I have read Journey to the West more than ten times from beginning to end since I was a child, and it is a novel that I would not feel guilty if I read it twenty times.
It is the only novel that I refuse to read and look down on any fanfic. Except for adaptations in other art forms, we will not look down on them, such as the CCTV TV series in the 1980s and American Film's "Havoc in Heaven". But I also lament that some of the spirit of the original work has been slightly weakened.
Journey to the West was banned in the Ming Dynasty. It is said that the sentence "The emperor takes turns, and he will come to my house next year" was considered counterintuitive. Just because of one sentence, the whole story was given such a big label and was banned. When I was a child, I felt that Journey to the West was particularly unfair. I have also read Water Margin before. Water Margin was a serious attempt to rebel against the imperial court, and the stories of the good and bad people were written in great detail. In my eyes, Journey to the West has always been a children's book.
Now, I understand that the author of Journey to the West has a heart that dares to be rebellious. He has already rebelled. What he writes is not rebellious, but he always leaves behind some rebellious notes on the worldview and subtleties. Whether it's Water Margin, Three Kingdoms, Red Mansions, or X in the Golden Vase, even though the world is written from all angles, the author still doesn't have a rebellious heart. That was it in the end.
No wonder people say: Young people don't read Journey to the West.
Conception: