oboi. To
Songgotu, Wei Xiaobao is easy to prey on. His original intentions are to take advantage of the
young man’s relationship with the emperor, hoping that if he is close with the emperor’s favorite
servant, he will gain in wealth and political power, thus coming up with the idea of becoming
sworn-brothers to keep Wei Xiaobao firmly in his grip. When reciting the oath to become sworn
brothers with Songgotu,
Trinket was thinking to himself: “You’re a lot older than me -- so why should I
want to die on the same day of the same month of the same year as you!”

But then he managed to think his way round it: “Why, I’m not really Trinket
Laurel anyway I can just say it, and it won’t really mean a thing!

So he knocked his head on the ground in front of the Buddha and spoke out loud
and clear: “Your disciple Trinket Laurel, who has for all these years been waiting
on the Emperor in the humble role of eunuch, and whom people call Little
Laurie, wishes to be tied in a bond of friendship and brotherhood with His
Excellency Songgotu, to share with him blessing and hardship. We may not have
been born on the same day of the same month of the same year, but we wish to
die on the same day of the same month of the same month, but I pray word, that
we may die on the same day of the same month of the same month…If little
Laurel does not fulfill this obligation with honour, may little Laurel be struck
dead by Heaven and destroyed by Earth, may little Laurel be sent down to the
deepest pit of Hell and never be reborn for ten thousand years.”
175

Although Wei Xiaobao swears on the real Xiao Guizi’s name, he is still wary of dying at the
same time with Songgatu, thus mumbles his oath to make it that they will die on the same day of
the same month, but not the same year. Both elder and younger brothers are insincere in different
ways, but they do not consider it problematic to enter into such a relationship halfheartedly.
As for some other brothers, it is Wei Xiaobao’s turn to prey on others. Already
mentioned above, the brotherhood with Galdan and Sangye Gyatso closely resembles political

175
Minford, Deer, 220.
141

alliances through marriage more than actual friendship. The brotherhood formed with Zhang
Yong, Sun Sike, Wang Jinbao, and Zhao Liangdong are also along the lines of political gain.
Zhang Yong, Sun Sike, and Wang Jinbao are generals from Yunnan, and thus suspected of siding
with Wu Sangui when he rebels. In order to dispel Zhao Liangdong’s distrust of the three
Yunnan generals, Wei Xiaobao offers to all become sworn-brothers, uniting the three suspects
with Zhao Liangdong and himself.
Wei Xiaobao’s fondness for Yang Yizhi and Hu Yizhi are sincere, but these two brothers
appear only briefly. Yang Yizhi is a guard under Wu Sangui, and soon dies. Hu Yizhi was once a
famed swordsman known for his physical attractiveness, but in order to stay near the love of his
life, he ruined his own complexion and became a servant at a temple. Hu Yizhi’s obsession with
Chen Yuanyuan 陳圓圓 mirrors Wei Xiaobao’s infatuation with A’ke. The two thus swear
brotherhood based on their similar dedication to women, who happen to be mother and daughter.
Already mentioned above, Wei Xiaobao is Jin Yong’s only male protagonist who ends up
marrying more than one woman in the second edition of the novels. Having grown up in a place
where sex can be bought and women are not respected, Wei Xiaobao sees women as prey to be
conquered. He has no comprehension of romantic love, only lust. The seven women he marries
are of different backgrounds, but they are all of Han Chinese ancestry. A majority of his wives
choose to marry Wei Xiaobao only because they have no better alternative. For example, two of
the seven wives willingly marry Wei Xiaobao after he rapes them and they become pregnant.
Princess Jianning 建寧 is significantly different from the other six wives because she is
the only wife who actively pursues Wei Xiaobao, while all the other six are the ones pursued by
him. When the princess is pregnant, Wei Xiaobao is forced to take her along when he escapes the
capital. Princess Jianning is the emperor’s younger sister, but she is actually the daughter of the
142

fake Empress Dowager and her lover, who is also of the Divine Dragon Sect. Princess Jianning
thus represents both the Qing court and the Divine Dragon Sect, with a limited relationship with
Wu Sangui’s household. Princess Jianning’s first marriage is to Wu Sangui’s eldest son, who she
castrates before marriage so she would not have to consummate the relationship. Her agency
within the romantic relationship is both unusual and refreshing for Jin Yong’s female
protagonists. Her pursuit of Wei Xiaobao is not limited to demure charm, but is outright sexual
seduction. Her strong desires are accompanied with masochism. They are only satisfied by Wei
Xiaobao, who is not afraid of physically hurting her. The princess’s aggressiveness in pursuing
her love interest mirrors Wei Xiaobao’s aggressiveness in pursing A’ke 阿珂 (discussed below),
except her sexual desire is contained safely within the palace, while Wei Xiaobao’s sexuality is
not. Wei Xiaobao only considers Princess Jianning a temporary sexual partner, and prefers to
chase after women who are meek.
The two other wives that play prominent roles in Deer are Shuang’er 雙兒 (Doublet in
Minford’s translation) and A’ke. Shuang’er is a gift from the Zhuang 莊 widows, women who
were rescued by Jiunnan after the literary inquisition of the Zhuang Tinglong 莊廷鑨 Case
(1661-1663), also known as the Ming History Case 明史案. The maidservant is a present to
thank Wei Xiaobao for killing Oboi, who was in charge of the inquisition. Shuang’er is skilled in
martial arts, thus she also serves as Wei Xiaobao’s bodyguard. She accompanies Wei Xiaobao to
most of his adventures, and is the keeper to many of his secrets. However, she has no agency
throughout the novel. Since only women and children were rescued from the Ming History Case
catastrophe, these women do not seek revenge against the Qing court. They peacefully live in
hiding, and their hidden lifestyle is reflected in Shuang’er’s role in Wei Xiaobao’s life. She is
always in the background, assuming the role of the obedient maidservant, later wife, who follows
143

the man around. Despite her limited importance, Wei Xiaobao does acknowledge that of all the
women he is involved with, only Shuang’er truly cares about him. This is the closest
understanding of romantic love for Wei Xiaobao.
The other wife, A’ke has a complicated background that represents the fall of the Ming
Dynasty. She is one of the two female students of Princess Changping/Jiunan. The elder disciple
is named A’qi 阿琪, for which no background information is provided. A’qi later marries Prince
Galdan, and does not play any significant part in A’ke or Jiunan’s life. A’ke is also the daughter
of Chen Yuanyuan, Wu Sangui’s concubine. When the Ming Dynasty fell, she was captured and
presented to then Shun 順 (1644) emperor Li Zicheng 李自成. She was then retaken by Wu
Sangui after the Manchus took over. In the novel, Li Zicheng did not die from the fall of Beijing,
but hid as a monk in a temple in Yunnan. The triangular relationship is made up of individuals
who are directly or indirectly responsible for the fall of the Ming. There is no clear explanation
of who A’ke’s father really is, only that she takes after her mother’s great beauty. Jiunan kidnaps
A’ke when she is a child, teaching her martial arts so that she can assassinate her own father in
the future. This subplot closely resembles the story of Nie Yinniang, who is also taken by a nun
at a young age, and trained to become an assassin. The difference is that A’ke has poor martial
arts skills and is not very smart. Her initial love interest is Zheng Keshuang 鄭克塽 from
Taiwan, the grandson of Zheng Chenggong. These leftover men and women of the Ming occupy
a peculiar position in the new dynasty, constantly threatening the legitimacy of the early Qing,
but not being able to make any permanent political difference.
Besides her physical attractiveness, A’ke has no other remarkable features. When Wei
Xiaobao first meets her when he is a monk at Shaolin Temple, it is as if he is struck by an
unknown force.
144

Suddenly, as Trinket approached the girls, he was smitten with a sensation the like of
which he had never experienced before. It was the girl in green. She was quite simply the
most beautiful girl he had ever seen. He stood gazing at her, wide-eyed and open-
mouthed.

“I’d like to marry that girl,” he thought. “I will marry her. Even if it means going though
fire or flood or boiling oil, I’ll have that girl for my wife!”
176

Wei Xiaobao’s extreme infatuation with her beauty mirrors the Ming loyalists’ obsession in
restoring the previous dynasty. The Ming emperors were not particularly virtuous, and the court
was mired in corruption and faction conflicts. The Ming loyalists’ only reasoning for rebelling
against the Qing to restore the Ming is to place a Han Chinese man back on the throne. In
comparison, Wei Xiaobao’s persistence in wooing A’ke is solely because of her loveliness.
Desperate to capture A’ke in order to learn more about her, Wei Xiabao even desires to learn
martial arts from his elderly sword nephew (shizhi 師侄), and becomes the student of Jiunan,
even though he already has a teacher. Wei Xiaobao disregards A’ke’s detestation, continuously
trying to court her or force her into marriage. The desire for a Han Chinese emperor and the
desire to marry a pretty woman is similar in shallowness, but these men lose their reasoning
when chasing after the unattainable. A’ke only marries Wei Xiaobao after she is raped and
pregnant with his child.
The other four wives, Su Quan 蘇荃, Fang Yi 方怡, Mu Jianping 沐劍屏, and Zeng Rou
曾柔 play much smaller roles. Su Quan’s first husband is the Divine Dragon Sect leader, Hong
Antong 洪安通. Despite being married, Hong Antong and Su Quan’s marriage was never
consummated because his martial arts technique requires him to refrain from sexual activities.
There is no background information about Su Quan’s life before she was forced into the
marriage. Su Quan is one of the victims of Wei Xiaobao’s rape, but willingly follows him after

176
Minford, Deer, 354.
145

she is pregnant. Fang Yi and Mu Jianping are sword sisters from the Ming dynasty’s King Mu
household 沐王府 of Yunnan. The Mu family ruled over Yunnan during the Ming, and
contributed to the rebellion against the Qing and the restoration of the Ming. Mu Jianping is a
fictive descendent of Mu Ying 沐英 (1345-1992), the first of the local rulers. The sword sisters
are captured by the Divine Dragon Sect early in the novel, and are part of the younger generation
of members under the command of Su Quan. Zeng Rou is a disciple of the Wangwu 王屋
School, which is later merged with the Heaven and Earth Society.
Wei Xiaobao has sexual relations with four of them prior to marriage. Other than
Princess Jianning, the rapes that impregnate two others takes place in Lovely Spring Court. The
women are either unconscious from poison or immobile from certain pressure points being hit
(dianxue 點穴).
And so one by one, he carried them all in and laid them out on the big bed – even the
Fake-Empress Dowager… Then he thought twice about including Blue Girl [Ahqi] in his
harem: she was, after all, technically speaking his sister-in-law, since Galdan had become
his brother. Even he was bound by a certain code of honour. So he carried her back to the
parlour, and propped her up in a chair. He thought he saw a glimmer of recognition in her
eyes, a hint of approval, even of congratulation for his honourable decision. She looked
so lovely. For a moment he was tempted again, and even began carrying her back. But in
the end, chivalry won the day.
177

Although Wei Xiaobao is moved by A’qi’s beauty, he decides that he would rather be a good
brother to Galdan, and even compares himself with Guan Yu 關羽. Wei Xiaobao’s
understanding of history derives mostly from the storyteller and theatre, thus he likes to compare
himself to the heroes in these stories. This is only one of the many instances when he makes
reference to historical figures, in which Minford omitted the references to Guan Yu and Tang
Bohu 唐伯虎 (1470-1524) in this scene.

177
Minford, Deer, 368.
146

He suddenly thought, “I cannot take advantage of my friend’s wife. Second sister-in-law,
I am a heroic fellow, I have to respect the brotherly bond … My sworn brotherhood with
the lama and the Mongol prince is not out of sincerity, it is only a scheme to keep them
from killing me. Elder brother and second brother is all nonsense. A’qi is such a beautiful
maiden, it would be such a waste to call her my second sister-in-law. Maybe it is best if
she becomes my wife too. In the tale of Three Smiles and Nine Beauties, Tang Bohu has
nine wives, even if I consider A’qi, I only have eight beauties, I am one short…
Compared to Tang Bohu, he can deal with being one beauty short, but being two short, it
is just too much. He then carried A’qi into the room again. After a couple steps, he
suddenly thought, “Guan Yu delivered his imperial sister-in-law for a thousand li, but he
didn’t turn Liu Elder sister-in-law into Guan second sister-in-law. Wei Xiaobao is only
delivering his imperial sister-in-law in seven steps, I really cannot disregard friendship,
even if I am two beauties short now, I will be able to collect them in the future.” He then
immediately turned around, and placed A’qi back on the chair.

忽然想到: “ 朋友妻, 不可欺. 二嫂, 你是我嫂子, 咱們英雄好漢, 可得講義氣… 我跟大
喇嘛和蒙古王子拜把子, 又不是情投意合, 只不過是想個計策, 騙得他們不來殺我. 什
麼大哥, 二哥, 都是隨口瞎說的. 這阿琪姑娘如此美貌, 叫她二嫂, 太過可惜, 不如也做
了我老婆罷. 說書的說三笑姻緣九美圖, 唐伯虎有九個老婆. 我就把阿琪算在其內, 也
不過是八美, 還差了一美.”… 與唐伯虎相比, 少他一美, 還可將就, 連少兩美, 實在太
也差勁, 當下又抱起阿琪, 走向內室. 走了幾步, 忽想: “ 關雲長千里送皇嫂, 可沒將劉
大嫂變成關二嫂. 韋小寶七步送王嫂, 總不能太不講義氣, 少兩美就少兩美罷, 還怕將
來湊不齊?” 於是立即轉身, 又將阿琪放在椅中.
178

There is no explicit description of the rapes, only that he “shook out the quilt and spread
it over the recumbent bodies of the six other young women, kicked off his shoes, and with a little
cry of glee, crept in under the covers. Time passed, the candles burned themselves out, and soon
it was pitch dark in the room.”
179
Wei Xiaobao remembers having sex with three women, but
with only two of them pregnant later on, the third victim is never revealed. There is doubt that he
accidentally included the fake Empress Dowager into his “conquest.”
His brief relationship with Princess Sofia ends in friendship, as former lovers and the two
states they each represent. Of all the women Wei Xiaobao encounters, Princess Sofia is the most
sexually open, and the most politically powerful through his advising. While Wei Chunhua
defensively declares that she would never serve Russian men, Wei Xiaobao is not picky in his

178
Jin Yong, Deer, Ch. 39, 1651.
179
Minford, Deer, 268-9.
147

sexual partners, and Princess Sofia’s hairiness does not discourage him. Despite Princess Sofia’s
power and fondness over Wei Xiaobao, Jin Yong’s portrayal of Russians is very negative. Not
only are they greedy and brutal, but they are also unintelligent. It is her receptiveness to Wei
Xiaobao’s sexual advances that leads her to heed his advice. Wei Xiaobao’s lack of education
and lack of morals is emphasized throughout the novel, but to accept the strategies proposed by
such a mean figure only shows that the Russians are more despicable. When Princess Sofia asks
about Wei Xiaobao’s “wisdom” in staging coups, he simply smiles and said, “’The Chinese have
always been this way’” 中國人, 向來這樣.
180
This simple statement embodies a great deal of
Chinese history, in which violence and bloodshed are integral components in establishing power.
Within this history, the Manchus were not the only ones who committed violence, but so did all
the other rulers in the past.

Conclusion
The Cultural Revolution caused Jin Yong to reconsider his own ethnic identity, which
brought about the drastic changes in his interpretation and portrayal of chivalry and Chinese
ethnic identity in his last few major works. This opened up some new possibilities in developing
the wuxia genre, and at the same time also questioned the solidarity of the Chinese people. Both
Demi-Gods and Deer were written towards the end of Jin Yong’s career, and reformulates the
portrayal of chivalry and the wuxia genre as a whole. Xiao Feng is Jin Yong’s only non-Chinese
xia, and he is also the last xia that is linked to ethnicity in Jin Yong’s body of works. Xiao Feng’s
wu masculinity is directly related to his non-Chinese, Khitan identity. I break down Xiao Feng’s
life into three stages in relation to his form of masculinity. The first is when he is the leader of

180
Jin Yong, Deer, Ch. 36, 1517.
148

the Beggar Clan; the second stage is when he is in a relationship with Azhu; the last is after he
accidentally kills her and moves to the north to live with the Jurchens and Khitans. Xiao Feng’s
life is heavily impacted by his change of ethnicity because it dramatically changes how others
see him, and how he sees himself. Xiao Feng’s desire to protect the Song even when he attained
high social status in the Liao shows that it is possible for chivalry to manifest from a non-
Chinese body, and that chivalry can also exist outside of Chinese territory.
After Demi-Gods, there is no specific historical setting in Ode to Gallantry and Proud,
Smiling Wanderer, thus the male protagonists’ chivalry is unrelated to the issue of ethnicity.
Although Deer is set in the early Qing, Wei Xiaobao is an anti-xia who does not consider
ethnicity an important aspect in life. He is not emotionally burdened by constantly performing
duties for conflicting parties. In contrast to Xiao Feng’s discovery of his Khitan parentage, Wei
Xiaobao never learns of his father throughout the novel. Later, his Manchu Banner membership
also does not impact the course of his life. Wei Xiabao does not fit into the masculinity spectrum
of wen and wu, but is an outlier. His form of masculinity is manifested through his honoring of
male friendship and his lechery. Wei Xiaobao values male friendship greatly, hoping to emulate
the heroes of historical sagas. Yet his treatment of women is very different. He treats women like
property that he can lay claims to, and they cannot break free from his clutches once they are
targeted. This conquest attitude towards women earns Wei Xiaobao seven wives, not only
breaking free from all types of masculine archetypes, but also breaking free from Jin Yong’s
typical portrayal of a male protagonist that is sincere in monogamous romantic relationships.

149

Ch. 4: The Shaw Brothers’ Cinematic Adaptations of Jin Yong

Introduction
There is a long history of martial arts films in Chinese cinema, and Jin Yong’s cinematic
adaptations are a part of this legacy. Film was one of the earliest forms of visual adaptations of
Jin Yong’s works. Because there have not been anymore Jin Yong film adaptations over the last
twenty years, I consider these films a middle stage in the evolution of Jin Yong’s oeuvre, from
novels to their final and most influential format, television series. Most of the Jin Yong films
were produced in Hong Kong, even after the bans on Jin Yong’s works were lifted in Taiwan and
China. The Shaw Brothers serve as a connecting point between the film and television
adaptations, because the film studio and TVB were owned by Run Run Shaw, and they are
located in Hong Kong. The British colony is the birth place of Jin Yong’s fiction, and it is where
his works were first adapted into the most influential forms of media in the thirty years since the
fiction’s initial serialization. While there have not been any more cinematic adaptations of his
novels since 1994, there have been a significant number of Jin Yong films produced from the
late 1950s up until the early-1990s. Only a few of these films attained box office success or
gained cultural influence.
In this chapter, I focus on the Shaw Brothers’ adaptations of Jin Yong’s fiction and the
portrayal of masculinity and ethnicity on screen. I show how the studio erases the chivalric
aspect of the xia characters by limiting the settings to China proper only. Although the films
share the novels’ titles and character names, there is a conceptual gap between the films and the
novels. The films are heavily dependent on the audience’s knowledge of the stories, thus they
present only parts of the novels. These films limit the geographical settings to being in China
150

proper only, which significantly reduces the xia figures’ political and social influences. Without
the foreign elements, the films portray “pure” Chinese heroes that are not cultural hybrids. When
there are no national conflicts anymore, the aspect of chivalry disappears. The male characters
are only skilled Chinese martial artists. The Shaw Brothers’ adaptations of Jin Yong’s films are
only costume pieces that present wu but no xia, and more closely resemble kung fu films.
The films of focus were produced between 1977 and 1984, which is very close to the
studio’s production hiatus between 1985 and 2009. These films are adaptations of some of the
novels discussed in previous chapters, including the The Brave Archer series 射雕英雄傳,
181
The
Brave Archer and His Mate 神雕俠侶,
182
The Emperor and His Brother 書劍恩仇錄,
183
and
Tales of a Eunuch 鹿鼎記.
184
The Brave Archer series, also known as Kung Fu Warlords,
consists of three films that were released in 1977, 1978, and 1981. These three films, along with
The Brave Archer and His Mate, were all directed by Chang Cheh (1923-2002), and all three
starred Alexander Fu 傅聲 (1954-1983). The two other films were directed by Chor Yuen 楚原
and Huashan 華山. Although these films had different directors, they are all similar in their
geographical reductions of the stories’ settings. Because they cover significantly less time and
space than the novels, the films omit numerous characters that are associated with the non-
Chinese as well as locations outside of China proper. The Shaw Brothers’ Jin Yong xia is no

181
The Brave Archer 射鵰英雄傳 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu 傅聲, Tien Niu 恬妞, Shaw Brothers,
1977); The Brave Archer 2 射鵰英雄傳續集 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu, Niuniu 妞妞, Shaw Brothers,
1978); The Brave Archer 3 射鵰英雄傳第三集 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu, Niuniu, Shaw Brothers,
1981).
182
The Brave Archer and His Mate 神雕侠侶 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Alexander Fu, Philip Kwok, Shaw Brothers,
1982).
183
The Emperor and His Brother 書劍恩仇錄 (Dir. Chor Yuen 楚原, perf. Ti Lung 狄龍 and Jason Pai 白彪, Shaw
Brothers, 1981).
184
Tales of a Eunuch 鹿鼎記 (Dir. Huashan 華山, perf. Wang Yu 汪禹, and Gordon Liu 劉家輝, Shaw Brothers,
1983).
151

longer a transnational figure when his activities are restricted in China proper. Without the non-
Chinese to antagonize, the xia figures do not perform any chivalrous deeds. These films were all
filmed in the studio. The various landscapes, ranging from mountains to beaches, are all
portrayed through the use of different props. For example, the arrival to an island is shown
through the characters disembarking from a boat. I first provide a brief background of the Shaw
Brothers, then address the films in chronological order of production.
The Shaw Brothers was one of the most prolific and influential studios in East Asia
during the period of the 1960s to the 1970s. The studio had an extensive network in Southeast
Asia and exportation to numerous countries, so its works had an effect on both Chinese speaking
and foreign audiences. There are few studies on the Shaw Brothers and their films thus far, and
none regarding their Jin Yong adaptations. The Jin Yong adaptations were produced towards the
studio’s decline, when they were already losing their monopoly and popularity to the newer
studios and to the Hong Kong New Wave directors. These films differed greatly in quality, but
they all contribute to the transition state of Jin Yong visual adaptations. The films of focus were
not particularly popular or successful, but they were a part of a larger martial arts trends that
began with Bruce Lee’s rise to fame in the early 1970s. The adaptions of Jin Yong’s fiction
blended in with the numerous martial arts-related films at that time. From the mid-1970s through
the ‘80s, a majority of the Shaw Brothers’ productions were martial arts pieces, either set in
contemporary times or imperial China. The popularity of Jin Yong’s fiction was a major
incentive for adaptations, but the incomplete stories presented in the films greatly reduced their
appeal. Jin Yong’s complicated plots do not make fast paced and action-packed films due to their
heavy emphasis on personal relationships and layered plotlines. In contrast, the Shaw Brothers’
sister company, TVB produced many Jin Yong television adaptations from the late 1970s to the
152

1980s, and a great number of them were aired close to the times when the films were released.
These Jin Yong television series garnered much more popularity than the films.

4.1 The Shaw Brothers and Jin Yong’s Cinematic Adaptations
The Shaw Brothers’ entertainment empire began in Shanghai with Unique Film Company
天一影片, founded in 1925 by the eldest Shaw brother Runje 邵仁傑 (1896-1975, also known as
Zuiweng 醉翁).
185
The Shaw Brothers eventually expanded their business outside of China
proper, first to Southeast Asia, and then to Hong Kong. The branch locations served as a means
to break out of the boycott from their fellow film companies at home in Shanghai. In 1930, Shaw
Brothers Limited was founded in Singapore. The younger brothers Runme 仁枚 (1901-1985) and
Run Run 仁楞 (1907-2014, also known as 逸夫 Yifu) were in charge of distributing films in
Singapore.
186
The huge market for Cantonese films eventually brought Runme to Hong Kong in
1934, where Unique Film Productions Hong Kong Studio was established. Unique Films Hong
Kong was later renamed twice, first to Nanyang 南洋 Studio, and then to Shaw and Sons
Limited.
187
In Hong Kong, Run Run split with his elder brother Runde 仁棣 (1898-1973, also
known as Cunren 邨人) to concentrate on filmmaking in 1958, while Runde remained focused
on the theatre business. Run Run named his company Shaw Brothers.
The Shaw Brothers studio was at the forefront of Chinese cinema from the 1960s to the
70s. It is an important part of the history of Chinese cinema and the history of East Asia cinema.
Many of their productions became classics, and they launched numerous actors into super-

185
Stephanie Chung Po-yin, “The Industrial Evolution of a Fraternal Enterprise: The Shaw Brothers and the Shaw
Organization,” in The Shaw Screen: A Preliminary Study, trans. Teri Chan, ed. Wong Ain-ling (Hong Kong: Hong
Kong Film Archive, 2003, 1-17), 2.
186
Chung, “The Industrial Evolution of a Fraternal Enterprise,” 4.
187
Chung, “The Industrial Evolution of a Fraternal Enterprise,” 5-7.
153

stardom. They were also the studio that housed the most influential martial arts films directors at
the time, including King Hu 胡金銓 (1932-1997), Chang Cheh, and Chor Yuen. The Shaw
Brothers’ network was far-reaching, extending into Southeast Asia and overseas when Mainland
China was shutoff after the Communist takeover in 1949. The studio has been one of the major
powers that shaped the understanding of Chinese culture and identity for local and overseas
Chinese communities, and it continued to do so with television series with the founding of TVB.
Hong Kong’s Emei Film 峨眉影片 was the first studio to adapt Jin Yong’s fiction during
the late 1950s to the mid-60s. There was a resurgence of wuxia films in Cantonese cinema during
the 1960s, and the films often adapted fiction that was first serialized in newspapers.
188
In
addition to Jin Yong’s fiction, Shangguan Hong’s 上官虹 Buddhist Palm 如來神掌, which was
also serialized in Ming Pao, also became popular in cinema.
189
Emei produced Cantonese films
that targeted a local audience. The Shaw Brothers’ films were generally dubbed in Mandarin,
with some dubbed in Cantonese in the 1980s. Emei’s Jin Yong productions include Story of the
Vulture-Conqueror (adaptation of Legend),
190
Sword of Blood and Valour (adaptation of Sword
Stained with Royal Blood),
191
The Story of the Great Heroes (adaptation of Return),
192
The Book

188
Stephen Teo, Chinese Martial Arts Cinema: The Wuxia Tradition (Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press,
2009), 87-90. I obtained all the information regarding Emei Film’s Jin Yong adaptations from the Hong Kong
Movie Database (HKMDB). URL for HKMDB: http://hkmdb.com/db/index.php.
189
Teo, Chinese Martial Arts Cinema, 89.
190
Story of the Vulture-Conqueror 射鵰英雄傳 1 and 2 (Dir. Wu Pang 胡鵬, perf. Walter Tso 曹達華 and Yung
Siu-Yi 容小意, Emei Film, 1958, 1959).
191
Sword of Blood and Valour 碧血劍 1 and 2 (Dir. Lee Sun-Fung 李晨風, perf. Walter Tso and Ng Cho-Fan 吳楚
帆, Emei Film, 1958, 1959).
192
The Story of the Great Heroes 神鵰俠侶 1, 2, 3, and 4 (Dir. Lee Fa 李化, perf. Patrick Tse 謝言 and Nam Hung
南紅, Emei Film, 1960-1961).
154

and the Sword,
193
The Flying Fox in the Snowy Mountains,
194
and Twin Swords.
195
Twin Swords
is an adaptation of Jin Yong’s novelette “Mandarin Duck Blades” 鴛鴦刀.
196
Emei stopped
producing films after 1965, which was also close to the time when another major studio, Motion
Picture and General Investment 國際電影懋業 (MP&GI), ceased production. The Shaw Brothers
eventually filled in the void to become a cinematic giant.
The Shaw Brothers began adapting Jin Yong’s works in the late 1970s, and produced a
total of thirteen Jin Yong films, with some repeats and some sequels to earlier films. They did
not adapt all of Jin Yong’s novels, but a majority of the more popular ones. Their first Jin Yong
film is The Battle Wizard 天龍八部,
197
released in 1977, and the last is The New Tales of the
Flying Fox 新飛狐外傳 from 1984.
198
The Battle Wizard is only distantly connected to Demi-
Gods, and only presents a part of Duan Yu’s story. The New Tales of the Flying Fox is the
second adaptation of Flying Fox by the studio. The first adaptation, Legend of the Fox, was
released in 1980.
199
The New Tales of the Flying Fox was soon followed by the television version
in 1985.
200

193
The Book and the Sword 書劍恩仇錄 1 and 2 (Dir. Lee Sun-Fung, perf. Cheung Ying 張瑛 and Tsi Law-Lin 紫
羅蓮, Emei Film, 1690).
194
The Flying Fox in the Snowy Mountains 雪山飛狐 1 and 2 (Dir. Lee Fa, perf. Kong Hon 江漢 and Pearl Au 歐嘉
慧, Emei Film, 1960).
195
Twin Swords 鴛鴦刀 (Dir. Lee Fa, perf. Lam Fung 林鳳 and Chow Chung 周驄, Emei Film, 1961).
196
Jin Yong, “Mandarin Duck Blades” 鴛鴦刀 (Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1987).
197
The Battle Wizard 天龍八部 (Dir. Pao Hsueh-li 鮑學禮, perf. Danny Lee 李修賢, Tanny Tien Ni 恬妮, Lin
Chen-chi 林珍奇, Shaw Brothers, 1977).
198
The New Tales of the Flying Fox 新飛狐外傳 (Dir. Liu Shih-yu 劉仕裕, perf. Kara Hui Ying-hung 惠英紅, Alex
Man 萬梓良, and Felix Wong 黃日華, Shaw Brothers, 1984).
199
Legend of the Fox 飛狐外傳 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Chin Siu-ho 錢小豪 and Philip Kwok (Shaw Brothers,
1980).
200
The Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain 雪山飛狐 (Prod. Wong Tin-lam 王天林, perf. Ray Lui 呂良偉 and Patrick
Tse (TVB, 1985).
155

Run Run Shaw was also the owner of Hong Kong’s first free-to-air television, Television
Broadcast (TVB) 無線電視, founded in 1976. The Shaw family sold TVB in 2011. TVB began
adapting Jin Yong’s novels in 1978, and continued to do so into the early 2000s. Many of the
Shaw Brother’s Jin Yong films and TVB’s television versions overlapped. These series became
star vehicles for a huge number of local actors, many of whom are still very popular today. On
the other hand, the Shaw Brothers’ versions of Jin Yong’s works are rarely mentioned, even in
the local media. While the TVB adaptations successfully entered the collective memory of the
Hong Kong people, the Shaw Brothers Jin Yong films were left out.
The Shaw Brothers’ adaptations are not all loyal representations. Some of the stories are
broken up into multiple films, like the Brave Archer series. To simplify the films, there are
omissions of characters and some major plotlines, especially those that take place outside of
China proper. The elimination of foreign lands in the films immediately downsizes the scope of
the stories, and removes the most important factor that contributes to Jin Yong’s xia, the non-
Chinese. The xia figure of the Shaw Brothers’ Jin Yong adaptations is no longer Chinese heroes
that emerge from a victimized state, but simply men who are skilled in martial arts. In Wei
Xiaobao’s case, he never enters the martial grove or gets involved in politics.

4.2 Chang Cheh’s The Brave Archer Series
Chang Cheh was active from the 1960s to the 1980s. Along with King Hu, both directors
were the leading figures of the martial arts genre. Their influence can still be seen through the
works of their disciples. Other than his limited involvement in the Swordsman trilogy in the early
1990s, King Hu did not make other Jin Yong adaptations. Chang Cheh made a few Jin Yong film
adaptations, but they are not his most well-known works. In addition to the Brave Archers and
156

The Brave Archer and His Mate, Chang Cheh also directed Legend of the Fox, Sword Stained
with Royal Blood,
201
and Ode to Gallantry.
202
The novels Chang Cheh adapted are very different
from his landmark works, such as the One-Armed Swordsman 獨臂刀
203
and Vengeance! 報
仇.
204
Chang Cheh is famous for his staunch masculine (yanggang 陽剛) films that generally
feature strong and youthful male characters in violent settings, where the bare-to-the-waist
heroes fight until they die. Stephen Teo points out that Liu Chia-Liang’s 劉家良 (also romanized
as Lau Kar-Leong) films were significantly influenced by Cheng Cheh’s heroes that die standing
up, which Teo calls upright death.
205
Staunch masculinity was Chang Cheh’s response to the
dominance of female xias featured in martial arts cinema at the time.
206
Although Jin Yong’s
works primarily focus on the male characters, his portrayals are very different from Chang
Cheh’s staunch masculine protagonists.
In this section of the chapter, my focus is on Chang Cheh’s cinematic portrayal of the xia
figure in The Brave Archer (hereafter Archer) series through his management of gender and
ethnicity elements. Unlike Legend, the Archer series is not a bildungsroman. The three films
only cover Guo Jing’s adult life in the Chinese martial grove. His childhood is omitted, and his
middle-aged military career is also not included. The most important part that is removed from
Guo Jing’s life is his Mongolian background. In Archer, Guo Jing is raised in the steppes, which
are portrayed as cold and barren. The Oddities and their charge are in the steppes to escape from
the Jurchen and Chinese authorities after killing so many soldiers. The Oddities are natives of

201
Sword Stained with Royal Blood 碧血劍 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Philip Kwok and Candy Wen 文雪兒, Shaw
Brothers, 1981).
202
Ode to Gallantry 俠客行 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Philip Kwok and Candy Wen, Shaw Brothers, 1982).
203
The One-Armed Swordsman 獨臂刀 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. Jimmy Wang Yu 王羽 and Lisa Chiao 焦姣, Shaw
Brothers, 1967).
204
Vengeance! 報仇 (Dir. Chang Cheh, perf. David Chiang 姜大衛 and Wong Ping 汪萍, Shaw Brothers, 1970).
205
Teo, Chinese Martial Arts Cinema, 99.
206
Teo, Chinese Martial Arts Cinema, 94.
157

southern China, but they are quick to suggest relocating to the north, despite being unfamiliar
with the land and the locals. This decision allows the party to escape from the local and Jurchen
authorities, and further removes them from civilization in general. The land is completely
uninhabited by people or animals. The Oddities and the Guo family are the only people in the
“wilderness.” They are only protected from the harsh environment by a large tent. Without his
Mongolian background, Guo Jing is “purified” and presented as only being a Han Chinese
martial artist. The film no longer portrays the xia as a transnational figure, but strictly situates
him in the Chinese martial grove only. The conflicts between states are only mentioned in
passing, with no references as to how these events change the characters’ lives. There are other
elements of his life that are eliminated when the Mongols are nonexistent in the films. The first
erasures are Guo Jing’s animal companions, and then his chivalry and his mother.
The narrator is a constant presence throughout the series. This closely resembles
traditional oral storytelling, except the films provide the audience with visual images. Like
drama, storytelling has been a major form of entertainment throughout Chinese history, because
it passes on already popular tales from one generation to the next.
207
There are many types of
storytelling. Depending on the location, some performances were accompanied by singing and
strumming of simple tunes on a stringed instrument. The narrator makes it clear at the beginning
of the first Archer that this series is based on the novels. The hardcopies are presented at the
beginning, fanned out on a flat surface for display. Instead of portraying the films as an
independent work, the narrator, the display of the books, and the lineup of the actors all point out
that the films are extensions of the novels. The narrator fills in the blanks for a majority of the
missing segments and recaps the previous films’ contents. The narrator’s role is most significant

207
Margaret B. Wan argues in Green Peony and the Rise of the Chinese Martial Arts Novel that the earliest forms of
wuxia novels were adaptions of chantefables (Albany: SUNY Press, 2009).
158

in the first Archer, with a majority of the narration concentrated in the first fifteen minutes. In
addition to introducing the Guo and Yang families, the narrator also presents all of the major
actors and the characters they play. The actors are all in costume against a green screen. They are
lined up like statues at Madame Tussauds’ museum and they do a signature move after the
narrator’s introduction. The significance of the narrator decreases as the films progress, with
significantly less narration in the second and third films. Although the narrator bridges gaps in
between plotlines to simplify the films through a few sentences of explanation, he is unable to
fill in all of the gaps.
With the films only tracing one or two threads of the novel, there are numerous details
that are left unexplained, and many loose ends are left hanging. For example, Bao’s hut inside
the Jurchen palace is never addressed. Only those who have read the novel would know that the
hut was removed from Niu Family Village, located near the Song capital Lin’an, and delivered
all the way to the Jurchen southern capital in modern day Beijing. This expectation that the
audience already knows the plot also applies to the other Shaw Brothers’ Jin Yong adaptations.
Jin Yong finished serializing his last novel in 1972, which is very close to the time when the
Shaw Brothers were producing his adaptations.
Chang Cheh was one of the first directors to display the male body in such a huge extent
in Chinese cinema.
208
Since the Archer series does not require a half-naked hero to fight until
death, the revealing costumes made it possible to display the male actors’ chests as much as
possible. The first Archer opens with the brothers Guo Xiaotian and Yang Tiexin practicing
martial arts without shirts on. Many more actors appear bare chested or semi-clad, including Lo
Meng 羅莽, Wang Ching-Liang’s 王慶良, Suen Shu-Pau 孫樹培, Sun Chien 孫建, Philip Kwok

208
Michael Lam, “The Mysterious Gayness in Chang Cheh's Unhappy World,” in The Shaw Screen, (175-87), 176.
159

郭追, and many other unnamed stuntmen. Yang Tiexin is fully clad in the scene of his death, but
he pulls open his shirt to stab himself in the abdomen.
In contrast to the supporting actors, Alexander Fu’s costumes in Archer and Mate are not
revealing. When Guo Jing first appears in Archer, he is wearing a fur-lined hat, along with a
short-sleeved jacket with no shirt underneath, and a pair of matching colored pants. The jacket is
secured with a belt, but his bare chest is visible. Yet, when he travels south, where it should be
warmer, he wears a fur cape, and a shirt and pants with a fur vest. His chest is firmly covered up
when in the Song. When Guo Jing is played by Philip Kwok in Matethe, his costume is
significantly different. Philip Kwok/Guo Jing’s chest is revealed with a tight shirt with a deep V-
neck opening, and paired with a cape. He uses this cape like a matador when in battle, and he
does not perform or reference Guo Jing’s most powerful technique, the Eighteen Palms of
Dragon Subdual (Xianglong shiba zhang 降龍十八掌). In general, the Archer series’ has very
limited references to the characters’ martial arts techniques and progress throughout the films.
The characters involved in the battle scenes do not perform any techniques that resemble Jin
Yong’s martial arts inventions.
Whether in Chinese or in English, Legend’s titles refer to Guo Jing’s talent in archery, a
skill he learns growing up in the Mongol steppes, in addition to horse-riding. The opening scene
of the first Archer is the only time when Guo Jing uses a bow and arrow. Before the title appears,
there is the sound of hooves, followed by a man on horseback appearing on screen, assumed to
be Guo Jing. The horse gallops up a barren hill, presumed to be the Mongol steppes. The camera
then closes-up on Alexander Fu/Guo Jing’s face, showing that he is wearing a white Mongolian
fur hat. When he shoots his arrow towards the sky, the audience never sees what he is shooting
at. This scene that establishes the relationship between the main character and archery lasts for
160

only ten seconds. This is another point in which the audience is assumed to already know that
Guo Jing is shooting at condors in this opening scene.
Guo Jing’s condors and his Feraghan horse (hanxue ma 汗血馬) are both omitted in the
films. Guo Jing’s horse is originally one of the wild horses rounded up by Temujin’s breeders. It
is tamed by Guo Jing before he leaves for the Song. Jin Yong portrays the Mongol steppes as a
location of both vastness and wilderness. While these animals belong to Guo Jing, they are not
held in captivity. The birds follow the Guo couple across the Asian continent, but they only
appear when they are bid. The horse also roams free most of the time, especially during the
segment when the characters are at sea. All of the animal companions from the steppes are
mobile and self-sufficient while in the Song. This contrasts with Li Ping, who never returns to
her homeland.
As mentioned above, Li Ping dies in the steppes in the novel version of the story.
However, in Archer she simply disappears. The removal of the Mongols from Guo Jing’s life
necessitates the omission of Li Ping’s ending. The last time Li Ping (played by Chu Jing 祝菁)
appears in Archer is before Guo Jing departs from the steppes. After the Oddities return to the
Song with their disciple, there is no mention of Guo Jing’s mother again. Neither is she
mentioned in the second and third films. She simply vanishes in the steppes because Guo Jing
has no reason to return to his childhood home. As mentioned in Chapter 2, the mothers of Guo
Jing and Yang Kang are their sons’ only anchors to the fatherland. Li Ping’s importance
diminishes when the Mongols are not present. This is because she is no longer Guo Jing’s link to
the Song when abroad, and she is not his anchor in the steppes when he is in the Song. Guo Jing
is not at risk of losing his sense of Han Chinese identity when his childhood is in an uninhabited
location. Li Ping’s presence is limited to being a caretaker, not a teacher of Chinese culture and
161

customs in a foreign land. The steppes are a place that is empty of meaning in Archer when both
his biological and surrogate families are no longer there. The steppes are simply a place where
Guo Jing grew up, and not a home with family members. His filial piety is then transferred from
his only parent to his teachers, who are only involved in the Chinese martial grove.
The importance of Yue Fei’s Wumu’s Posthumous Manual is greatly reduced in the
Archer series. In Legend, the Guo couple suffers life threatening injuries twice while attempting
to locate and retrieve the Manual. The first time, Guo Jing is stabbed by Yang Kang in the Song
imperial palace. The second time, Huang Rong is injured by the Iron Palm clan 鐵掌幫 leader.
The Manual is only a minor object in the films because it has no function in a story without
Mongols. The Manual’s most important function is to serve as the link between the Guo couple
and the King of Dali. When they find the Manual in front of the a skeleton, Guo Jing begs the
spirit for forgiveness because he is not taking the Manual out of greed, but for the sake of
“resisting the Jurchens” 抗金. Guo Jing hastily stuffs the thick volume into his shirt, and it is
never mentioned again. Preventing the Manual from falling into the hands of the Jurchen prince
is the most significant action Guo Jing ever takes to resist against the Jurchens.
The presence of the Jurchens never elicits any sense of urgency. Other than the attack on
the Guo and Yang families, the Jurchens are no longer important. Wanyan Honglie and his men
are too busy mixing in the affairs of the martial grove and courting people who do not
necessarily make a difference in the scene of politics. The lack of military activities on both the
Song and Jin sides keeps the plot limited within the boundaries of conflicts between schools. The
political aspects are only mentioned but not acted upon. Although Guo Jing’s quest begins with
his desire to avenge his father, Wanyan Honglie does not die in the films, making Guo Jing an
incomplete hero in both the large and small contexts of the country and the family.
162

When the Jurchens first appear, they are dressed comically. The fathers of Guo Jing and
Yang Kang (played by Bruce Tong Yim-chaan 唐炎燦 Dick Wei 狄威) are topless while
practicing their techniques, and their bare upper bodies are shiny with sweat. In contrast, the
Jurchens are always clad in attire or accessories with fur, as if constantly living in the dead of
winter. There are almost no weather changes throughout the films, it is simply always sunny and
dry. The only time it rains is to reveal the hidden message in Yue Fei’s painting, which is a short
scene with the narrator’s voice over to explain the discovery. In the novel, the first chapter opens
during the middle of winter, and is named “Sudden Changes in the Snow” 風雪驚變, where the
cold and the snowstorm play an important part in the plot.
209
The Jurchen soldiers’ uniforms
resemble Santa Claus’s elves because they conist of a red tunic paired with black pants. The
soldiers also wear red pointed hats that are lined with white fur on the rims. Their superiors are
in padded tunics with larger hats that are also lined with white fur. Their enlarged ear covers
extend down to the waist, alternating in blocks of black and white. Wanyan Honglie (played by
Yue Wing 于榮) does not wear a hat. Instead, he wears a small golden crown with a red pompom
that matches his fur-lined cape and robes. Because there is no specification as to where the Guo
and Yang families live in Archer, the Jurchen men in winter attire may not be unreasonable.
Later in Mate, the Jurchen soldiers have a different set of costumes that are yellow and gold. No
longer covered in fur and capes, the soldiers wear only thin, sleeveless tunics with a deep V-neck
that exposes their necks all the way down to their bellybuttons. These men do not resemble
soldiers, but rather members of the martial grove. In contrast, Yang Kang (played by Lung Tien-
Hsiang 龍天翔) is still wearing a cape, also sans fur, and made of thinner material. When Yang
Kang takes off his cape, his midriff is exposed through a hole cut out from his robes. Once he

209
Jin Yong, Legend, Ch. 1, 9-59.
163

loses his sanity from poison, he rips apart his clothes to expose his body before he is killed.
These uniforms are the only indicators that these men are Jurchens and not Chinese. There is no
language barrier in the novel, and this is carried over into the films.
Huang Rong’s injuries can only be healed by the King of Dali Duan Zhixing 段智興,
who connects the couple to one of the other great martial arts masters. The side plot regarding
the love triangle between Zhou Botong, Liu Ying 劉瑛, and Duan Zhixing is the major focus of
Archer 3, even though it is all a flashback. Already mentioned above, the films’ setting is mostly
limited to China proper. Thus, this long segment that takes place in a foreign land is removed
from the present narrative. The flashback’s setting is limited to the Dali imperial palace, with no
Dali cultural references. The Dali characters are isolated from the local population, culture, and
politics. Duan Zhixing is not occupied with governing his land, but instead he is driven to
become the most powerful martial artist in the realm. The affairs of the Dali palace are all
extensions of situations firmly rooted in the struggles between martial artists’ conflict with each
other.
The flashback serves as a replacement for Guo Jing’s military involvement with the
Mongols towards the end of Legend. In the novel, the Dali love triangle fills in the background
information to one of the five great martial arts masters, but in the films it only diverts attention
from the two leading characters by presenting new characters late in the film’s development.
This extensive side plot is personally unrelated to the Guo couple or to issues of ethnicity or
loyalty, and even the connection to the actual practice of martial arts is very small. The
replacement of the Mongols with the Dali segment is another attempt to contain the films’
geographical settings and present characters that are not cultural others. As a Chinese tributary
state, Dali’s sinification is constantly emphasized in Jin Yong’s novels. They are never
164

exoticized or depicted as culturally backwards. Like the young prince Duan Yu mentioned in
Chapter 3, the Dali imperial family is portrayed as educated in Chinese classics and devout
Buddhists. The Dali imperial harem also closely resembles the imperial Chinese harem, with an
emperor and numerous ranked consorts.
The Archer series is different from Chang Cheh’s landmark works in regards to the
importance of the female protagonist. Huang Rong’s constant presence in Legend is one of the
novel’s most unique aspects. Female protagonists in other novels never play such a huge role in
shaping the male protagonists’ lives. Yang Guo can exist alone in Mate without Xiao Longnu,
but Guo Jing and the story of Legend cannot hold up without the presence of Huang Rong.
Despite her importance, Huang Rong’s major function in both the novel and the films is to serve
as Guo Jing’s helper. As a skilled martial artist herself, she never battles the most powerful
people. When she attempts to do so, she is severely injured. As the brains to the team, Huang
Rong’s cleverness never outshines Guo Jing’s brawns. In accordance with Chang Cheh’s typical
heroes, the men’s martial prowess and physical strengths are their defining heroic traits. When
Guo Jing is constantly engaging in battles with other men while Huang Rong watches on the
side, there is no doubt that Guo Jing is the stronger of the two.
The death of five Oddities is pushed from Archer into Mate. Mate merges plotlines from
Legend with an early part of Return. The narrator does not appear in Mate, but the story picks up
immediately from where Archer 3 leaves off. Archer 3 ends with Guo Jing and Huang Rong’s
marriage, and Mate opens with the couple already married and returning to Peach Blossom
Island. While the Chinese title of Mate indicates that it is an adaptation of Return, the focus of
the film is solely on Yang Guo’s early life. Without Xiao Longnu and the huge condor, the film’s
contents do not match up to the Chinese title. It may have been that Chang Cheh had intended to
165

produce more films to complete the story, just like how Archer consists of three films, but he did
not because of Alexander Fu’s death in 1983. When Alexander Fu played the lead in Mate again,
there is no doubt that the whole series was tailored for Alexander Fu, who was one of Chang
Cheh’s godsons. Alexander Fu generally played the boyish (xiaozi 小子) characters that are
young and childlike, which is similar to Chang Cheh’s portrayal of Guo Jing and Yang Guo.
210

Mate ends with Yang Guo’s arrival at the Quanzhen School in the midst of the conflict over
winning Xiao Longnu’s hand in marriage, even though she never appears. It would have been the
perfect point for her introduction if another film was made.
Since the Mongols do not make an appearance in Archer, they also do not play any
significant parts in Mate. One of the men who desires to win the hand of Xiao Longnu is a
Mongol prince named Huodu 霍都. In Mate, the battles that take place in front of the Tomb are
limited to matches between martial artists, and they do not touch on politics. Without the non-
Chinese to antagonize, both Guo Jing and Yang Guo are not involved in the military or politics,
and Yang Guo never matures into a chivalric figure. Throughout the film, Yang Guo remains a
childish character while Guo Jing lives an idle life on Peach Blossom Island.
Yang Guo’s foster father, Ouyang Feng, appears briefly in Mate. The relationship
between the father and son is comical, and it does not attempt to portray a familial bond at all.
Like in Return, Ouyang Feng in the film has already lost his sanity at this point, and he hides in
the Metal Lance Temple 鐵槍廟. The Metal Lance Temple is where his biological son was
killed. The mad man and Yang Guo work together to play pranks on a blind man, but otherwise
do not form any sincere bonds. Yang Guo travels between the Metal Lance Temple and Peach
Blossom Island very easily, as if the two locations are not separated by sea.

210
Teo, Chinese Martial Arts Cinema, 105.
166

In 1983, another adaption of Return was released, named Little Dragon Maiden 楊過與
小龍女.
211
The film was directed by Huashan, and stars Leslie Cheung (1956-2003) and Mary
Jean Reimer 翁靜晶. TVB also produced a television series adaptation of Return in the same
year. This television series has since become a classic, and the stars Andy Lau 劉德華 and Idy
Chan 陳玉蓮 are still considered the classical portrayal of the Yang couple. The film was
released in December of 1983, while the series was broadcasted from October, 1983 to January,
1984. Like the Brave Archer series, Little Dragon Maiden also does not address the Mongol
invasion, but specifically focuses on the romantic relationship between the teacher and her
student.
In Archer, the lack of Mongols ensures that Guo Jing’s loyalty to the Song is not
endangered by his ties to the Mongol ruling family. It also ensures that his loyalty is not
potentially compromised when his mother is held hostage. There are no acts of chivalry in the
films. Instead, the story is mainly composed of the Guo couple’s adventures. Similarly, Yang
Guo’s story is set in a realm without hostile non-Chinese invaders. He never physically or
emotionally matures in Mate, which is mostly composed of Yang Guo’s peevish ways. There is
no depth or character development. Because Jin Yong’s xia figures are so tightly situated within
the historical context, the removal of the non-Chinese characters causes the chivalric aspect of
Guo Jing and Yang Guo to be nonexistent. The limitations of the geographical settings also
reduces the transnational political influence of the characters. Chang Cheh’s set of Archer films
has no interest in depicting chivalry. It focuses on depicting adventures of youthful characters.

211
Little Dragon Maiden 楊過與小龍女 (Dir. Huashan, perf. Leslie Cheung and Mary Jean Reimer 翁靜晶, Shaw
Brothers, 1983).
167

4.3 Chor Yuen’s The Emperor and His Brother
Chor Yuen is one of the most important directors of Cantonese cinema, especially during
the revival of the dialect in local Hong Kong cinema during the 1960s to 1970s. Despite his
importance, there are few sources dedicated to studying his life and works. Law Kar situates
Chor Yuen amongst two other significant Cantonese film directors, Partrick Lung Kong 龍剛
(1934-2014) and Shu Shuan 唐書璇 (1941- ).
212
In addition to his realist dramatizations of urban
changes in The Great Devotion 可憐天下父母心
213
and his social parody in House of 72 Tenants
七十二家房客,
214
Chor Yuen devoted a great portion of his career towards making costume
films. This dramatic style change from contemporary drama to martial arts occurred later in his
career, when the market for Cantonese films dwindled. It was during his tenure at the Shaw
Brothers when Chor Yuen directed most of his costume films in unspecified periods of imperial
China. Prior to his contract at the Shaw Brothers, Chor Yuen worked for Kong Ngee 光藝, Tse’s
Brothers Motion Pictures 謝氏 that was founded by actor Patrick Tse, and Cathay 國泰.
215
A
majority of the costume pictures are adaptations of Gu Long’s works. Chor Yuen found
inspiration from Gu Long’s depiction of human nature, and continued to adapt Gu Long’s fiction
nonstop for five years.
216
Though Jin Yong and Gu Long wrote around the same time, their
portrayals of imperial China and the martial grove are drastically different. Gu Long presents a
lot of martial arts in his fiction that borders on science fiction. Gu Long’s xia figure is not

212
Law Kar, “An Overview of Hong Kong’s New Wave Cinema,” in At Full Speed: Hong Kong Cinema in a
Borderless World, Ed. Esther Yau (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001, 31-52).
213
The Great Devotion 可憐天下父母心 (Dir. Chor Yuen, perf. Pak Yin 白燕, Cheung Wood-Yau 張活游, and
Petrina Fung Bo-Bo 馮寶寶, Shanlian Film Company 山聯影業公司, 1960).
214
House of 72 Tenants 七十二家房客 (Dir. Chor Yuen, perf. Yueh Hua 岳華 and Ching Li 井莉, Shaw Brothers,
1973).
215
Director Chor Yuen (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive, 2006), 19-35.
216
Chor Yuen, The Making of Martial Arts Films: As Told by Filmmakers and Stars 電影口述歷史展覽之再現江
湖 (Hong Kong: Provisional Urban Council 臨時市政局, 1999), 44.
168

narrowly defined by ethnicity and loyalty. It is possible to known as a xia as long as one is a
martial artist. Chor Yuen directed for the Shaw Brothers for fifteen years, and mainly acted for
TVB until he retired in the early 2000s.
Chor Yuen’s The Emperor and His Brother (hereafter Brother) was released in 1981.
This is the second cinematic adaptation of Book. The earliest was directed by Li Chenfeng 李晨
風 (1908-?) and produced by Emei Film in Cantonese. The Emei version was released in two
parts, in May and June of 1960, which was fairly close to the time of the original’s serialization
in Hong Kong’s New Evening Post 新晚報 from 1955 to 1956. Chor Yuen’s adaptation of Book
was later followed by Ann Hui’s 許鞍華 The Romance of the Book and Sword
217
and its sequel
Princess Fragrance 香香公主.
218
Both films were released in 1987. Thus far, Ann Hui’s version
is the only Jin Yong film made outside of Hong Kong. This set of films was part of the very
early Hong Kong and Mainland Chinese co-productions. The films were entirely filmed in
China, and only featured actors from the Mainland. Since then, there have only been television
adaptations of Book. Seven adaptations have been produced over the last four decades from
Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China.
Although the actors’ wear a queue in Brother, there is no shaving of the front of the head.
Also, many actors sport robust sideburns. The Qing Dynasty had their male subjects wear their
hair in Manchu fashion, meaning that the front half of the head was shaved, and the other half
was worn in a queue. Brother is not the only film with actors who did not shave their heads.
Other films that are set during the Qing Dynasty, such as The New Tales of the Flying Fox 新飛

217
The Romance of the Book and Sword 書劍恩仇錄 (Dir. Ann Hui 許鞍華, perf. Zhang Duofu 張多福 and Da
Shichang 達式常, Sil-Metropole 銀都機構有限公司, 1987).
218
Princess Fragrance 香香公主 (Dir. Ann Hui, perf. Aiyinuo 艾依諾 and Zhang Duofu, Sil-Metropole, 1987).
169

狐外傳 also feature actors with unshaved heads. This “tradition” of not requiring actors to shave
their heads for Qing Dynasty settings extends into TVB’s television series. It was not until the
recent years that a majority of TVB’s Qing Dynasty dramas featured actors with shaved heads.
This change was most likely do to the increase of Mainland dramas entering Hong Kong.
Brother features only half of the novel. The film’s focus on the multiple supporting
characters takes the spotlight away from Chen Jialuo. Already mentioned above, the first half of
the novel’s focus is on a few Red Flower Society managers. Brother does not include the
Uighurs’ struggle against the Qing, the Southern Circuit, and the desert segments. Without the
connection between Chen Jialuo and the Southern Circuit, the Uighurs sisters are also absent.
Chen Jialuo has no romantic plotline, although romance manifests through other couples. The
film does an excellent job in depicting the unique aspects of all the Red Flower brothers. It is
also especially loyal to the novel when presenting the love quadrangle between Wen Tailai 文泰
來, Luo Bing 駱冰, Yu Yutong 余魚同, and Li Yuanzhi 李沅芷, and the comedic relationship
between Xu Tianhong 徐天宏 and Zhou Qi 周綺. These characters take up so much screen time
that Chen Jialuo is no longer the main character. There is more detailed information and
background dedicated to these supporting characters than there is for Chen Jialuo. For example,
Yu Yutong’s deep love for his sister-in-law, Luo Bing (Wen Tailai’s wife), his temporary
attempt to repent by becoming a Buddhist monk, and his return to the Red Flower Society as a
layman are depictions that present a much more dynamic and complicated character than Chen
Jialuo. When Chen Jialuo has no romantic involvement, Yu Yutong’s experiences better reflect
Chor Yuen’s typical romantic heroes that Stephen Teo describes as “romantic on the whole
though still possessing the requisite masculine sensibility to be good fighters.”
219
Although the

219
Teo, Chinese Martial Arts Cinema, 153.
170

supporting characters’ relationships are all important in character building, they are not the
essential relationships that move the story forward. The supporting characters’ affairs all lead to
happy endings, but they are dead ends in terms of plot development.
Like Guo Jing in Archer, Chen Jialuo is stripped of his multicultural background. The
removal of this part of the young Helmsman’s life limits his identity to only being a Han
Chinese. In Brother, Chen Jialuo (played by Ti Lung) never speaks Uighur or dresses in non-
Chinese attire. More importantly, he is never shown outside of China proper. The furthest
location from the Chinese cultural center is Gansu 甘肅. When he appears for the first time in the
film, he is already in China. At the end of the film, in order to retrieve a piece of evidence to
prove Emperor Qianlong’s ethnic background, Chen Jialuo leaves China by riding into the
desert. The narration of the Red Flower brothers towards the beginning of the film explains that
Chen Jialuo is being escorted back to the middle kingdom from “beyond the pass” (guanwai 關
外) to take up the position of Helmsman. When he first meets Qianlong, and the emperor asks
where Chen Jialuo is from, his response is from “beyond the frontier” (saiwai 塞外). The Uighur
region (huibu 回部) is only mentioned once throughout the film, and this is where the piece of
evidence is kept. The specific location of Chen Jialuo’s previous residence is avoided most of the
time to refrain from associating him with any other culture or ethnicity.
The omission of the Uighur setting and characters greatly simplifies Chen Jialuo’s life
and his cultural background. The years he spent in the Southern Circuit are portrayed as
completely irrelevant to his current life. Brother’s Chen Jialuo is not displaced from the cultural
setting that is suitable for a young-scholar character to succeed in. His wen masculinity is greatly
diminished when there is no discussion of his education, exam achievements, and romantic
involvement. The removal of the Uighur sisters purifies Chen Jialuo’s characterization by
171

drastically flattening his character. The lack of romantic entanglements frees Chen Jialuo from
the original character’s huge ego, his sense of inferiority, and his half-heartedness in the cause of
rebelling against the Qing. Although Chen Jialuo is not the only leader figure in Brother,
Qianlong is portrayed negatively. The emperor is a lecher and he is feebleminded. Untainted in
the film by romantic and political failures, Chen Jialuo is an upright and able leader. Under his
guidance, the Red Flower Society overcomes many obstacles, and it can even make a clean
escape when surrounded by Qing soldiers on the West Lake. At the end, the failure to overthrow
the Qing is not Chen Jialuo’s fault. He exits the scene to carry out another step in their mission,
and not running away from his failures in a cowardsly manner. Although the film ends, it is
assumed that the Red Flower Society’s mission does not. This ambivalent ending does not show
any disappointments from the Red Flower brothers, but they are not any closer to successfully
rebelling than they were at the beginning of the film.
There is a strong emphasis on martial arts techniques in Brother, but this attention is
limited to Chen Jialuo’s techniques. The narrative truly begins with the Red Flower brothers’
arrival at the Red Flower headquarters, where Chen Jialuo makes his first appearance. In a
simiarl manner to the Archer series, the film opens with the narrator’s elaboration that provides
the backstory of Prince Yong and the Chen family’s baby switch. The narrator also tells of the
capture of Wen Tailai (played by Guo Bi-chuan 郭碧川) and his first rescue attempt. Chen
Jialuo’s first battle on screen is with his Red Flower brothers. He has no difficulty beating a few
men at the same time, even though the brothers are all much older and more established martial
artists. The paper folding fan is Chen Jialuo’s primary weapon, even when he is fighting against
metal weapons, ranging from swords to hooks. His paper fan is even capable of shielding hidden
weapons. After giving away his fan to Qianlong, Chen Jialuo uses a pair of double swords in the
172

second attempt to rescue Wen Tailai. Chen Jialuo also frequently uses his teacher’s invention
Hundred Flowers Erroneous Fists 百花拳錯, and then uses a long sword when in a final battle.
The constant switch of choice of weapons and techniques shows that Chen Jialuo is a very
versatile martial artist. He is skilled in both the use of fists and weapons of various lengths and
weights.
Of the films that I focus on in this chapter, Brother is the only film that successfully
depicts the characters’ missions and their relationship to their lack of a homeland. There is great
depth in the portrayal of the many supporting characters, which takes away from the main
character’s emotional development. Chen Jialuo is successfully portrayed as a scholarly
character that is skilled in martial arts and morally just. However, there is no attempt to link him
with the type of chivalry in which one sacrifices himself for a country that no longer exists.
Brother’s dedication to the logic of the plot brings about a careful avoidance of casting the
characters in negative light. The Red Flower Society never succeeds in overthrowing the Qing,
but it also does not fail. Its integrity remains intact when Brother concludes with an open ending.

4.4 Huashan’s Tales of a Eunuch
Huashan is one of the lesser known directors from the Shaw Brothers. Huashan was
outshined by other directors, and he was active in the 1970s to 80s, towards the Shaw Brothers’
decline. Huashan’s more famous works include the snippets in The Criminals 香港奇案 series,
which consists of two to four snippets in each film. A total of four The Criminals films were
released between 1976 and 1977. The snippets are all adaptations of true events. In the first three
films, Huashuan contributed one snippet per film, including “Hidden Torsos” 血濺吊頸嶺,
“Mama San” 大家姐, and “Arson” 老爺車縱火案. He did not contribute to the fourth film. Most
173

of his works are in contemporary settings, with only a few costume pieces, in which Tales of a
Eunuch (hereafter Eunuch) is one of them. Huashan only adapted Jin Yong’s works twice. The
other Jin Yong film is also the aforementioned Little Dragon Maiden. Like the other adaptations
discussed above, Eunuch presents less than half of the novel’s plot and characters, with a
majority of the film taking place within the imperial palace.
Eunuch is the first cinematic adaptation of Deer. Unlike the films discussed above,
Eunuch is not a simplified version of Deer, but a shortened version. Eunuch was dubbed in both
Mandarin and Cantonese, with a clear awareness of addressing a Cantonese audience. One of the
characters that is not in the novel is named Zhuang Tangong 莊彈公. His name is a homonym of
a slang term in Cantonese for plotting against somebody (zong daan gung 裝彈弓). This
character does not play a significant role later in the film.
The only other film adaptation of Deer is Wong Jing 王晶 and Stephen Chow’s 周星馳
Royal Tramp in 1992.
220
Royal Tramp consists of two films that were released in two parts
within the same year. One year later, Blackie Ko 柯受良 (1953-2003) released Hero: Beyond the
Boundary of Time 正牌韋小寶之奉旨溝女, in which Wei Xiaobao time travels into the
future.
221
Although the characters are those from Deer, this film depicts an independent story
unrelated to the novel. In 1984, just one year after Eunuch’s release, TVB aired their first
television adaptation of Deer.
Eunuch is an erotic comedy with martial arts elements. The fim is bookended neatly by
opening in Wei Xiaobao’s (played by Wong Yu 汪禹) hometown of Yangzhou, and then ending

220
Royal Tramp I 鹿鼎記 and II 鹿鼎記 2: 神龍教 (Dir. Jing Wong, perf. Stephen Chow and Chingmy Yau 邱淑貞,
Win’s Entertainment 永盛娛樂製作, 1992).
221
Hero: Beyond the Boundary of Time 正牌韋小寶之奉旨溝女 (Dir. Blackie Ko 柯受良, perf. Tony Leung Chiu-
wai and Dicky Cheung 張衛健, Movie Impacts Film Investment 藝能電影, 1993).
174

with his return to his home as an official. There is a great amount of sexual references at the
beginning of the film, which takes place in the brothel house. This makes up for the lack of Wei
Xiaobao’s sexual conquests that are supposed to take place later on, when he is outside of the
palace. The film ends with the capture of Oboi and the rescue of the real Empress Dowager.
Therefore, Wei Xiaobao never travels to anywhere else other than Yangzhou and the capital. In
addition to Wei Xiaobao’s accidental consumption of a patron’s aphrodisiac, there is also Wei
Chunhua’s repeated involvement in a patron’s frequent case of koro. Koro is a culturally specific
belief that the genitalia will retract into the body. The role of Wei Xiaobao’s mother is played by
Siu Yam Yam 邵音音, who is a well-known actress in the Shaw Brothers’ erotica that were
produced in the 1970s. Wei Chunhua’s responsibility is to prevent the patron’s penis from
retracting into his body by sucking on it with her mouth.
Already discussed in Chapter 3, Deer is a multi-volume novel that covers that span of
more than ten years, with the geographical coverage across many parts of the Asian continent.
While the other films discussed above limit the setting to within China proper, Eunuch further
reduces the setting to within architectural structures. In comparison to the other films, Eunuch is
the one that is most heavily dependent upon the audiences’ prior knowledge about the novel.
There are a great number of details from Deer included in Eunuch that are never followed up on.
The treasure map found in the Sutra of Forty-Two Chapters 四十二章經 is not pursued since the
location of the treasure is in Russia. The Buddhist ordination of Emperor Shunzhi is mentioned,
but Wei Xiaobao does not travel to Wutaishan 五台山, so this part of the plot is dropped. The
dagger and the protective tunic Wei Xiaobao confiscates from Oboi’s mansion receive special
attention, even though they do not come to use outside of the palace. The poison Wei Xiaobao
175

consumes over the course of a couple months is also not followed up on, since it is Chen Jinnan
who cures him in the novel. He is still alive and healthy when the film concludes.
In Deer, the palace segments only sets the scene for more complex events, which reach
beyond the Qing empire and the local rebels’ struggles. The film’s setting is reduced to mostly
be in the palace, causing the movie to lack a central theme and conflict. The incidents that occur
in the palace are divorced from the larger historical context presented. There are two major
events in Eunuch, the assassination of Oboi and the rescue of the real Empress Dowager from the
fake one. Wei Xiaobao’s contributions to both occasions gain him the trust of Kangxi. However,
since none of these events are driven by the main character, Wei Xiaobao’s role is more of a
bystander instead of a protagonist. The palace becomes an isolated world that is shielded from
the various ethnic tensions outside. The agenda of rebelling against the Qing and restoring the
Ming falls into the background. The challenge to Emperor Kangxi’s sovereignty over the
Chinese land and people in Eunuch is very weak. With the rebel group unnamed and blending
into the background, anti-Qing movements are not the major force of the film as they are in the
novel. Wong Yu’s Wei Xiaobao has no specific goals, and the story is incomplete with
undeveloped characters. Without Yunnan, Divine Dragon Island, Russia, and Taiwan, the
political situation is only conveyed through the conversation of a band of unnamed rebels in the
film’s opening scene.
The rebels are a marginalized group. One of their members even claims that nobody
mentions rebelling against the Qing and restoring the Ming anymore. The placard in the hall of
their meeting says the Hall of Assembled Righteousness 聚義堂, but the members are never
named. Those who have read Deer know this band references the Heaven and Earth Society,
even though Hall of Righteousness is not one of the Society’s branches. Their plan is to steal the
176

Sutra of Forty-two Chapters, which holds the secret to the location of the Manchu spiritual
source (longmai 龍脈). They hope that if they destroy the spiritual source the whole Manchu
population will die off, allowing them to retake the throne. Without the Heaven and Earth
Society, Wei Xiaobao has no fictive kin in the martial grove, and his only sincere relationship is
with Mao Shiba and the emperor (played by Gordon Liu).
A significant number of female characters are also cut from Eunuch, eliminating one of
Wei Xiaobao’s life goals of collecting beautiful women. Only three of the seven women Wei
Xiaobao eventually marries are included in Eunuch. Princess Jianning appears very early on in
the film, with particular attention dedicated to her sadomasochism. When the Princess takes the
initiative to seduce Wei Xiaobao, he rejects her advances. Without their journey together to
Yunnan, Wei Xiaobao’s connection to the Princess is limited to being master and her servant.
His only sexual partner is the unnamed prostitute in Yangzhou, due to Wei Xiaobao’s accidental
consumption of an aphrodisiac. Fong Yi and Mu Jianping are actually unnamed in the film. They
enter the palace secretively, with no elaboration on their mission or identities. Only those who
have read the novel can identify the women. At the end of the film, the two women are only
shown to be leaving the palace disguised as Wei Xiaobao’s soldiers. Their relationships to Wei
Xiaobao later on are also not addressed. Wei Xiaobao’s portrayal is less lecherous and has more
self-control in this film, since most of his interactions are with men. Without this despicable trait,
his wickedness is diminished, simultaneously reducing the uniqueness of his character. Although
the importance of friendship is reinforced many times throughout the film, it only applies to two
of Wei Xiaobao’s friends. There are no other opportunities to display Wei Xiaobao and to focus
on friendship when he is not part of the martial grove.
177

As Jin Yong’s last fictional “hero,” Wei Xiaobao is not only the ultimate anti-xia, but
also a skilled politician. Although he is illiterate, his friendly manners and easygoing personality
earn him many friends in court and in the rivers and lakes. His social skills extend into the world
of diplomacy, especially when negotiating with the Russians. With the restriction of the settings
in Eunuch, his character correspondingly becomes restricted in his roles. The complicated
political landscape is not exhibited without the well-traveled Wei Xiaobao. The film is therefore
only the tales of a fake eunuch, which is a very small theme when compared to the Chinese title,
which translates to a tale of hunting parties chasing after deer in the middle kingdom. At the end
of the film, during Wei Xiaobao’s glorious return home as the emperor’s ambassador, he returns
to the gambling house to show off his immense wealth. He even buys the brothel he grew up in,
elevating his mother’s status from prostitute to madam. This ending depicts a Wei Xiaobao that
has only risen in social status by helping to kill Oboi and by rescuing the real Empress Dowager.

Conclusion
The Archer series, Brother, and Eunuch were all produced close to the time of the Shaw
Brothers’ production hiatus. Despite being the works of different directors, all the films have a
significant similarity in their limitation of geographical settings. Keeping stories within a
Chinese cultural context reduces the involvement of the (anti-)xia figures within the Chinese
martial grove; they are no longer the transnational figure that Jin Yong depicts. The Shaw
Brothers’ fictive imperial China is a land that is untainted by non-Chinese influence, which is a
poor match with Jin Yong’s history heavy fiction. For the limited appearances of the few non-
Chinese characters, they all appear in China proper. The non-Chinese characters are
differentiated from the Chinese characters through attire only. There are no attempts to adjust the
178

actors’ skin color or any other features with makeup. Most important of all there are no language
differences. These non-Chinese characters are almost all foreign soldiers that are insignificant to
the plot. The important non-Chinese characters from the novels are never included in the films.
Without the non-Chinese settings and influential non-Chinese characters, there is nobody to
antagonize, thus omitting one of the most important factors that contributes to Jin Yong’s
definition of chivalry. Because the Shaw Brothers’ xias are removed from the greater scene of
wars and politics, there is no chivalry depicted in the films, not even at the interpersonal levels.
While Jin Yong was able to break ground by portraying multicultural heroes, the Shaw Brothers
collapsed the heroes back into a small world.
After the Shaw Brothers’ production hiatus in 1985, other studios adapted Jin Yong’s
fiction, including Golden Harvest 嘉禾 and Win’s Entertainment 永盛電影. Other than Ann
Hui’s The Romance of the Book and Sword 書劍恩仇錄
222
and its sequel Princess Fragrance 香
香公主,
223
all other non-Shaw Brothers Jin Yong films were produced in Hong Kong. Only a
few of these adaptations were successful in the box office or attained cultural influence,
including the aforementioned Royal Tramp series, Ashes of Time, and the Swordsman trilogy. Jin
Yong film adaptions ceased after 1994, which coincided with TVB’s second wave of Jin Yong
productions that picked up in 1994.
Soon after TVB was sold in 2009, the Shaw Brothers resumed film production. Most of
their films have been limited to contemporary local productions that are closely related to TVB.
Many recent Shaw Brothers productions are film adaptations of TVB’s popular series, which

222
The Romance of the Book and Sword 書劍恩仇錄 (Dir. Ann Hui 許鞍華, perf. Zhang Duofu 張多福 and Da
Shichang 達式常, Sil-Metropole 銀都, 1987).
223
Princess Fragrance 香香公主 (Dir. Ann Hui 許鞍華, perf. Aiyinuo 艾依諾 and Zhang Duofu, Sil-Metropole,
1987.
179

began with Turning Point 變節 in 2009.
224
The studio now primarily targets the local audience.
Even though some of the newer films have been released in Mainland China, they are not co-
productions with Mainland companies.

224
Turning Point Laughing Gor 之變節 (Dir. Herman Yau 邱禮濤, perf. Michael Tse 謝天華 and Anthony Wong
黃秋生, Shaw Brothers, 2009).
180

Ch. 5: Television Adaptations of Jin Yong

Introduction
Since the 1970s, television series have become the most important form of visual
adaptation of Jin Yong’s works. In this chapter, I focus on the television adaptations of Jin
Yong’s novels, specifically the reproductions of Proud, Smiling Wanderer (hereafter Proud).
Proud is the only Jin Yong novel that has undergone such a significant reinterpretation in its
visual adaptations by “rectifying” the gender and sexuality of one character. The television
productions from the past twenty years were heavily influenced by the film Swordsman II from
1992. The film shifts the spotlight to an originally minor character in the novel, Dongfang Bubai
東方不敗, with actress Brigitte Lin 林青霞 playing the role of a castrated homosexual man. This
set of films raises the important question of how sexualual orientation impacts the treatment of
sexuality and gender on screen. Dongfang Bubai is not the only castrated character in Jin Yong’s
oeuvre, but he is the only homosexual character. For Swordsman II, reinterpreting the Sect as a
Miao rebel group also removes Dongfang Bubai’s gender and sexual “abnormalities” from the
Chinese context. When this character is of Miao ancestry and played by a woman, the gender and
sexual “abnormalities” are eroticized, exoticized, and otherized.
I only focus on the television adaptations of Proud after 1992, with specific emphasis on
Hong Kong TVB’s 1996 State of Divinity, and the most recent Swordsman, produced by Hunan
Television in 2013. State of Divinity (1996) is the only post-1992 production with a man playing
Dongfang Bubai, with no attempt to normalize and beautify the character. Swordsman (2013) is
the most radical reinterpretation thus far because Dongfang Bubai is a biological woman. Proud
181

is one of the most widely adapted Jin Yong novels, and its television versions have been
produced in Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, and Singapore.
Brigitte Lin playing the castrated homosexual had a lasting impact on the character’s
portrayals in later television versions of Proud. Since the Swordsman films’ release, it became a
fashionable trend to have women playing Dongfang Bubai. When women play the grotesque
Sect leader, the on screen homosexuality is no longer problematic when actors are of the
opposite sex, hence “correcting” the Sect leader’s sexuality. In regards to gender, the character’s
outlandishness is immediately diminished since the actresses do not look out of place in
women’s clothing. This “gender and sex change” has become a convenient strategy to dodge the
political allegories from the original work by permanently removing the distorted and incomplete
man from the position of power. Now that Jin Yong’s works are only adapted into television in
Mainland China, Dongfang Bubai’s “gender and sex change” is most likely irreversible, and the
original character and his queerness will never appear on screen in the future.
Below, I first provide a brief description of the novel’s themes, then some historical
background on the television adaptations. Television series have not received much academic
attention in general, despite their wide viewership and their importance in shaping Chinese
popular culture. I especially want to draw attention to TVB and Chinese producer Zhang Jizhong
張紀中, together they represent the most influential station and producer in shaping the
television adaptations of Jin Yong’s oeuvre thus far. I then turn to Swordsman II and the film’s
impact on Proud’s post-1992 television series, specifically looking at the gender issues featured
in each version. A majority of the post-1992 series casted women for the role of Dongfang
Bubai, greatly feminizing and normalizing the character, in addition to enlarging his/her
importance in the plots. These actresses all played the role of a castrated man who desires to be a
182

woman, which is how Proud portrays Dongfang Bubai. It is only in the most recent adaptation
that this character is no longer a castrated man, but a biological woman, played by actress Joe
Chen 陳喬恩. There have been five Proud television productions since 1992, but there are
actually six actors and actresses who have played the role. This “extra” Dongfang Bubai is from
a Taiwanese series that is not an adaptation of Proud, but that includes a rendition of this
character combined with other elements from traditional Chinese folklore and contemporary
popular culture.
Unlike Jin Yong’s other works discussed in the previous chapters, Proud does not touch
on any issues of ethnicity or national loyalty. However, the element of ethnicity is injected into
the story’s visual adaptations, at the same time magnifying the themes of gender and sexuality.
Not all the adaptations make use of the ethnicity element, and those that do also vary in how
much importance they designate the non-Chinese. This additional element in Proud’s adaptations
thus transforms it from a story of political struggles to struggle between ethnicities. However, the
lack of ethnicity in the novel does not make it especially suitable for television adaptation
because it is a political allegory of the Cultural Revolution. Dongfang Bubai is only one of the
many school leaders in Proud, which are all portrayed as twisted individuals due to the
corruption of power. When there are no longer homosexual relationships depicted in the
television series, the focus of the different versions shifts from politics to romance. The image of
the various Dongfang Bubais became more feminine as time progressed. It gradually moved
from gender neutral robes to extravagant face makeup, hairpieces, and sometimes costumes that
accentuate the breasts.

183

5.1 The Novel Proud, Smiling Wanderer
Proud is Jin Yong’s tenth novel, originally serialized in Ming Pao from 1967 to 1969. Of
Jin Yong’s novels, only Proud and Ode to Gallantry have no specific historical setting. The
novel centers on the power conflict between different martial arts schools, and the personal
struggles to attain martial arts skills. Jin Yong points out in Proud’s “Postscript” 後記 that many
characters were designed after politicians.
225
The power struggle within Proud’s context is
exhibited through a triangular relationship between the pursuit of martial arts, the pursuit of
power, and gender-bending.
The central conflict in Proud revolves around the struggles within and between the Five
Swords Schools’ Alliance 五岳劍派 and the Sun Moon Sect 日月神教. The five schools are Mt.
Hua School 華山派, Mt. Song 嵩山, Mt. Tai 泰山, and the two Mt. Hengs. The pronunciation of
the two Mt. Hengs is the same in both Cantonese and Mandarin. Therefore, they are typically
differentiated in speech by identifying their geographical locations in relation to each other. They
are referred to as the Northern Mt. Heng 北岳恆山 and the Southern Mt. Heng 南岳衡山. Other
schools that are important in the novel are also associated with different mountain ranges,
including the Shaolin Temple of Mt. Song, Mt. Wudang 武當山, Mt. Qingcheng 青城山, and the
Sun Moon Sect’s headquarters which is located on top of Black Wood Cliff 黑木崖.
Power in the martial grove can be divided into two types. One is the actual strength of the
martial arts technique, and the other is the amount of social influence it has. The latter type of
power is linked to social status and recognition, which sometimes comes with established
powerful martial artists, but it can also be associated with chivalrous deeds or wealth. In Proud,

225
Jin Yong, “Postscript” 後記, in Proud, 1689-1692.
184

the male characters that do reach the apex of power in terms of martial arts and social influence
are only able to do so by practicing the Sacred Sunflower Scroll 葵花寶典. The Sunflower Scroll
technique requires castration, a self-mutilation that results in gender and sexual abnormality.
There are four post-castrated male characters towards the end of Proud, but only three of them
are Sunflower Scroll practitioners, Dongfang Bubai, Yue Buqun 岳不群, and Lin Pingzhi 林平
之. Dongfang Bubai is the only one that becomes a homosexual, while the other two men do not
show any signs of altered gender behaviors or changes in sexual preferences. The other castrated
character, Tian Boguang 田伯光, does not practice the Sunflower Scroll, and does not display
any behavioral changes post-castration. These characters will be discussed in more detail below.
Proud only features men competing with each other for political power. The women who
are in positions of power are stripped of their femininity and traditional roles as women. The
only women leaders in the Five Schools are the Buddhist nuns of the Northern Heng School.
When the three leading nuns die, the school’s leadership position is passed on to Linghu Chong,
a man who is not originally a part of the school. As for the other female character who is
powerful, Ren Yingying 任盈盈, she is able to retain her femininity by staying far away from the
center of power, and dedicating her time to music and romantic love.
The gender issues become more important late in the novel, after the appearance of
Dongfang Bubai in the thirty-first chapter. The first half of Proud focuses on the difference
between the good and evil martial arts. The male protagonist, Linghu Chong, does not actively
take part in the schools’ political intrigues. He is a character who seeks to untangle himself from
these struggles. His most important quest in Proud is not to acquire the best techniques or to
become a school leader, but to overcome the father figure’s emotional influence. The story rarely
185

diverts from Linghu Chong’s perspective after his formal introduction. It is not until the later
cinematic and television adaptations that he loses the spotlight.
Like all Jin Yong novels, Linghu Chong does not appear at the beginning of the novel.
The story opens with Lin Pingzhi, who learns of Linghu Chong through others’ stories. He first
overhears a conversation between other Mt. Hua students at an inn. Then, Lin Pingzhi hears
about Linghu Chong again through the narration of a young nun, Yilin 儀琳 of the Northern
Heng School. She tells her teacher and the other elders of her capture by (pre-castration) Tian
Boguang, and how Linghu Chong almost lost his life while rescuing her. The reader learns about
Linghu Chong’s chivalrous deeds before his formal appearance through Lin Pingzhi’s
perspective of Yilin’s recount. Lin Pingzhi’s part of the narrative ends temporarily with him
coming under the tutelage of Yue Buqun, later to play a more significant role.
Linghu Chong’s rescue of Yilin is what Wei Zhengtong lists as the second standard of
chivalry, which is helping those in need. Linghu Chong and Yilin, though both are students of
the Five Schools, have never met before their journey to the Southern Heng School. This rescue
mission establishes his chivalric and carefree characterization. Linghu Chong demonstrates
chivalry in other ways later on, including interfering in the affairs of the Mt. Song School, and
assisting a martial artist who is greatly outnumbered in battle. Linghu Chong and Xiao Feng
share a love of alcohol, but Linghu Chong is not a wu masculine character. He is constantly
involved in romantic relationships with different women, and his eventual martial arts progress is
not based on physical strength, but based on the speed of his movements.
Linghu Chong’s teacher and surrogate father figure, Yue Buqun, is the leader of the Mt.
Hua School. Yue Buqun’s nom de guerre is Gentlemanly Sword 君子劍, although he is typically
referred to as a Hypocrite 偽君子 by others. In Jin Yong’s works, when the father figure is
186

present, he is always problematic. Yue Buqun’s Confucian learning is an important factor that
influences his attitude when disciplining students. He underscores the importance of remaining
true to justice and repelling evil, which are values based along the lines of school affiliation. The
Five Schools Alliance was formed in order to contend with the growing influence of the “evil”
Sun Moon Sect. Whether the schools are in or outside of the Alliance, they generally consider
themselves reputable and righteous (mingmen zhengpai 名門正派). Anything or anybody who is
outside of these self-identified righteous schools are considered malevolent.
Yue Buqun expels Linghu Chong from the Mt. Hua School in the middle of the novel.
Linghu Chong’s primary technique after his departure from the school is the Nine Swords of
Dugu 獨孤九劍, which was passed down through a minor branch of the Mt. Hua School. The
Nine Swords is a set of techniques invented to break up the attacks of different types of weapons,
ranging from arrows to sabers. The main goal of the techniques is to be faster than one’s
opponents, minimalizing their chances of attacking to begin with. The Nine Swords, unlike other
sword techniques, has no set performance of any steps (zhao 招). Lacking predetermined order
of performance is preferable because this eliminates the possibility of the opponent’s anticipation
(wuzhao sheng youzhao 無招勝有招). This is a declaration that good swordsmanship, or martial
arts in general, does not come from strictly following the manual or from cultivating qi, instead it
is integral to be swift and flexible when in battle. It does not matter how powerful or varied a set
of techniques are if one is too slow in performance. The need for speed minimalizes the time
required in battle, and also reduces the possibility of suffering injuries. Swiftness in martial arts
becomes the universal key to mastering all types of techniques. The Sunflower Scroll allows one
to be powerful because the qi can flow in a direction that allows one to move in more quickly
once the penis is removed.
187

Linghu Chong’s desire to be readmitted into the Mt. Hua School ends when he discovers
that his former teacher is practicing the Sunflower Scroll. The techniques that Yue Buqun uses to
blind the former Alliance leader and to kill the Northern Heng nuns closely resemble those used
by Dongfang Bubai, which also means that Yue Buqun is castrated. Yue Buqun’s status as
Linghu Chong’s surrogate father is disqualified with this transformation. Linghu Chong’s
emotional burden can only be released through the physical removal of the father’s manhood.
Yue Buqun’s daughter and wife also die very soon after his castration, removing him from the
context of the family since he is no longer able to fulfill the role of father and husband. It is only
after the death of Linghu Chong’s surrogate father and Ren Yingying’s biological father that the
two are able to form their own family.
Yue Buqun and Lin Pingzhi are castrated very late in the novel, and never display any
signs of homosexuality. Lin Pingzhi displays many feminine characteristics, even before
castration. He is originally the young master of Fuwei Escort 福威鏢局, and is known for his
comely features. His attractiveness is reinforced repeatedly, and he is generally compared to
beautiful women. However, unlike Chen Jialuo, Lin Pingzhi is not portrayed as a learned
character. Lin Pingzhi is so beautiful that he attracts unwanted attention from men on a daily
basis. He is described as “greatly resembling his mother, his brows are clean-cut and his eyes are
beautiful. He is quite handsome indeed. Usually if any man looked at him with a flirtatious
expression, Lin Pingzhi would definitely give him a good slap on the face” 林平之相貌像他母
親, 眉清目秀, 甚是俊美, 平日只消有哪個男人向他擠眉弄眼的瞧上一眼, 勢必一個耳光打了
過去.
226
Described as closely resembling his mother, his features are already established as the
feminine type of attractiveness. His femininity is not emphasized later on, and his post-castration

226
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 1, 11.
188

transformation is noted by his change of voice and his donning of very colorful (haohua 好花)
attire. Lin Pingzhi’s clothing is described as ostentatious but not gaudy. His post-castration
appearance is presented through Linghu Chong’s perspective.
He [Lin Pingzhi] reined the horse and jumped down. Carrying the sword on his back, he
walked quickly towards the Qingcheng School men. Linghu Chong took a moment to
register the scene, and saw that Lin Pingzhi wore a jade-green robe. The hem and the
sleeves were embroidered with dark golden flowers, outlined by gold thread. On his waist
was a golden ribbon that flashed with movement. It was indeed all very bright and
magnificent. Linghu Chong thought, “Younger Brother Lin has always dressed simply,
now that he is married, he is so different. It is only reasonable, he gained so much at a
young age, and married such a good wife, of course he should be expressing himself
gaily.”
227

他將馬一勒, 飛身下馬, 長劍負在背上, 快步向青城人眾走來. 令狐沖一定神, 見他穿
的是一件翠綠衫子, 袍角和衣袖上都繡了深黃色的花朵, 金線滾邊, 腰中繫著一條金
帶, 走動時閃閃生光, 果然是十分的華麗燦爛, 心想: “ 林師弟本來十分樸素, 一做新
郎, 登時大不相同了. 那也難怪, 少年得意, 娶得這樣的媳婦, 自是興高采烈, 要盡情的
打扮一番.”

The focus is on Lin Pingzhi’s agility and clothing, but his physical attractiveness is no longer
mentioned. The bright and luxurious clothing does not reflect any gender altering behavior or
desires. Clothing is a symbol of power for Lin Pingzhi. Before the fall of his family, he first
appears in the novel wearing brilliant robes (jinyi 錦衣).
228
The simplicity that Linghu Chong
mentions is only temporary. It takes place when Lin Pingzhi is under the mercy of Yue Buqun,
stripped of power and status as a Mt. Hua disciple. Unlike Dongfang Bubai, Lin Pingzhi remains
in the public realm in pursuit of his enemies after his castration. There is no mention of whether
he takes homosexual interests or if he desires to be a woman later on because he is only driven
by the desire to avenge his parents.
Tian Boguang’s castration is unrelated to martial arts learning. He serves as a contrast to
the other three men because he is the only castrated man that is not practicing the Sunflower

227
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 35, 1429.
228
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 1, 7.
189

Scroll. His castration is a form of punishment meted out by a Buddhist monk. Castration is not
just an atonement for all the women he has violated in the past. It also serves as a guarantee for
the future safety of women in general. After his castration, Tian Boguang does not lose interest
in women or take up feminine habits. He even falls sincerely in love with the nun Yilin, which is
also a strong contrast to the other three men who kill their wives post-castration. Tian Boguang is
able to retain a little bit of his lecherous traits, in which he is able to smell the presence of
women. This “skill” is only revealed when the Northern Heng nuns are kidnapped.
The last of the castrated characters is also the most powerful and famous. As the leader of
the Sun Moon Sect, Dongfang Bubai is mentioned numerous times throughout the novel, but
he/she does not appear until towards the end. Dongfang is a compound surname that consists of
two characters, literally meaning east side. His given name “Bubai” literally translates to
invincible. The mysterious Sun Moon Sect leader is presented through the perspective of his
opponents: Linghu Chong, former Sect leader Ren Woxing 任我行, his daughter Ren Yingying,
and former Sect official Xiang Wentian 向問天, who is also Linghu Chong’s elder sworn-
brother. When the four capture Black Wood Cliff, the physical appearance of the famed
unbeatable martial artist takes them all by surprise.
The room was filled with flowers, and the aroma of rouge and powder was very
overpowering. At the eastern wall was a vanity, sitting in front of it was an individual
dressed in a pink robe. They held an embroidery stretcher frame in the left hand and an
embroidery needle in the right. When he looked up, there was an expression of awe on his
face, but his surprise was nothing compared to Ren Woxing and the others. Other than
Linghu Chong, all others have known this man as the person who had ousted Ren Woxing
to become the new Sect leader. And over the past ten years, he has been reputed as being
the most powerful martial artist in the realm. Yet, he has now shaved off his beard, and
even powdered his face. The robe on him is neither for male nor female; the gaudiness of
the color would even be too ostentatious on a young maiden like Ren Yingying. Such a
commanding and terrifying martial oddity has hidden in his boudoir to sew!
229

229
All translations from Proud are mine.
190

房內花團錦簇, 脂粉濃香撲鼻, 東首一張梳妝台畔坐著一人, 身穿粉紅衣衫, 左手拿著
一個繡花繃架, 右手持著一枚繡花針, 抬起頭來, 臉有詫異之色. 但這人臉上的驚訝神
態, 卻又遠不如任我行等人之甚. 除了令狐沖之外, 眾人都認得這人明明便是奪取了
日月神教教主之位, 十餘年來號稱武功天下第一的東方不敗. 可是此刻他剃光了鬍鬚,
臉上竟然施了脂粉, 身上那件衣衫式樣男不男, 女不女, 顏色之妖, 便穿在盈盈身上,
也顯得太嬌艷, 太刺眼了些. 這樣一位驚天動地, 威震當世的武林怪傑, 竟然躲在閨房
之中刺繡!
230

Dongfang Bubai claims that his change in gender and sexual orientation took place after
he started practicing the Sunflower Scroll. Because he is dressed in women’s attire, he is no
longer fit to be seen by his subordinates. This is why he hid from the public, and let Yang
Lianting handle the Sect’s affairs.
“Such is my fate. When I practiced that Sunflower Scroll, I followed its instructions in
castrating myself to cultivate my qi and consumed the prescribed supplements.
Gradually, my beard disappeared, my voice changed, and even my personality changed.
Since then, I was no longer interested in women, I killed my seven concubines, but …but
then I gave all my attention to this hairy man, Yang Liangting. It would have been
wonderful if I was born a woman.”
231

冤孽, 冤孽, 我練那葵花寶典, 照著寶典上的秘方, 自宮練氣, 煉丹服藥, 漸漸的鬍子沒
有了, 說話聲音變了, 性子也變了. 我從此不愛女子, 把七個小妾都殺了, 卻… 卻把全
副心意放在楊蓮亭這鬚眉男子身上, 倘若我生為女兒身, 那就好了.

His desire to be a woman is so intense that he greatly envies Ren Yingying.
Dongfang Bubai sighed, and said lightly, “I do not think I treated you extremely well, but
I have always envied you greatly. When a person is born a woman, it is a hundred times
better than being a stinky man. Not to mention you are so young and beautiful. If I could
switch places with you, who would care to be the mere leader of Sun Moon Sect, I
wouldn’t even want to be an emperor.”
232

東方不敗又歎了口氣, 幽幽的道: “ 很好是談不上, 只不過我一直很羨慕你. 一個人生
而為女子, 已比臭男子幸運百倍, 何況你這般千嬌百媚, 青春年少. 我若得能和你易地
而處, 別說是日月神教的教主, 就算是皇帝老子, 我也不做.

The four are only able to overcome Dongfang Bubai when Ren Yingying takes Yang Lianting
hostage. Dongfang Bubai willingly surrenders to save his lover.

230
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 31, 1281-1282.
231
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 31, 1291.
232
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 31, 1286.
191

Lin Pingzhi and Dongfang Bubai are the first and last examples of those practicing the
Sunflower Scroll. While Lin Pingzhi’s femininity is reinforced early on, his form of emasculation
is limited to a change in his style of dress. Dongfang Bubai’s self-description of his pre-
castration life indicates that he was much closer to the wu masculinity than Lin Pingzhi, but he
became a complete transgender. Such emasculation topples the traditional trope of women being
polluting factors, especially for the wu masculine figures. For Dongfang Bubai, the polluting
factor is himself, who is neither a man nor a woman. It is originally a strong desire to learn great
martial arts that drove the three men to willingly give up their natural forms. The attainment of
such superb abilities changes their physical forms and psychology at the same time. Dongfang
Bubai wanted to dominate the martial grove with brute force, but after he attains invincibility, his
only desire is to be a woman.
Despite his great strength and influence, Dongfang Bubai is portrayed as grotesque. Jin
Yong vilifies Dongfang Bubai through his sexual and gender abnormalities. During the novel’s
initial serialization in the 1960s, homosexuality was still considered an illness. In the United
States, homosexuality was not removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders (DSM) until 1973.
Emasculation and castration are important elements in Proud, but the number of blind
men in the novel heavily outnumber those who are castrated. There are ten male characters that
are blinded by the end of the novel, either losing just one or both eyes. These characters include
Ren Woxing, the former Alliance leader Zuo Lengchan 左冷禪, Lin Pingzhi, and seven unnamed
swordsmen whose eyes were slit by Linghu Chong in one move. The characters’ blindness
reflects the political environment when the story was serialized. Blindness is not limited to the
inability to see, but it is a blindness of the mind. The Sect and Mt. Song School’s leaders lead
192

blindly, and thus their subordinates follow blindly. The power struggles between the leaders of
the Alliance and the Sect are only downsized versions of the number of people who participated
in the Cultural Revolution.
Since the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, all of Jin Yong’s major works have
included a cult leader figure. In addition to the two Sun Moon Sect leaders, there are Ding
Chunqiu 丁春秋 from Demi-Gods and Hong Antong from Deer. While Ding Chunqiu and Hong
Antong only play minor roles as leaders of marginal schools, Dongfang Bubai and Ren Woxing
are the most ostentatious of this character trope. They lead a large and influential group of
martial artists that are so formidable that other schools must ally with each other to compete in
influence. After Dongfang Bubai assumes power over the Sect, his subordinates must chant
“Long Live the Leader to unite the rivers and lakes” 教主千秋萬載, 一統江湖 when they greet
their leader. There are complaints from senior Sect members that the Leader has been doting on
younger followers, promoting them even if they have no merit. Dongfang Bubai instills great
fear and admiration inside and outside of the Sect. Part of this fear and mysteriousness is due to
his limited presence in public. Although this is done on purpose, it is not for the sake of inspiring
awe. Even Dongfang Bubai knows that his actions would draw ridicule from others and
undermine his authority. The chants and preference for youthful followers all point to the Sect’s
cult-like characteristics that were exhibited by Mao Zedong during the Cultural Revolution. Ren
Woxing also enjoys these compliments after resuming power, and even adds “saintly” to his own
title to become Saintly Leader 聖教主.
The novel’s focus on Linghu Chong never shifts after his formal appearance. While he is
not an active participant in the struggle for power within the Alliance or in the Sect, he is
affected by the actions of those who do actively engage in the intrigues for power. As stated
193

above, Dongfang Bubai’s role in the novel is very limited. His importance is much less than that
of Yue Buqun and Lin Pingzhi. However, it is this strange but minor character that becomes the
focus in Tsui Hark’s Swordsman films in the 1990s.

5.2 Swordsman II and Asia the Invincible
The Swordsman trilogy is the second cinematic adaptation of Proud. The first is the Shaw
Brothers’ The Proud Youth 笑傲江湖 from 1978, directed by Sun Chung 孫仲.
233
The Proud
Youth was exported to Taiwan. Therefore, the characters were all renamed because the ban on
Jin Yong’s fiction was not yet lifted. Tsui Hark is the producer of the The Swordsman trilogy,
which had releases in 1990, 1992, and 1993. So far, there have been no more Proud film
adaptations. The trilogy had various directors, including King Hu, Tony Ching 程小東, and
Raymond Lee 李惠民. Unlike the novel, the film injects a historical setting and the theme of
ethnicity into the plot. All three films are set in the Ming Dynasty’s Wanli 萬歷 reign (1573-
1620). The first film focuses on the conflict over the Sunflower Scroll. Despite the many changes
from the novel, the first film is able to retain the original spirit of Proud. Brigitte Lin’s Dongfang
Bubai does not appear until the second film; he continues to be the center of focus in the third.
Dongfang Bubai’s name is translated as Asia the Invincible in the films’ English subtitles.
Linghu Chong, translated as Ling in the English subtitles, appears in the first two films, but only
Asia is left in the third film. When referring to the characters within the films, I use the films’
English translations instead of the Chinese transliteration.

233
The Proud Youth 笑傲江湖 (Dir. Sun Chung 孫仲, perf. Wong Yu, and Shih Szu 施思, Shaw Brothers, 1978).

194

For this section, I only focus on the second film because it has the most influence on later
television adaptations’ portrayal of Dongfang Bubai, and the plot is still somewhat relevant to
Proud. Swordsman II takes a wild reinterpretation of the originally minor villain Dongfang
Bubai, who becomes both the hero(ine) and the villain at the same time. The focus of the second
film is no longer on the Sunflower Scroll, but on the romantic relationship between Ling and
Asia.
Asia is still the leader of the Sun Moon Sect, but they are portrayed as Miao 苗 and not
Han Chinese. Miao is translated as Highlanders in the English subtitles. Asia is leading the Sect
to revolt against the Ming, with the assistance of the wokou 倭寇. The wokou were pirates that
raided the East Asian and Southeast Asian coastlines from the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries.
These pirates were composed of people from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds, but
the film portrays them as Japanese. While the wokou characters were dubbed over in Japanese,
there are no language barriers between the pirates and Asia. The pirates understands Asia’s
Chinese speech, and Asia also comprehends their Japanese. The Highlander Sect is not simply
resisting against the Ming because they desire to be their own sovereigns, but are attempting to
be the new rulers of the Middle Kingdom. The chants from the novel are interpreted slightly
differently to mean that the Leader will conquer the whole empire. Although the desire for
supreme martial arts is still important in the films, the practicalities of war are also well
considered. The presence of guns and canons indicate that the Ming, Highlanders, and the pirates
were interacting with western powers at the time. However, these non-Asian characters never
appear on screen.
Brigitte Lin's career began in Taiwan in the 1970s, mainly starring in romantic dramas
that were adapted from Qiongyao’s novels. The relocation of her career from Taiwan to Hong
195

Kong put her in touch with martial arts films. Brigitte Lin is one of the few actresses that were
able to gain popularity in more than one film genre. Best known for being a great beauty (da
meiren 大美人), Brigitte Lin’s Asia serves as a strong contrast to the grotesque portrayal of
Dongfang Bubai in the novel.
When Asia is a woman in reality, the relationship between Ling and Asia is differentiated
from Dongfang Bubai and Yang Lianting’s homosexual relationship. Brigitte Lin's femininity is
openly displayed, especially in the scene when she first meets Ling at the beach. The pale skin,
rouged lips, jet-black long hair, and the bright red robe all accentuate the feminine features. This
is why Ling mistakes Asia for being a woman, addressing her as “miss” (guniang 姑娘). Along
with Brigitte Lin, the two other leading actresses in Swordsman II, Rosamund Kwan 關芝琳 and
Michelle Reis 李嘉欣, are also iconic actresses of the 1980s and 1990s. Each actress represents a
different generation within Chinese cinema. However, the three women are not playing the roles
of standard beautiful women in the film. Brigitte Lin plays a castrated man, Michelle Reis plays
a tomboy, and Rosamund Kwan’s Ren Yingying is an exoticized Highlander Sun Moon Sect
subdivision leader.
Petrus Liu suggests that Dongfang Bubai/Asia is a half-man, half-woman individual that
is closer to a non-gendered body.
234
Yet I think Dongfang Bubai/Asia can be more appropriately
described as sexless and not gender-less. In terms of biological sex, since Dongfang Bubai/Asia
has been castrated, he is no longer able to produce offspring. In terms of gender, Dongfang
Bubai/Asia’s female garb and makeup in both the novel and in the visual adaptations contradict
Petrus Liu's point. After all, gender is performance.
235
Asia is closer to the female-maling

234
Liu, Stateless Subjects, 153-200.
235
Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990).
196

discussed by Tan See-kam and Annette Aw in reference to The Love Eterne 梁山伯與祝英台.
236

Cross-dressing in Chinese cinema has minimized since the huangmei 黃梅 operas fell out of
fashion. Brigitte Lin's Asia is similar to Ivy Ling Po's 凌波 role as Liang Shanbo 梁山伯, who is
also a woman playing the part of a man. Brigitte Lin's Asia adds one more layer to this cross-
dressing performance, because the character she plays is a man who desires to be a woman, thus
it is “female-maling-femaling.” The audience follows Asia's metamorphosis through the
comments of his concubine, Cici 詩詩 (played by Candice Yu 余安安). Cici’s body later
becomes an important link between Asia and Ling when she is forced to be Asia’s substitute in
spending the night with Ling. When she commits suicide, the link between Asia and Ling
disappears, followed by Asia’s death and Ling’s retirement from the rivers and lakes. Ling’s
masculinity crisis is never resolved because he never finds out who he spent the night with. This
“homosexual” relationship is left hanging when the second film ends, and is no longer addressed
when Asia “comes back to life” in the third film. This hanging homosexual relationship is only
resolved in later television series.

5.3 Television Adaptations with Men Playing Dongfang Bubai
TVB was one of the first television stations to adapt Jin Yong’s fiction. Between 1978
and 2001, TVB produced twenty-two Jin Yong adaptations and five Jin Yong-related dramas,
making them the most prolific of the television stations that have produced Jin Yong series thus
far. TVB produced two of the three television versions of Proud with men as Dongfang Bubai.

236
See-kam Tan and Annette Aw, “The Love Eterne: Almost a (Heterosexual) Love Story,” in Chinese Films in
Focus II, ed. Chris Berry (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008). The Love Eterne was directed by Lee Han-hsiang
李翰祥 (1926-1996) and produced by the Shaw Brothers in 1963.

197

TVB’s The Smiling, Proud Wanderer from 1984 was the first television adaptation of Proud,
with Kong Ngai 江毅 (1931-2013) as Dongfang Bubai.
237
TVB’s second adaptation is titled State
of Divinity in English, and was produced in 1996 with Henry Lo 魯振順 as Dongfang Bubai. The
1985 adaptation of Proud has no English title. It was produced in Taiwan by Yang Peipei 楊佩
佩 for Taiwan Television (TTV), with Qian Demen 乾德門 as Dongfang Bubai.
238
Yang Peipei
produced another version of Proud in 2000, discussed below.
TVB was founded in 1967 by Run Run Shaw, John Douglas Clague 祈德尊 (1917-1981),
and Harold Lee 利孝和 (1910-1980), but the station is typically associated with the Shaw family.
When Run Run Shaw’s health declined, his second wife Mona Fong 方逸華 was mainly
responsible for running his entertainment businesses. TVB was Hong Kong’s first broadcast
television station, and it is still in business today. The only other free Hong Kong television in
the past few decades was Asia Television 亞洲電視 (ATV, 1973-2016), which only produced a
small number of Jin Yong series that never garnered much popularity. During the heyday of
TVB, they produced many landmark television series, variety shows, singing contests, and
beauty pageants that have influenced generations of Hong Kongers and shaped the Sinophone
entertainment industry.
TVB’s television series are exported to many locations. They are generally dubbed into
Mandarin, Vietnamese, Khmer, and Thai. The consumption of TVB products is not limited to
Chinese-speaking communities. The extension of eligibility for overseas Chinese to participate in
the singing contests and beauty pageants has also integrated the nonlocals into mainstream Hong

237
The Smiling, Proud Wanderer 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Lee Ting-Luen 李鼎倫, perf. Chow Yun-fat 周潤發 and Rebecca
Chan 陳秀珠, TVB, 1984).
238
Xiao’ao Jianghu 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Yang Peipei 楊佩佩, perf. Bryan Leung 梁家仁 and Leanne Liu 劉雪華,
Taiwan Television 臺灣電視公司, 1985).
198

Kong popular culture. The Cantonese themes songs that were paired with the television series
also gave birth to the first generation of Cantopop stars, song writers, and lyricists. TVB’s
influence on the Cantonese music industry has significantly decreased since 2009, when conflict
over royalties broke out between the television giant and the Hong Kong Recording Industry
Alliance (HKRIA) 香港音像聯盟. Despite the resolution between the two parties in 2012, TVB
has never been able to regain its stature in local pop culture, or amend the relationship with the
members of the HKRIA.
A majority of the TVB Jin Yong series were produced by two producers, Wong Tin Lam
王天林 (1927-2010) and Lee Tim-Sing 李添勝 (1948- ). Although TVB is an extension of the
Shaw Brothers’ empire, the television branch operates differently. Each series is the sole
responsibility of a producer, who gathers their own team of scriptwriters, directors, and actors.
There are a few directors for each production, and one director is responsible for shooting their
assigned episodes, which are not necessarily in chronological order. Wong Tim Lam produced
three Jin Yong series in the 1980s. Only his 1983 version of Legend is a major work.
239
Lee Tim-
Sing produced nine Jin Yong series, beginning in 1984 with The Duke of Mount Deer 鹿鼎記,
240

and ending with Crimson Saber 碧血劍 in 2000.
241
TVB sometimes slightly altered the plots and
characters, but there were never any radical reinterpretations. In comparison to the some of the
recent productions by other companies, TVB’s series are more faithful to the novels. The five Jin
Yong-related series are not actual adaptations. They are offshoots of the novels that focus on

239
The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄傳 (Prod. Wong Tin Lam, perf. Felix Wong 黃日華 and Barbara
Yung 翁美玲, TVB, 1983).
240
The Duke of Mount Deer 鹿鼎記 (Prod. Lee Tim-Sing, perf. Tony Leung Chiu-Wai 梁朝偉 and Andy Lau 劉德
華, TVB, 1984).
241
Crimson Saber 碧血劍 (Prod. Lee Tim-Sing, perf. Gordon Lam 林家棟 and Charmaine Sheh 佘詩曼, TVB,
2000).
199

supporting characters, and they share similarities with fan fiction. This cluster of Jin Yong-
related series was only produced between 1992 and 1993, and was never remade. A majority of
the cast were not A-listers at that time because these series were produced to be sold overseas.
For a list of these Jin Yong-related series, see Appendix 8. Although Taiwanese and Singaporean
companies were also producing Jin Yong series in the 1990s, they never surpassed TVB’s
influence and abundance. Some of the more recent productions from China have adopted TVB’s
revisions in narration to make it easier for the audience to follow complicated plotlines. The wide
dissemination of the television series reaches a larger audience than the novels, which are often
limited by the written language barrier. Although Jin Yong wrote in Chinese script, his use of
traditional vernacular is very different from contemporary Chinese in all Sinophone locations.
When paired with the visual images, the dubbed script or subtitles makes Jin Yong’s fictive
world much easier to understand.
State of Divinity (1996) is the version that is most loyal to the novel thus far, despite
being produced after Swordsman II. Lee Tim-Sing’s adaptions of Jin Yong’s major works have
all been fairly loyal to the originals, including his versions of Legend, Return, and Demi-Gods.
However, his adaptations of the lesser works have significant plot and character changes. The
faithfulness of State of Divinity (1996) to Proud is both in large and small aspects, from the plot
down to different characters’ weapons. There are clear distinctions in the different types of
swords used by the different schools. Because all the members of the Alliance use swords as
their primary weapons, the different colors, lengths, and widths of the props presented contribute
to differentiating between the dozens of sword bearers. Other adaptations of Proud pairs Ren
Yingying with a whip, which is what Ren Yingying uses in the Swordsman films, but Fiona
Leung’s Ren Yingying uses the short double sword. The order of the major characters’
200

introduction in the series is also retained. This significantly limits the screen time of some actors
when they are introduced halfway into the series. However, this arrangement is better at
explaining the characters’ different personalities in relation to the conflicts that takes place in
different stages of the story.
State of Divinity (1996) does make a few changes by adding a subplot that is not in the
novel. The three extra episodes focus on the poisoned Ren Yingying. This subjects her to the role
of the damsel in distress, which is never the case in Proud. She is one of the few resourceful
female protagonists that never suffers any physical injuries or needs the hero to rescue her from
dire situations. This subplot may only be a part of the international version, which has forty-three
episodes; the local version has only forty episodes. The discussion below is based on the
international version because that is the only one I have been able to see.
Unlike many other of Lee Tim-Sing’s Jin Yong productions, State of Divinity (1996) does
not have any superstars at the time, and it did not launch any of the actors into superstardom. A
majority of the actors from this series has left the entertainment business. Jackie Lui 呂頌賢,
who played Linghu Chong, was ATV’s contract actor until he left in 1995 to work for ATV’s
longtime competitor. Like all ATV veterans’ situations in TVB, Jackie Lui did not receive many
opportunities. State of Divinity (1996) is his only major work at TVB, and it is still his only
representative work at this point. All his other works at ATV or TVB never garnered much
popularity because they were small productions, or his role is not as significant as that of Linghu
Chong’s.
Henry Lo, the actor who played Dongfang Bubai in State of Divinity (1996), has always
been a minor actor in the company. While he is still currently working for TVB, his career has
not moved forward. The later high profile actresses who played Dongfang Bubai were meant to
201

share the center of attention with the other leads, despite their limited roles. Henry Lo’s costume
and makeup closely resemble Dongfang Bubai’s description in the novel. His facial features,
body shape, and height all contribute to his awkwardness in women’s clothing, with no desire to
beautify him. His rectangular face is not rounded out with contouring, and his complexion is
exaggerated with overly done blush and lipstick.
Without any attempts to beautify and normalize Dongfang Bubai in State of Divinity
(1996), both the actor and the series stand out in the post-1992 productions. The choice to remain
loyal to Proud not only defies the popular trend of having women play Dongfang Bubai at that
time, but also indicates that the producers were unafraid of the series’ political references. The
year the series was released also coincided with a unique time in Hong Kong, one year before the
handover in 1997. TVB’s productions were exported to China at that time, but the target
audience was still locals. Hong Kong productions were not wary of Chinese censors until the
recent years. In the past, the Mainland television stations censored all of the parts they thought
were inappropriate. Although Jin Yong has never shied away from the connection between
Proud and the Cultural Revolution, the novel’s lack of a specified historical setting allows for
open interpretations, and it can be applied to different cultures and countries as a political
allegory. Jin Yong notes in Proud’s “Postscript” that Vietnamese senators called each other Yue
Buqun and Zuo Lengchan during debates.
242
The political aspect is unavoidable when presented
on screen because the story would be incomplete without the Sect and the Five Schools’ leaders.
However, the focus of the plot can be shifted to downplay the importance of politics.

242
Jin Yong, “Postscript,” 1691.
202

5.4 Television Adaptations with Women Playing Dongfang Bubai
Having a woman play Dongfang Bubai in the Swordsman films originally resolved the
issue of on screen homosexuality, especially when the romantic relationship shifted to involve
the hero of the story. Yet Tsui Hark’s innovation provided later producers with a strategy to
dodge some of the political references that are inherent to Proud. When a women plays
Dongfang Bubai, the element of romance can be safely magnified, or even take the center of
attention. When the relationships of the female Dongfang Bubais in later television series are
emphasized, the various portrayals of Yang Lianting also increase in importance.
Since TVB’s last Jin Yong series in 2001, all of the later series, whether produced by
Taiwanese or Chinese companies, have been filmed and aired in China. After the mid-2000s,
these are mostly co-productions between Chinese, Hong Kong, or Taiwanese companies. Since
the 2010s, these series have been predominantly Mainland productions with actors from various
Sinophone locations. In order to be released in China, the scripts must be sensitive to the PRC
censorship. In China, one Jin Yong series is released almost every other year, even though all of
them are now repeats. The novels’ content is constantly renewed in the minds of the younger
generations with each new production.
One major challenge to adapting Jin Yong’s works in China is the treatment of ethnicity.
In Zhang Jizhong’s 張紀中 adaptation of Deer in 2008 (English title Royal Tramp), the term dazi
韃子 was forbidden.
243
When the Ming loyalists curse the Manchus, they had to use replacement
terms to express their anger and xenophobic reactions. The complete relocation of dramatic
production from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore to the Mainland shows that Jin Yong is

243
Royal Tramp 鹿鼎記 (Prod. Zhang Jizhong 張紀中, perf. Huang Xiaoming 黃曉明 and Wallace Chung 鍾漢良,
CCTV, 2008).
203

fully accepted and enjoys wide popularity “back home.” Yet the visual adaptations can no longer
enjoy the freedom they once had in the Sinophone communities. The Chinese market, though
massive and seemingly inexhaustible, throws the reins on what were once expressions of literary
freedom.
Two television adaptions of Proud with female Dongfang Bubais were released in
Taiwan and Singapore in 2000, quickly followed by another production in Mainland China in
2001, and then in 2013. There is also a Taiwanese series that features a female Dongfang Bubai
from 1996, but it is not an adaptation of Proud. The productions from the early 2000s all have
female Dongfang Bubais, but they vary in the degree of the characters’ importance and his/her
femininity. It takes another decade for Dongfang Bubai’s character to go through a complete
“sex change” in Swordsman (2013). Not only does this completely eradicate the homosexuality
aspect from the series, it also resolves the issue of emasculation that is not addressed in the films
and other television adaptations.
Taiwan CTV’s Heavenly Ghost Catcher 天師鍾馗 from 1996 is not an adaptation of
Proud. However, it is the earliest television series that features a female Dongfang Bubai.
244

Heavenly Ghost Catcher follows the adventures of Zhong Kui 鍾馗, a ghost-catcher in Chinese
folklore. This series is an anthology that combines numerous characters from Chinese folklore,
classical Chinese literature, contemporary novels, and contemporary Chinese films. In addition
to Dongfang Bubai (played by Cynthia Khan 楊麗菁), the ghost catcher and his sidekicks also
encounter Nie Xiaoqian 聶小倩, Judge Bao 包, Madame Du 杜十娘, and Pan Jinlian 潘金蓮.
Cynthia Khan’s Dongfang Bubai appears in the segment named “Sacred Sunflower Scroll” 葵花

244
Heavenly Ghost Catcher 天師鍾馗 (Prod. Keung Leung-Kam 姜良鑒, perf. Jin Chao-chun 金超群 and Fan
Hung-hsuan 范鴻軒, CTV, 1996).
204

寶典, which includes a lot of other elements from Jin Yong’s fiction. It recreates a story that is
like Jin Yong fan fiction, but that is merged with the fantastic. When Jin Yong ties the welfare of
the state to the heroes of common backgrounds, the writers of Heavenly Ghost Catcher take
things one step further by linking the spiritual realm with the affairs of the state. Zhong Kui
manages to rescue the Ming Empire by investigating ghostly matters.
Cynthia Khan’s character is a woman named Fang Lin 方琳. She temporarily assumes the
role of Dongfang Bubai, a legendary figure that is long dead when the story begins. Yet
Dongfang Bubai is immortalized through different people taking turns in assuming this identity.
Dongfang Bubai becomes a suit that one can wear and shed without any permanent changes to
the actual body. This is the earliest television portrayal of Dongfang Bubai that addresses the
importance of one’s sex in practicing the Sunflower Scroll. Fang Lin/Dongfang Bubai states that
only women can successfully practice the Sunflower Scroll, obviously referring to the need for a
man to first be castrated in order to practice the technique. Cynthia Khan's costume and makeup
is very similar to Brigitte Lin's male garb from Swordsman II, especially with the tall black hat
and pairing of a white robe under a red one. This combination is Brigitte Lin’s unique color
scheme; the novel never mentions Dongfang Bubai wearing white. The other women’s Miao
costumes also closely resemble Fennie Yuan’s 袁潔瑩 costumes in Swordsman II.
“Sacred Sunflower Scroll” directly borrows from Swordsman II in regards to ethnicity
and historical setting. The story takes place during the Ming dynasty, but there is no specific
reign mentioned. The setting is in a fictional village that is predominantly inhabited by Miao
people. The village is in a remote location with few people entering or leaving the area. The
Miao in “Sacred Sunflower Scroll” portrayed as secluded and not causing any trouble within the
205

empire. This is to serve as contrast to Swordsman II’s Highlanders, who are in contact with
foreigners.
State of Divinity (2000) was produced by Yang Peipei 楊佩佩 for China Television 中國
電視 (CTV).
245
Like Lee Tim-sing from TVB and Zhang Jizhong from China, Yang Peipei was
responsible for the production of Jin Yong series in Taiwan from the 1980s into the early 2000s.
State of Divinity (2000) is her second adaption of Proud. She also adapted Saber in 1994, and
Return in 1998. Her versions of Proud and Return have become controversial works in the Jin
Yong oeuvre because of her choice of actors whose physical appearances do not resemble these
characters’ descriptions in the novels. These series have been subject to a great deal of criticism
and ridicule. Yang Peipei’s version of Return is also very bold in reimagining Xiao Longnu
(played by Jacklyn Wu 吳倩蓮) to be wearing black instead of white.
Leanne Liu 劉雪華 played Dongfang Bubai in State of Divinity (2000). Her background
is similar to Brigitte Lin in relation to Qiongyao’s romances, except Leanne Liu relocated from
Hong Kong to Taiwan in the 1970s. Leanne Liu’s portrayal of Dongfang Bubai is an obvious
imitation of Brigitte Lin’s Asia. Her costume is colored in a similar shade and paired with the tall
black hat, and she also replicates some of Brigitte Lin’s actions in the film, such as holding up
the strings and lightly biting them.
Dongfang Bubai’s role increased significantly in State of Divinity (2000). He/she appears
from the beginning, continuously playing an important part in directing the affairs of the Sect.
This Dongfang Bubai dresses in female attire very early on, and does not hide in the boudoir
from other Sect members. There are many scenes showing Dongfang Bubai applying makeup, or

245
State of Divinity 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Yang Peipei 楊佩佩, perf. Richie Ren 任賢齊 and Anita Yuan 袁詠儀, CTV,
2000).
206

Yang Lianting (played by Ben Lee 李志希) applying it for her. Despite being almost like a
woman, Ren Yingying still addresses Dongfang Bubai as uncle (shushu 叔叔). This open display
of gender change through the use of cosmetics and bright red clothing does not diminish his/her
power.It becomes an accepted part of the Sect leader’s identity in the headquarters. Although
Xiang Wentian (played by Norman Chu 徐少強) criticizes Dongfang Bubai for being absurd in
women’s clothing, he/she does not consider this gender change shameful or a threat to his/her
authority.
Dongfang Bubai’s affection for Yang Lianting is also on display in front of others. The
affection is like doting on a young child since Ben Lee’s Yang Lianting is greatly feminized.
This screen couple is the direct opposite of the relationship described in the novel. In Proud,
willingly plays the part of an obedient “wife,” while Yang Lianting is the dominating “husband.”
This happens despite Dongfang Bubai’s greater martial arts skills and higher status in the Sect.
The description of Yang Lianting’s appearance in the novel is also presented through Linghu
Chong’s perspective. He sees that Yang Lianting is a burly young man in his thirties, with
abundant facial hair and a pleasingly deep voice 只見這人三十歲不到年紀…身形魁梧, 滿臉虯
髯, 形貌極為威武 …聲音低沉, 甚是悅耳動聽.
246
Ben Lee’s Yang Lianting does not have a
burly figure or any facial hair. He speaks with a high pitched voice, and acts like a spoiled child.
He does not assume any real power within the Sect.
The unabashed display of gender change and Yang Lianting’s childish behaviors alters
the male-male homosexual relationship to one that closely resembles a female-female
relationship in this adaptation. The flirtations that are carried out in front of others merge the

246
Jin Yong, Proud, Ch. 30, 1259-1260.
207

private and public spheres of the Sect. It becomes a semi-public and semi-domestic location. Yet
the Sun Moon Sect is out of touch with the outside world when Leanne Liu’s Dongfang Bubai is
not actively trying to conquer the martial grove. He/she is much more involved in preventing
Ren Yingying (played by Anita Yuan 袁詠儀) from discovering the truth of Ren Woxing’s
capture.
In the same year, The Legendary Swordsman was released in Singapore by Mediacorp 新
傳媒, with Jacelyn Tay 鄭秀珍 as Dongfang Bubai.
247
The Legendary Swordsman is the other
television adaptation that includes the ethnicity element from Swordsman II. This series bears
little resemblance to Proud, other than using the names of the characters and some of their
relationships. Although The Legendary Swordsman portrays the Sect as Miao, this factor does
not have much impact on the plot. It contributes to the exoticization of the Sect members, but
there are not attempts to rebel against the Ming. The major conflicts are still those between the
martial arts schools.
Dongfang Bubai plays an important role in this version, appearing from beginning to end.
Without Yang Lianting, Dongfang Bubai’s attention is dedicated to Linghu Chong (played by
Steve Ma 馬景濤). This romantic interest is not reciprocated by Linghu Chong. This leaves
Jacelyn Tay’s Dongfang Bubai as the only version of the character that has no romantic partner.
It is because he/she is not completely occupied by a lover that this Dongfang Bubai is still
interested in advancing in martial arts and conquering the martial grove. In all the other versions,
Dongfang Bubai is deterred from his/her martial arts practice and ambitions by the presence of
Yang Lianting or Linghu Chong. Dongfang Bubai approaches Linghu Chong as the courtesan

247
The Legendary Swordsman 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Ma Jiajun 馬家駿, perf. Steve Ma 馬景濤 and Jacelyn Tay,
Mediacorp, 2000).
208

Dongdong 東東, an identity that does not raise any suspicions regarding his/her sex. For the
second half of the series, Dongfang Bubai appears mostly in female garb. This costume has a
low-cut bodice that accentuates the actress’s breasts, and she is decked in ornate hairpieces and
earrings. The shogun hat, a reference to the collaboration between Asia and the Japanese Shogun
in the Swordsman films, only appears early on.
The Legendary Swordsman reinterprets the Sunflower Scroll as a set of exercises to attain
immortality. As a successful practitioner of the technique, Dongfang Bubai is transformed from a
man into a semi-woman, and then into a superhuman. In Proud, this technique requires one to be
castrated only because it was invented by a eunuch. It was not intended to be practiced by non-
eunuchs. This causes great personal struggles among all of those who temporarily own it. The
Legendary Swordsman has the manual broken down into various stages, making possible to
begin practice without castration. Dongfang Bubai reaches the highest levels. This allows
him/her to obtain immortality, and to obtain objects through thin air (gekong quwu 隔空取物).
However, Dongfang Bubai still dies in the hands of Linghu Chong at the end. This scene is
extremely similar to the death of Asia. Steve Ma’s Linghu Chong also plunges down a cliff to
rescue the descending Dongfang Bubai. As Dongfang Bubai is falling towards the ocean, he/she
pushes Linghu Chong back towards the edge of the cliff.
In 2001, Zhang Jizhong produced Laughing in the Wind with CCTV in China.
248

Laughing in the Wind was the first locally produced Jin Yong series in China. Zhang Jizhong is
thus far the Chinese producer who made the most Jin Yong series, even though he has not
completely adapted all of Jin Yong’s works yet. He also adapted Legend, Return, Demi-Gods,

248
Laughing in the Wind 笑傲江湖 (Prod. Zhang Jizhong, perf. Li Yapeng 李亞鵬 and Xu Qing 許晴, CCTV,
2001).
209

Deer, Saber, Sword Stained with Royal Blood, and Ode to Gallantry. Zhang Jizhong has also
produced other adaptations of classical works, including Romance of the Three Kingdoms 三國
演義, Journey to the West 西遊記 and Water Margin in the 1990s through the early 2000s.
Other than the early appearance of Ren Yingying (played by Xu Qing 許晴), Laughing in
the Wind has no significant differences from Proud. This is the only version that adds local
flavor to the Sichuanese Qingcheng School. The school leader performs a change of masks
(bianlian 變臉) when he initially appears. His students all speak with a Sichuanese accent, while
the other characters do not have this geographical indicator in speech. The Miao Sect members
of the Swordsman films are also dubbed over with Sichuanese accented Mandarin in the
Cantonese versions of the films. Dongfang Bubai appears fairly late in the series, and makes a
limited appearance in the battle with Linghu Chong and his companions.
Of the actresses who played the role of Dongfang Bubai, Mao Weitao 茅威濤 is given
the least screen time. Although her part is limited in significance, Mao Weitao is an interesting
figure. She is a Yue 越 opera actor known for specializing in the young-scholar role that displays
the wen form of masculinity on stage. Mao Weitao’s portrayal of Dongfang Bubai is the only
version that has broken free from the influence of Brigitte Lin. Her makeup is much more
exaggerated when compared to the previous actresses. The dramatic eyeliner, lipstick, and the
face paint somewhat resembles opera makeup, but it is not exactly the same. While opera
makeup consists of thick layers of paint that cover the face completely, the floral patterns on
Mao Weitao’s forehead and cheekbones are only a half mask that conceal a part of her face.
These patterns are not drawn on to hide her identity. They draw the audience's attention to
his/her madness. The color of her garb is toned down by the dark blue outer garment, but he/she
still wears a bright pink robe as the under layer. The signature tall black hat and white and red
210

robes never show up in Laughing in the Wind. As a “professional man” in the opera world, there
is an extra layer of gender identity to Mao Weitao’s portrayal. Mao Weitao is a woman who is
also a man who plays Dongfang Bubai, who desires to be a woman.
Swordsman (2013) was produced by Yu Zheng 于正, a controversial figure. He has
accumulated much fame in the recent decade through his roles as scriptwriter and producer for
both film and television. It is rare to see a Yu Zheng production that is not marred by bad
publicity or free from controversy, because many of his works are thinly veiled copies of other
authors’ creations. Many of his dramas are close replicas of Qiongyao’s romances with a specific
historical background. Yu Zheng’s style is so similar to Qiongyao that she recently sued him for
plagiarism. Yu Zheng’s romantic formulas are carried over into this adaptations of Jin Yong’s
works. Other than Swordsman (2013), he has produced The Romance of the Condor Heroes 神鵰
俠侶 from 2014,
249
which is Jin Yong’s most romance-centered work.
Swordsman (2013) completes the final step in Dongfang Bubai’s “sex change” by
reinterpreting this character to be a biological woman who cross-dresses as man. Although this is
a bold step in revolutionizing Proud, it was not bold enough to alter the ending. When Dongfang
Bubai is a “real” woman, Swordsman (2013) allows for the celebration of love between the two
main heterosexual characters, resolving the hanging homosexual anxiety left in Swordsman II
and the other television adaptations discussed above. Despite all the changes that had to be made
to accommodate a woman Dongfang Bubai, this version’s Linghu Chong (played by Wallace
Huo 霍建華) still ends up marrying Ren Yingying (played by Mabel Yuan 袁姍姍).

249
The Romance of the Condor Heroes 神鵰俠侶 (Prod. Yu Zheng, perf. Michelle Chen 陳妍希 and Chen Xiao 陳
曉, Yu Zheng Studio, 2014).
211

In order to integrate the woman Dongfang Bubai into the main plot, she replaces some
minor characters from the novel. This leaves part of the original story untouched, but it still
allows her the space to be an active part of Linghu Chong’s life. For example, the Buddhist
monk Bujie 不戒 does not appear in this version. Thus, the nun Yilin (played by Deng Sha 鄧莎)
does not have a father. Instead, she has a long lost elder sister, Dongfang Bubai. Joe Chen’s
Dongfang Bubai also replaces the comical Six Faeries of Plum Valley 桃谷六仙 as Linghu
Chong’s companion in some segments of the series. Most important of all, Joe Chen’s character
is the female lead, and not Ren Yingying.
Joe Chen is the youngest and most alluring Dongfang Bubai thus far. She was thirty-four
years old when the series was produced. As the spokeswoman for Ladies 蕾黛絲 lingerie, she is
also well-known for her good figure and sex appeal. The makeup and costumes accentuate her
youth and desirability as a woman, while crossdressing is her form of self-protection. Joe Chen’s
Dongfang Bubai is purified in this adaptation through the “sex change” and her acts of kindness.
As a woman, her love for Linghu Chong is no longer taboo or a sexual abnormality.
Dongfang Bubai navigates this double gender identity to her advantage. Before attaining
power in the Sect, she pretends to be a man in the martial grove to shield herself from potential
molestations and avoid discrimination. She only reveals her sex after she takes over the Sect.
Only a few subordinates are aware that their Leader is a woman. To the outsiders, they only
know of Dongfang Bubai as a powerful martial artist, which is never associated with women.
She then assumes a female identity when she travels outside of Black Wood Cliff. She is no
longer afraid of being the weaker sex after mastering the Sunflower Scroll technique. Her
femininity becomes a new form of disguise, especially when she voluntarily becomes a
courtesan, working under her own name. It is assumed by others that Dongfang Bubai is the
212

courtesan’s stage name that capitalizes on the fame of a great martial artist. Taking advantage of
others’ assumptions, she is hidden in plain view.
The strategy of using prostitution as a disguise is also featured in The Legendary
Swordsman. In both versions, the brothel is used as a permeable border, and a place of
transformation and descent. The pleasure quarters is the midway house between Black Wood
Cliff and the outside world. Both Dongfang Bubais are in direct contact with the martial grove
through interacting with patrons and collecting information from them. The brothel is a place
where femininity is the most important trait for fitting in. It must be openly displayed so as to not
attract any suspicion.
Joe Chen’s Dongfang Bubai is able to break free from the character's long established
villainy by the end of Swordsman (2013) through the displacement of her heart. When Ren
Yingying anachronistically requires a cardiac transplant, Dongfang Bubai volunteers her heart.
This “kindheartedness” supplements her physical beauty. It allows for a symbolic unification
between Dongfang Bubai and Linghu Chong. With Dongfang Bubai’s heart housed in Ren
Yingying’s body, the two women merge into one. Without a drastic change to the happy ending
between the Linghu couple, Linghu Chong is able to be monogamous while simultaneously
being with both women. As in Swordsman II, the consummation of the relationship between the
male and the (fe)male protagonists does not take place. It is relocated into the body of a third
party. In the case of Swordsman (2013), this third body is Ren Yingying. Despite being a
biological woman, Joe Chen’s Dongfang Bubai is only a mere display of femininity, she does not
actually function as a woman within the family context as a wife or a daughter. Her only blood
relation, Yilin, is a Buddhist nun that is removed from the familial context.
213

During the time of separation between Dongfang Bubai and Linghu Chong, they each fall
in love with someone else. While Linghu Chong is engaged to Ren Yingying, Dongfang Bubai is
entangled with a Linghu Chong look-alike named Yang Lianting. Yang Lianting is also played
by Wallace Huo, but he is distinguished from his doppelganger by ostentatious robes and heavy
eye and lip makeup. This costume and makeup feminizes Wallace Huo’s Yang Lianting. The
explanation for Dongfang Bubai’s interest in this man is because of resemblance to her true love,
and is irrelevant to his elfish appearance.
While the wu masculine Yang Lianting in Proud and State of Divinity (1996) have solid
power within the Sect, the feminized Ben Lee and Wallace Huo versions do not. They closely
resemble the “concubines” of the fe(male) leader. These feminized Yang Liantings are all
portrayed as playthings that do not pose as any substantial threat to the Sect’s center of power.
Their potential as polluting factors is minimized through their feminizations. This allows the
masculine figure Dongfang Bubai to retain their political dominance in their own realm, despite
being played by a woman and dressed in women’s clothing. This masculinity is not curbed by a
change of gender. It can only be lessened through the release of power, which is exactly how
Proud’s Dongfang Bubai is emasculated and feminized.
Swordsman (2013) minimalizes the importance of Proud’s many themes. With the
importance of politics, martial arts, and music buried into the background, romance takes the
foreground. The tragic couple’s tale closely resembles the story of Return, which places a heavy
emphasis on forbidden love. Dongfang Bubai, Linghu Chong, and Ren Yingying, the nun Yilin,
Tian Boguang (played by Han Dong 韓棟), Yue Lingshan (played by Yang Rong 楊蓉), and Lin
Pingzhi (played by Chen Xiao 陳曉) are all involved in the chaotic romantic heptagon. Knowing
Yilin’s feelings for Linghu Chong, Dongfang Bubai attempts to assist her younger sister in
214

developing a relationship with Linghu Chong. However, Dongfang Bubai ends up falling in love
with him also. Although Yue Lingshan and Ren Yingying are extremely important characters
that shape Linghu Chong’s life in Proud, the element of romance never overtakes the importance
of the Five Schools’ intrigues.

Conclusion
Jin Yong television series are the most important visual adaptations. They are now only
produced in China. These dramas have been repeatedly released every few years in the past four
decades in various locations, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, and Singapore. These
ongoing productions continuously educate the younger audiences about Jin Yong’s fictive world.
The constant remakes in the Mainland are an important indicator that Jin Yong’s fiction is now
fully integrated into the Chinese market and local imagination, despite the radical
reinterpretations of the novels. The act of tracing the different novels’ adaptations over the years
is not just for following the evolution of the novels into different types of media. It also shows
their journey from the Sinophone locations into the Mainland.
Proud is one of the most frequently adapated novels. It is the only work that has
undergone a far-reaching reinterpretation in its many visual adaptations. This change first began
with the novel’s cinematic adaptation into the Swordsman trilogy in the early 1990s by Tsui
Hark. Tsui Hark elevated the minor villain Dongfang Bubai into center stage. In the novel, this
character is a castrated man who is in love with another man, and strongly desires to be a
woman. This role has typically been played by men in the earliest film and television
adaptations. When Birgitte Lin played Dongfang Bubai in the second and third films of the
Swordsman trilogy, the character was permanently transformed. Dongfang Bubai became both
215

the protagonist and antagonist at the same time, and his/her romantic involvement with the other
main character Ling also reshaped the plot and relationships in the films. These changes to the
story rippled into the later television adaptations.
In the seven television adaptations of Proud since Swordsman’s release in 1992, six out
of seven Dongfang Bubais have been played by women. This happened whether the adaptations
were produced in Taiwan, China, or Singapore. The only version with a man in this role is
TVB’s State of Divinity (1996). These female Dongfang Bubais are part of a popular trend. They
are a convenient strategy for normalizing the leader figure through feminizing and de-homo-
sexualizing, because there is no doubt that Jin Yong had Mao Zedong in mind when he wrote
Dongfang Bubai in the late 1960s. In Swordsman (2013), Dongfang Bubai is reinterpreted to be a
biological woman. This sexual re-formation removes the character from his/her long established
villainy, and clears any possibility of being considered abnormal in homosexuality or in gender
identity. The evolution from a castrated man to a biological woman in the portrayal of Dongfang
Bubai has shifted the focus of the various dramas. The original political satire in the novel is
marginalized in the recent Swordsman (2013). In its place is a love story that is suitable for a
Mainland audience, which hardly acknowledges the politics within the Alliance in a martial arts
context.
Jin Yong’s works have been Mainlandized through the television adaptations. While it is
typical for different versions of the adaptations to present the characters and story differently, the
new location of production limits the original works’ expressions of cultural hybridity and
political parody. The changes to Proud are most likely irreversible because it is the only novel
that features a character with gender and sexual “abnormalities.” These “abnormalities” can only
be “corrected” through having women instead of men play the role of Dongfang Bubai. When
216

homosexuality is no longer a possibility on screen, heterosexual romance becomes a safe
replacement for the theme of political struggle. As for the theme of ethnicity, as mentioned
above, it is possible to present non-Chinese characters, but terms and phrases that reflect
antagonistic prejudices towards non-Chinese are not allowed in the script to avoid disrupting the
ethnic “harmony” in contemporary China.

217

Conclusion

Jin Yong’s success in wuxia fiction is unsurpassed thus far. He wrote the initial versions
of his works between 1955 and 1972, in colonial Hong Kong. By managing the elements of
gender and ethnicity, Jin Yong redefined the xia figure in his works. Both the novels and their
visual adaptations are widely consumed, thus Jin Yong’s definition of the xia has become the
standard. Jin Yong only experimented with one female xia figure at the beginning of his career;
all of his later chivalry figures are men. Jin Yong’s xia figures are men who are loyal to the
Chinese state and its people. This masculinized image of the xia figures is widely circulated
through newspapers, novels, films, television series, comics and online games. Therefore, this
ethnicially-orientated and masculinized image of the xias has taken root in the cultural
imagination of Chinese readers and audiences.
Because Jin Yong, and other New School wuxia authors, wrote outside of China proper, I
propose to examine Jin Yong’s works from a Sinophone perspective. While there are some
detailed studies on wuxia fiction in Chinese and English, the majority of these works concentrate
on the historical evolution of the xia figures, or focus on specific elements within the stories. Jin
Yong’s body of works is significant because it reforms a traditional genre by addressing modern
issues of gender and ethnicity. His creations and its various forms of adaptations significantly
affected Sinophone Chinese readers’ understanding of Chinese culture and ethnic identity. The
cinematic and television versions reached an even larger audience once the written language
barrier was removed.
I examine Jin Yong’s characters on a masculinity spectrum, which incorporates a
majority of the characters. These include the scholarly Chen Jialuo from The Book and the
218

Sword; Guo Jing and Yang Guo from the Condor Trilogy, who fall in the middle of the
spectrum. They also include the wu masculine figure, Xiao Feng from The Demi-Gods and Semi-
Devils. There are only two exceptions: the female xia Huo Qingtong, also from Book, and Wei
Xiaobao from The Deer and the Cauldron, who is an outlier in terms of masculinity. The
characters that fall outside of the masculinity spectrum are not considered “true” xias. The two
characters from Book were modeled after archetypical characters. Huo Qingtong is the non-
Chinese female xia and general, and Chen Jialuo is the young-scholar. Both are failed chivalry
figures and failed archetypes because they cannot put their skills to proper use and they are never
integrated into the Chinese familial structure. They also fail to protect the Chinese state and its
people. In his later works, Jin Yong’s xias are no longer confined to established forms of
masculinity. The importance of loyalty to one’s people is emphasized in The Legend of the
Condor Heroes and its sequel The Return of the Condor Heroes. Both Guo Jing and Yang Guo
are portrayed as great xias due to their loyalty to the Song state, which is exhibited through their
anti-Jurchen and anti-Mongol actions. In Demi-Gods, the xia figure is not a Han Chinese, but a
Khitan. Due to Xiao Feng’s non-Chinese ancestry, he is the only character that is close to the wu
end of the masculinity spectrum. The only element that prevents him from being a complete wu
character is his temporary involvement with a lover. His efforts to protect the Chinese state and
its people are intact despite his status as a Khitan nobleman serving in the Liao court. Jin Yong’s
last male protagonist is an anti-xia who has no martial arts skills, lacks morals, and considers
ethnicity unimportant. Wei Xiaobao exhibits his masculinity through his value of friendship and
his lechery.
In the Shaw Brothers’ film adaptations of Jin Yong’s novels, there is no portrayal of
chivalry because the geographical scope is reduced to settings in China proper only. The xia
219

figure gets removed from the transnational context and is “purified.” These men are then only
skilled Chinese martial artists that do not exhibit any chivalric behaviors.
The Shaw Brothers’ sister branch, TVB, produced most of the early Jin Yong television
adaptations in Hong Kong. TVB was one of the most influential forces that shaped local and
overseas Chinese culture. The multicultural and multiethnic aspects of Jin Yong’s fiction were
“restored” on the small screen. Since 2001, China is the only location where Jin Yong series are
produced. In order to cater to the PRC’s censorship, the scripts needed to be sensitive to issues of
gender and ethnicity. For example, the term dazi was not permitted in series that featured non-
Chinese enemies. In regards to gender, the Swordsman film’s innovation became a convenient
strategy to “rectify” the abnormal gender and sexuality from Proud, Smiling Wanderer. The
films altered the portrayal of an originally minor character, Dongfang Bubai, who is the only
male homosexual character in Jin Yong’s oeuvre. This character has been played mainly by
women in television since 1992, regardless of whether the series was produced in Singapore,
Taiwan, or China. The only exception is TVB’s 1996 adaptation of Proud. Having a woman play
this homosexual character resolves the issue of on screen homosexuality and transgender
behaviors. Due to the constant reinterpretations and re-formations of Dongfang Bubai, Proud is
the only Jin Yong novel that has undergone such a significant change on screen. The various
series’ emphases have been constantly moving away from political parody to focus on romantic
relationships.
Now, there is a younger generation of authors who are currently contributing to the field
by publishing online. There is a significant number of female wuxia fiction writers in the New
Mainland School 新大陸武俠. The rising presence of female wuxia fiction writers 女子武俠 is
noteworthy because the genre has been a male dominated field since its birth in the early 1900s.
220

Although female authors are typically criticized for their magnification of romance,
contemporary author Zheng Feng 鄭丰 shows this is not always true.
250
With the introduction of
western superhero films, characters like Batman and Spider-Man are translated as bianfu xia 蝙
蝠俠 and zhizhu xia 蜘蛛俠 in their Chinese titles, adding a new foreign context to the once
culturally specific term.

250
Zheng Feng is the penname of Chen Yu-hwei 陳宇慧. She is the daughter of Taiwanese politician Chen Li’an 陳
履安. Chen Yu-hwei currently resides in Hong Kong, and she was the director of ABN AMRO Bank’s Hong Kong
branch.
221

Appendix

Appendix 1: Jin Yong’s Fiction

Novels
1. The Book and the Sword 書劍恩仇錄
2. Sword Stained with Royal Blood 碧血劍
3. The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射鵰英雄傳
4. The Return of the Condor Heroes 神鵰俠侶
5. The Young Flying Fox 飛狐外傳
6. The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber 倚天屠龍記
7. A Deadly Secret 連城訣
8. Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils 天龍八部
9. Ode to Gallantry 俠客行
10. Proud, Smiling Wanderer 笑傲江湖
11. The Deer and the Cauldron 鹿鼎記
Novelettes
1. Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain 雪山飛狐
2. White Horse Neighs in the West Wind 白馬嘯西風
3. Mandarin Ducks Blade 鴛鴦刀
4. Maiden of Yue 越女劍

222

223

224

225

226

227

Works Cited

Abbas, Ackbar. Hong Kong: Culture and the Politics of Disappearance. Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota, 1997.
A Chinese Bestiary: Strange Creatures from the Guideways through Mountains and Seas 山海
經. Ed. and trans. Strassberg, Richard E. Berkeley: University of California, 2002.
A Chinese Ghost Story 倩女幽魂. Dir. Tony Ching Siu-Tung 程小東. Perf. Leslie Chueng 張國
榮 and Joey Wang 王祖賢. Cinema City, 1987.
Altenburger, Roland. The Sword or the Needle: The Female Knight-errant (xia) in Traditional
Chinese Narrative. Bern: Peter Lang, 2009.
Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of
Nationalism. London: Verso, 2006.
Ashes of Time 東邪西毒. Dir. Wong Kar-wai 王家衛. Perf. Leslie Cheung and Tony Leung
Chiu-wai 梁朝偉. Jet Tone Productions 澤東, 1994.
A Step into the Past 尋秦記. Prod. Chong Wai-Kin 莊偉建. Perf. Louis Koo 古天樂 and Jessica
Hsuen 宣萱. TVB, 2001.
Barfield, Thomas J. The Perilous Frontier: Nomadic Empires and China. Cambridge:
Blackwell, 1989.
Bo, Xingjian 白行簡, “Story of Miss Li” 李娃傳. Ed. Cyril Birch. Anthology of Chinese
Literature from Early Times to the Fourteenth Century. New York: Grove, 1965. 300-13.
Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge,
1990.
228

Cai, Meibiao 蔡美彪. “Liao Dynasty’s Consort Clan and Three Cases of Empresses and
Concubines” 遼代后族與遼季后妃三案. Lishi Yanjiu 歷史研究 2 (1994): 43-61.
Cao, Zhengwen 曹正文. China’s Cultural History of the Xia 中國俠文化史. Shanghai: Shanghai
wenyi chubanshe 上海文藝出版社, 1994.
Chan, Hok-lam. “Commerce and Trade in Divided China: The Case of Jurchen-Jin versus the
Northern and Southern Song.” Journal of Asian History 36.2 (2002): 135–183.
_____. “From Tribal Chieftain to Sinitic Emperor: Leadership Contests and Succession Crises
in the Jurchen-Jin State, 1115–1234.” Journal of Asian History 33.2 (1999): 105–41.
Chan, Shun-hing 陳順馨. “The Chinese Cultural Transition in the 1940s to 1950s and Hong
Kong” 香港與四〇至五〇年代中國的文化轉折. Hong Kong Literature: Succession to
Traditions and Metamorphosis 香港文學的傳承與轉化. Eds. Leung Ping-kwan 梁秉鈞,
Chan Chi Tak 陳智德, and Cheng Zeng-hang 鄭政恆, Hong Kong: Infolink Pulishing 匯
智出版有限公司, 2011. 57-78.
Chan, So Man 陳素雯. Jin Yong's Martial Arts Fiction (1962-1972) and the Cultural
Revolution 金庸武俠小說連載本 (1962-1972) 與文化大革命. Master’s thesis, Hong
Kong University of Science and Technology, 2006.
Chang, K.C. Art, Myth and Ritual: The Path to Political Authority in Ancient China. Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 2003.
Chen, Fan-Pen Li. Chinese Shadow Theatre: History, Popular Religion, and Women Warriors.
Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2007.
_____. “Female Warriors, Magic and the Supernatural in Traditional Chinese Novels.” The
Annual Review of Women in World Religions: Volume II, Heroic Women. Ed. Arvind
229

Sharma and Katherine K. Young. Albany: State University of New York, 1992. 99-109.
Chen, Mo 陳墨. Jin Yong’s Novels and Chinese Culture 金庸小說與中國文化. Shanghai:
Baihuazhou wenyi chubanshe 百花洲文藝出版社, 1999.
Chen, Pingyuan 陳平原. The Literati's Chivalric Dreams: Narrative models of Chinese Knight-
Errant Literature 千古文人俠客夢: 武侠小說類型研究. Beijing: Xinshijie chubanshe
新世界出版社, 2004.
Chen, Shuo 陳碩. Producing Classics: The Cultural Politics of Jinology 經典制造: 金庸研究的
文化政治. Guilin 桂林: Guangxi Normal University Press 廣西師范大學出版社, 2004.
Chen, Sanping. Multicultural China in the Early Middle Ages. Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania, 2012.
Chow, Kai-wing. “Narrating Nation, Race, and National Culture: Imagining the Hanzu Identity
in Modern China.” Constructing Nationhood in Modern East Asia. Eds. Kai-wing Chow,
Kevin M. Doak, and Poshek Fu. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 2001.
Chor Yuen 楚原. Director Chor Yuen. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive. 2006.
Chung, Stephanie Po-yin. “The Industrial Evolution of a Fraternal Enterprise: The Shaw
Brothers and the Shaw Organization.” Trans. Teri Chan. Ed. Wong Ain-ling. The Shaw
Screen: A Preliminary Study. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive, 2003. 1-17.
Crimson Saber 碧血劍. Prod. Lee Tim-Sing 李添勝. Perf. Gordon Lam 林家棟 and Charmaine
Sheh 佘詩曼. TVB, 2000.
Crossley, Pamela Kyle. A Translucent Mirror: History and Identity in Qing Imperial Ideology.
Berkeley: University of California, 1999.
Drompp, Michael Robert. Tang China and the Collapse of the Uighur Empire: A Documentary
230

History. Leiden: Brill, 2005.
Ebrey, Patricia Buckley. Women and the Family in Chinese History. London: Routledge, 2003.
Elliott, Mark C. The Manchu Way: The Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial
China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001.
_______. “Hushuo: The Northern Other and the Naming of the Han Chinese.” Critical Han
Studies: The History, Representation, and Identity of China's Majority. Berkeley, CA:
University of California, 2012. 173-90.
Fist of Fury 精武門. Dir. Lo Wei 羅維. Perf. Bruce Lee. Golden Harvest 嘉禾, 1972.
Franke, Herbert. “The Chin Dynasty.” The Cambridge History of China Volume 6: Alien
Regimes and Border States 907-1368. Eds. Herbert Franke and Denis Twitchett.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 215-320.
Fu, Guoyong 傅國湧. A Biography of Jin Yong 金庸傳. Beijing: Beijing Shiyue wenyi
chubanshe 北京十月文藝出版社, 2003.
Gu Long 古龍. The Legend of Chu Liuxiang 楚留香傳奇. Kunming 昆明: Yunnan renmin
chubanshe 雲南人民出版社, 1988.
Hamm, John Christopher. Paper Swordsman: Jin Yong and the Modern Chinese Martial Arts
Novel. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2006.
Hero: Beyond the Boundary of Time 正牌韋小寶之奉旨溝女. Dir. Blackie Ko 柯受良. Perf.
Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Dicky Cheung Wai-kin 張衛健. Movie Impacts Film
Investment 藝能電影投資有限公司, 1993.
Heavenly Ghost Catcher 天師鍾馗. Prod. Keung Leung-Kam 姜良鑒. Perf. Jin Chao-chun 金超
群 and Fan Hung-hsuan 范鴻軒. CTV 中國電視, 1996.
231

House of 72 Tenants 七十二家房客. Dir. Chor Yuen. Perf. Yueh Hua 岳華 and Ching Li 井
莉. Shaw Brothers, 1973.
Hsia, Chih-tsing. "The Military Romance." C.T. Hsia on Chinese Literature. New York:
Columbia University Press, 2004. 135-70.
Hsieh, Daniel. Love and Women in Early Chinese Fiction. Hong Kong: Chinese University
Press, 2008.
Huang, Martin W. Negotiating Masculinities in Late Imperial China. Honolulu: University of
Hawai'i, 2006.
Huang Yi 黃易. Searching for Qin 尋秦記. Taipei: China Times Publishing 時報出版, 2001.
Huanzhu Louzhu 還珠樓主. Legend of the Shu Mountains 蜀山劍俠傳. Taiyuan 太原: Shanxi
renmin chubanshe 山西人民出版社, 1998.
Idema, Wilt. “The Founding of the Han Dynasty in Early Drama: The Autocratic Suppression of
Popular Debunking.” Thought and Law in Qin and Han China: Studies Dedicated to
Anthony Hulsewe on the Occasion of his Eightieth Birthday. Eds. Wilt Idema and E.
Zurcher. New York: Brill, 1990. 183-207.
Jay, Jennifer W. A Change in Dynasties: Loyalism in Thirteenth-century China. Bellingham:
Western Washington University, 1991.
Jenner, W.J.F. “A Knife in my Ribs for a Mate: Reflections on another Chinese Tradition.” The
Fifty-fourth George Ernest Morrison Lecture in Ethnology 1993. Central Printery,
Canberra, 1993. 1-52.
Jin Yong 金庸. “A Couple Points Worhty of Thought: Jin Yong’s Speech at the Closing
Ceremony” 小說創作的幾點思考: 金庸在閉幕式上的講話. Proceedings from the
232

International Conference on Jin Yong’s Fiction and Twentieth-Century Chinese
Literature 金庸小說與二十世紀中國文學國際學術研討會論文集. Ed. Lin Lijun. Hong
Kong: Ming Ho, 2000, 23-8.
_______. A Deadly Secret 連城訣. Taipei: Yuanliu 遠流, 1998.
_______. Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils 天龍八部. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1987.
_______. Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain 雪山飛狐. Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998.
_______. Fox Volant of the Snowy Mountain. Trans. Olivia Mok. Hong Kong: Chinese
University Press, 1996.
_______. Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain. Trans. Robin Wu. New York: Bridge, 1972.
_______. Ode to Gallantry 俠客行. Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998.
_______. “Postcript.” Proud, Smiling Wanderer. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1981. 1689-92.
_______. Proud, Smiling Wanderer 笑傲江湖. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1981.
_______. The Book and the Sword. 書劍恩仇錄. Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998.
_______. The Book and the Sword. Trans. Graham Earnshaw. Hong Kong: Oxford University
Press, 2004.
_______. The Deer and the Cauldron 鹿鼎記. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1981.
_______. The Deer and the Cauldron. Trans. John Minford. 3 vols. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1997.
_______. The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber 倚天屠龍記. Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998.
_______. The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射鵰英雄傳. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1993.
_______. The Return of the Condor Heroes 神鵰俠侶. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 1993.
_______. The Young Flying Fox 飛狐外傳. Taipei: Yuanliu, 1998.
233

Johnson, Linda Cooke. Women of the Conquest Dynasties: Gender and Identity in Liao and Jin
China. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2011.
Kane, Daniel. The Kitan Language and Script. Leiden: Brill, 2009.
Kim, Ho-dong. Holy War in China: The Muslim Rebellion and State in Chinese Central Asia,
1864-1877. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004.
Ko, Dorothy. Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in Seventeenth-century
China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994.
Lam, Michael. “The Mysterious Gayness in Chang Cheh's Unhappy World.” The Shaw Screen:
A Preliminary Study. Ed. Wong Ain-ling. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Archive, 2003.
175-87.
Laughing in the Wind 笑傲江湖. Prod. Zhang Jizhong. Perf. Li Yapeng 李亞鵬 and Xu Qing 許
晴. CCTV 中央電視台, 2001.
Law, Kar. “An Overview of Hong Kong’s New Wave Cinema.” At Full Speed: Hong Kong
Cinema in a Borderless World. Ed. Esther Yau. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press, 2001. 31-52.
Legend of the Fox 飛狐外傳. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. Chin Siu-ho 錢小豪 and Philip Kwok.
Shaw Brothers, 1980.
Leng Xia 冷夏. A Biography of Jin Yong 金庸傳. Hong Kong: Ming Pao Publications, 1994.
Levine, Ari Daniel. “The Reigns of Hui-tsung and Ch’in-tsung.” The Cambridge History of
China Volume 5: The Sung Dynasty and Its Precursors, 907-1279. Eds. Denis Twitchett
and Paul Jakov Smith. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 556-643.
Lewis, Mark Edward. Sanctioned Violence in Early China. New York: State University of New
York, 1990.
234

Lin, Baochun 林保淳. “The Study of Different Versions of Jin Yong’s Novels” 金庸小說版本
學. Proceedings of the International Conference on Jin Yong's Novels 金庸小說國際學
術研討會論文集. Ed. Wang Qiugui 王秋桂. Taipei: Yuanliu, 1999, 401-24.
Lin, Lijun 林麗君, ed. Proceedings from the International Conference on Jin Yong’s Fiction and
Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature 金庸小說與二十世紀中國文學國際學術研討會
論文集. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 2000.
Lin, Yiliang 林以亮. “An Interview with Jin Yong” 金庸訪問記. Collection of Essays by Lin
Yiliang 林以亮佚文集. Ed. Chen Zishan 陳子善. Hong Kong: Crown Publishing 皇冠,
2001. 413-28.
Liu, James J. Y. The Chinese Knight-errant. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967.
Liu, James T.C. “The Jurchen-Sung Confrontation: Some Overlooked Points.” China under
Jurchen Rule: Essays on Chin Intellectual and Cultural History. Eds. Hoyt Cleveland
Tillman and Stephen H. West. Albany: State University of New York, 1995. 39-49.
Liu, Petrus. Stateless Subjects: Chinese Martial Arts Literature and Postcolonial History. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell East Asia Program, 2011.
Liu, Xiangan 劉祥安. “Observing the Modern Public’s Expression of Individualism through the
Xias’ Journeys” 從俠的歷程看現代大眾的個體表達. Proceedings of the International
Beijing Jin Yong Conference 2000 北京金庸小說國際研討會論文集. Eds. Wu Xiadong
吳曉東 and Ji Birui 計壁瑞, 2000.118-28.
Liu, Zaifu 劉再復. “Conference Guidance Speech: The Status of Jin Yong's Novels in Twentieth
235

Century Chinese Literature.” Proceedings from the International Conference on Jin
Yong’s Fiction and Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature 金庸小說與二十世紀中國文
學國際學術研討會論文集. Ed. Lin Lijun. Hong Kong: Ming Ho, 2000. 13-22.
________. “Afterword.” The Jin Yong Phenomenon: Chinese Martial Arts Fiction and Modern
Chinese Literary History. Eds. Anne Huss and Jianmei Liu. Amherst, New York:
Cambria Press, 288-291.
Little Dragon Maiden 楊過與小龍女. Dir. Huashan 華山. Perf. Leslie Cheung and Mary Jean
Reimer 翁靜晶. Shaw Brothers, 1983.
Louie, Kam. Theorising Chinese Masculinity: Society and Gender in China: Society and Gender
in China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Lu, Jin 呂進 and Han, Yunbo 韓雲波. “Jin Yong’s ‘Anti-Xia’ and the Fate of the Wuxia Literary
Genre” 金庸 “ 反武俠” 與武俠小說的文類命運. Proceedings of the International
Beijing Jin Yong Conference. Eds. Wu Xiadong and Ji Birui, 2000. 428-54.
Luo, Guanzhong 羅貫中. The Three Kingdoms 三國演義. Trans. Sumei Yu. Ed. Ronald C.
Iverson. North Clarendon, VT: Tuttle Publishing, 2014.
Menges, Karl Heinrich. The Turkic Languages and Peoples. An Introduction to Turkic Studies.
Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1968.
McMahon, Keith. Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists: Sexuality and Male-female Relations in
Eighteenth-century Chinese Fiction. Durham: Duke University Press, 1995.
Minford, John. “General Glossary of Terms Relating to Kung Fu, Chinese Culture, History, and
Society.” The Deer and the Cauldron. Oxford University Press, 1997. Xxv-xxxi.
Mullaney, Thomas S. Critical Han Studies: The History, Representation, and Identity of China's
Majority. Berkeley, CA: University of California, 2012.
236

Ng, Margaret 吳靄儀. Jin Yong’s Female Characters 金庸小說的女子. Hong Kong: Ming
Cheong Publications 明窗出版社, 1997.
Perdue, Peter C. China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia. Cambridge, MA:
Belknap of Harvard University Press, 2005.
Polo, Marco. The Travels of Marco Polo. Trans. Ronald Latham. London: Penguin, 1958.
Princess Fragrance 香香公主. Dir. Ann Hui 許鞍華. Perf. Aiyinuo 艾依諾 and Zhang Duofu
張多福. Sil-Metropole 銀都機構有限公司, 1987.
Pu, Songling 蒲松齡. “The Magic Sword” 聶小倩. Trans. Herbert Allen Giles. Strange Tales
from a Chinese Studio: The Classic Collection of Eerie and Fantastic Chinese Stories of
the Supernatural 聊齋志異. Rutland, VT: Tuttle, 2010. 89-95.
________. “The Magnanimous Girl.” Trans. Herbert Allen Giles. Strange Tales from
a Chinese Studio: The Classic Collection of Eerie and Fantastic Chinese Stories of the
Supernatural 聊齋志異. Rutland, VT: Tuttle, 2010. 160-4.
Rage and Passion 中神通王重陽. Prod. Yu Mang-Sang 餘明生. Perf. Ekin Cheng 鄭伊健 and
Fiona Leung 梁藝齡. TVB, 1992.
Royal Tramp 鹿鼎記. Prod. Zhang Jizhong 張紀中. Perf. Huang Xiaoming 黃曉明 and Wallace
Chung 鍾漢良. CCTV, 2008.
Royal Tramp 鹿鼎記. Dir. Wong Jing 王晶. Perf. Stephen Chan 周星馳 and Chingmy Yau 邱淑
貞. Win’s Entertainment 永盛娛樂製作, 1992.
Royal Tramp II 鹿鼎記 2 神龍教. Dir. Wong Jing. Perf. Stephen Chan and Brigitte Lin 林青霞.
Win’s Entertainment, 1992.
Rulian Jushi 如蓮居士. Shuotang sanzhuan 說唐三傳. Beijing: Baowentang shudian 寶文堂書
237

店, 1987.
Shi, Nai'an 施耐庵. Outlaws of the Marsh 水滸傳. Trans. Sidney Shapiro. Beijing: Foreign
Languages, 2003.
Shi, Shu-mei. Visuality and Identity: Sinophone Articulations across the Pacific. Berkeley:
University of California, 2007.
Sima, Qian 司馬遷. Records of the Grand Historian 史記. Trans. Burton Watson. New York:
Columbia University Press, 1993.
_______. “Nie Zheng” 聶政. Anthology of Chinese Literature: Beginnings to 1911. Ed. Stephen
Owen. New York: Norton, 1996. 152-4.
Skaff, Jonathon. Sui-Tang China and its Turko-Mongol Neighbors: Culture, Power, and
Connections, 580-800. Oxford University Press, 2012.
Song, Geng. The Fragile Scholar: Power and Masculinity in Chinese Culture. Hong Kong: Hong
Kong University Press, 2004.
Standen, Naomi. Unbounded Loyalty: Frontier Crossing in Liao China. Honolulu: University of
Hawai’I Press, 2007.
State of Divinity 笑傲江湖. Prod. Yang Pei Pei 楊佩佩. Perf. Richie Ren 任賢齊 and Anita
Yuan 袁詠儀, CTV, 2000.
State of Divinity 笑傲江湖. Prod. Lee Tim-Sing. Perf. Jackie Lui 呂頌賢 and Fiona Leung 梁藝
齡. TVB, 1996.
Story of the Vulture-Conqueror I and II 射鵰英雄傳. Dir. Wu Pang 胡鵬. Perf. Walter Tso 曹達
華 and Yung Siu-Yi 容小意. Emei Film 峨眉, 1958, 1959.
Sun, Yixue 孫宜學. A Thousand Year’s Dream of Literary Sainthood: A Biography of Jin Yong:
238

金庸傳: 千古文壇俠聖夢. Taipei: Storm and Stress Publishing 風雲時代, 2004.
Sword of Blood and Valour I and II 碧血劍. Dir. Lee Sun-Fung 李晨風. Perf. Walter Tso and Ng
Cho-Fan 吳楚帆, Emei Film, 1958, 1959.
Swordsman 笑傲江湖. Prod. Yu Zheng 于正, Perf. Joe Chen 陳喬恩 and Wallace Huo 霍建華.
Yu Zheng Studio 于正工作室, 2013.
Swordsman 笑傲江湖. Dirs. King Hu 胡金銓, Tony Ching 程小東, Tsui Hark 徐克,
Ann Hui, Andrew Kam Yeung-wa 金揚樺 and Raymond Lee 李惠民. Perf. Sam Hui 許
冠傑 and Jacky Cheung 張學友. Golden Princess 金公主電影製作有限公司, 1990.
Swordsman II 笑傲江湖之東方不敗. Dir. Tony Ching. Perf. Jet Li 李連杰 and Brigitte Lin.
Golden Princess, 1992.
Swordsman III: The East is Red 東方不敗之再起風雲. Dirs. Ching Siu-tung and Raymond Lee.
Perf. Brigitte Lin and Joey Wong. Golden Princess, 1993.
Sword Stained with Royal Blood 碧血劍. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. Philip Kwok and Candy Wen
文雪兒. Shaw Brothers, 1981.
Tales of a Eunuch 鹿鼎記. Dir. Huashan. Perf. Wong Yu 汪禹 and Gordon Liu 劉家輝. Shaw
Brothers, 1983.
Tan, See-kam, and Aw, Annette. “The Love Eterne: Almost a (Heterosexual) Love Story.”
Chinese Films in Focus II. Ed. Chris Berry. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.
Teo, Stephen. Chinese Martial Arts Cinema: The Wuxia Tradition. Edinburgh, United Kingdom:
Edinburgh University Press, 2009.
The Battle Wizard 天龍八部. Dir. Pao Hsueh-li 鮑學禮. Perf. Danny Lee 李修賢 and Tien Ni
恬妮. Shaw Brothers, 1977.
239

The Book and the Sword 書劍恩仇錄. Dir. Li Chenfeng 李晨風. Perf. Cheung Ying 張瑛 and
Tsi Law-lin 紫羅蓮. Emei Film 蛾眉, 1960.
The Brave Archer 射鵰英雄傳. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. Alexander Fu 傅聲 and Tien Niu 恬妞.
Shaw Brothers, 1977.
The Brave Archer 2 射鵰英雄傳續集. Dir. Chang Cheh 張徹. Perf. Alexander Fu and Niuniu
妞妞. Shaw Brothers, 1978.
The Brave Archer 3 射鵰英雄傳第三集. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. Alexander Fu and Niuniu.
Shaw Brothers, 1981.
The Brave Archer and His Mate 神雕俠侶. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. Alexander Fu and Philip
Kwok 郭追. Shaw Brothers, 1982.
The Condor Heroes Return 射鵰英雄傳之南帝北丐. Prod. Chong Wai-kin. Perf. Ekin
Cheng and Marco Ngai 魏駿傑. TVB, 1993.
The Criminals 香港奇案. Dirs. Cheng Kang 程剛, Huashan 華山, and Ho Meng-hua 何夢華.
Shaw Brothers, 1976.
The Criminals, Part II: Homicides 香港奇案二之兇殺. Dirs. Huashan, Kuei Chih-Hung 桂治
洪, and Sun Chung 孫仲. Shaw Brothers, 1976.
The Criminals, Part III: Arson 老爺車縱火謀殺案. Dirs. Huashan, and Kuei Chih-Hung. Shaw
Brothers, 1977.
The Duke of Mount Deer 鹿鼎記. Prod. Lee Tim-Sing. Perf. Tony Leung Chiu-Wai and
Andy Lau 劉德華. TVB, 1984.
The Emperor and His Brother 書劍恩仇錄. Dir. Chor Yuen 楚原. Perf. Ti Lung 狄龍 and Jason
240

Pai 白彪. Shaw Brothers, 1981.
The Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain 雪山飛狐. Prod. Wong Tin-Lam 王天林. Perf. Ray Lui 呂良
偉 and Patrick Tse 謝言. TVB, 1985.
The Flying Fox in the Snowy Mountain 雪山飛狐 I and II. Dir. Lee Fa 李化. Perf. Kong Hon 江
漢 and Pearl Au 歐嘉慧, Emei Film, 1960).
The Golden Snake Sword 金蛇郎君. Prod. Lee Kwok-laap 李國立. Perf. Ekin Cheng and Angela
Pang 彭家麗. TVB, 1993.
The Great Devotion 可憐天下父母心. Dir. Chor Yuen. Perf. Pak Yin 白燕 and Cheung Wood-
Yau 張活游, Shanlian Film Company 山聯影業公司, 1960.
The Legendary Swordsman 笑傲江湖. Prod. Ma Jiajun 馬家駿. Perf. Steve Ma 馬景濤 and
Jacelyn Tay 鄭秀珍, Mediacorp, 2000.
The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射雕英雄傳.Prod. Wong Tin Lam. Perf. Felix Wong 黃日華
and Barbara Yung 翁美玲. TVB, 1983.
The Legend of the Condor Heroes 射鵰英雄傳. Prod. Karen Tsoi 蔡藝儂.Perf. Hu Ge 胡歌 and
Ariel Lin 林依晨. Chinese Entertainment Shanghai 上海唐人電視制作有限公司, 2008.
The Legend of the Golden Lion 金毛獅王. Prod. Lee Yuanke 李元科. Perf. Vincent Wan 尹揚明
and Anita Lee 李婉華. TVB, 1993.
The Love Eterne 梁山伯與祝英台. Dir. Lee Han-hsiang 李翰祥. Perf. Ivy Ling Po 凌波 and
Betty Loh Ti 樂蒂. Shaw Brothers, 1963.
The Mystery of the Condor Hero 射鵰英雄傳之九陰真經. Prod. Poon Ka-Tak 潘嘉德. Perf.
David Chiang 姜大衛 and Fiona Leung, TVB 1993.
241

The New Tales of the Flying Fox 新飛狐外傳. Dir. Liu Shih-yu 劉仕裕. Perf. Kara Hui
惠英紅 and Alex Man 萬梓良. Shaw Brothers, 1984.
The One-Armed Swordsman 獨臂刀. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. Jimmy Wang Yu 王羽
and Lisa Chiao Chiao 焦姣. Shaw Brothers, 1967.
The Proud Youth 笑傲江湖. Dir. Sun Chung. Perf. Wang Yu and Shih Szu 施思. Shaw
Brothers, 1978.
The Return of the Condor Heroes 神雕俠侶. Prod. Siu Sang 蕭笙. Perf. Andy Lau and Idy Chan
陳玉蓮. TVB, 1983.
The Romance of the Book and Sword 書劍恩仇錄. Dir. Ann Hui. Perf. Zhang Duofu and Da
Shichang 達式常. Sil-Metropole, 1987.
The Romance of the Condor Heroes 神鵰俠侶. Prod. Yu Zheng 于正. Perf. Michelle Chen 陳妍
希 and Chen Xiao 陳曉. Yu Zheng Studio 于正工作室, 2014.
The Smiling, Proud Wanderer 笑傲江湖. Prod. Lee Ting-Luen 李鼎倫. Perf. Chow Yun-fat 周
潤發 and Rebecca Chan 陳秀珠. TVB, 1984.
The Story of Great Heroes 神鵰俠侶 I, II, III, and IV. Dir. Lee Fa. Perf. Patrick Tse and Nam
Hung 南紅, Emei Film, 1960-1961.
Tillman, Hoyt Cleveland, and Stephen H. West, eds. China under Jurchen Rule: Essays on Chin
Intellectual and Cultural History. Albany: State University of New York, 1995.
Told by Filmmakers and Stars 電影口述歷史展覽之再現江湖. Hong Kong: Provisional Urban
Council 臨時市政局, 1999.
Turning Point Laughing Gor 之變節. Dir. Herman Yau 邱禮濤. Perf. Michael Tse 謝天華 and
242

Anthony Wong 黃秋生. Shaw Brothers, 2009.
Tsang, Steve. A Modern History of Hong Kong. London: I.B. Tauris, 2004.
Twin Swords 鴛鴦刀. Dir. Lee Fa. Perf. Lam Fung 林鳳 and Chow Chung 周驄. Emei Film,
1961.
Twitchett, Denis Crispin, and Tietze, Klaus-Peter. "The Liao." The Cambridge History of China
Volume 6: Alien Regimes and Border States 907-1368. Eds. Herbert Franke and Denis
Twitchett. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 154-214.
Vengeance! 報仇. Dir. Chang Cheh. Perf. David Chiang and Wong Ping 汪萍. Shaw Brothers,
1970.
Wan, Margaret B. Green Peony and the Rise of the Chinese Martial Arts Novel. Albany: SUNY
Press, 2009.
Wang, Shuo 王朔. “Reading Jin Yong” 我看金庸.China Youth Daily 中國青年報 1 November
1999.
Wei, Zhengtong 韋政通. “The Spirit of Xiayi in Mohism: A New Perspective in Mohist Studies”
墨家的俠義精神: 墨學研究的新視野. 2005 International Conference of Modernizing
Mohist Studies. Ed. Wang Zanyuan 王讚源. Taipei, 2005.
Wen Kang 文康. Tale of Heroic Lovers 兒女英雄傳. Taipei: Sanmin Shuju 三民書局. 1992.
Xiao’ao Jianghu 笑傲江湖. Prod. Yang Peipei 楊佩佩. Perf. Bryan Leung 梁家仁 and Leanne
Liu 劉雪華, Taiwan Television 臺灣電視公司, 1985.
Xu, Jieshun. “Understanding the Snowball Theory of the Han Nationality.” Critical Han Studies.
Ed. Thomas S. Mullaney. Berkeley, CA: University of California, 2012. 113-27.
Xu, Sinian 徐斯年. Traces of the Xia: A Discussion on the History of Chinese Wuxia Fiction 俠
243

的蹤跡: 中國武俠小說史論, Beijing: People’s Literature Publishing House 人民文學出
版社, 1995.
Ye, Hongsheng 葉洪生. A Record of Wuxia Xiaoshuo’s Artistic Discussion: Ye Hongsheng
Discusses the Sword 武俠小說談藝錄: 葉洪生論劍. Taipei: Linking Publishing 聯經出
版公司, 1994.
Ye, Hongsheng and Lin, Baochun 林保淳. The Historical Development of Taiwan’s Wuxia
Fiction 台灣武俠小說發展史. Taipei: Yuanliu, 2005.
Yuan, Zhen 元稹. “Story of Ts’ui Ying-ying” 崔鶯鶯傳. Ed. Cyril Birch. Anthology of Chinese
Literature from Early Times to the Fourteenth Century. New York: Grove, 1965. 290-9.
Zhu, Wenzhang. The Moslem Rebellion in Northwest China, 1862-1878: A Study of Government
Minority Policy. The Hague: Mouton, 1966.

Abstract (if available)

Linked assets

University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Conceptually similar

PDF

Between wushu warriors and queens: articulating gender and identity in Sinophone rap music videos

PDF

Language, soundscape, and identity formation in Shanghai fangyan literature and culture

PDF

Co-producing the Asia Pacific: travels in technology, space, time and gender

PDF

Choreographing the Sinophone body: martial movements and embodied languages in Hong Kong media

PDF

The lineage of figures and attributes of Xia embodied in Chinese Xia videogames

PDF

Tentacular sex: Gender, race, and science in American speculative fiction

PDF

The space of Japanese science fiction: illustration, subculture, and the body in SF Magazine

PDF

Ideological shifts in portrayals of ethnic gangs and gangsters in New York novels and film adaptations

PDF

Existential surplus: affect and labor in Asian diasporic video cultures

PDF

Animation before the war: nation, identity, and modernity in Japan from 1914-1945

PDF

Progressive technology, stagnant politics: how dating apps perpetuate gender hierarchy and transform relationships in urban China

PDF

Buddhist literature and gender in Korea: a preliminary survey and science fictional explorations

PDF

Speculative Latinidades: imagining Latinx identities in science fiction and fantasy Media and activism

PDF

Historical depictions of slavery and civil rights in 21st century American film: global circulation of post-racial ideology in the Age of Obama

PDF

Art and epic theater in Cold War Germany

Asset Metadata

Creator Mac, Gladys (author)

Core Title Jin Yong's chivalry: gender and ethnicity in wuxia fiction, film, and television

School College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program East Asian Languages and Cultures

Publication Date 09/26/2018

Defense Date 05/10/2016

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Chinese fiction,Ethnicity,film,gender,Hong Kong,Jin Yong,knight-errant,Martial arts,masculinity,OAI-PMH Harvest,Shaw Brothers,Sinophone,television series,TVB,wuxia,xia

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Bernards, Brian (committee chair), Birge, Bettine (committee member), Desser, David (committee member), Lippit, Akira (committee member)

Creator Email a33a33ino7@gmail.com,gladys.y.mac@gmaill.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c40-307149

Unique identifier UC11280672

Identifier etd-MacGladys-4817.pdf (filename),usctheses-c40-307149 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-MacGladys-4817.pdf

Dmrecord 307149

Document Type Dissertation

Format application/pdf (imt)

Rights Mac, Gladys

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA