Ho Yi, The Archer - Retold by Shelley Fu

                                                Introduction

The origins of  Chinese folktales include history, songs, theater, and the oral tradition of storytelling. Undoubtedly, storytelling was the earliest way these stories were handed down from generation to  generation.  They were sometimes translated into songs and vice versa. By about 1100 BC, many stories we now think of as folktales were common in "historical" accounts, These stories explained the origins of natural phenomena and documented the lives and deeds of semi-legendary figures and were believed to be true.  They were written in a very factual style in order to record what was thought of as scientific of historical information and often consisted only of outlines.  

During the Han Dynasty (206 BC to 220 AD), literature flourished as the great masters of the era used the refined language of the court to record popular folktales and songs.  During this period, most Chinese literatry works were written in wen yen wen, or the classical Chinese language, The combination of refined language with lively folk elements resulted in some of the finest early examples of Chinese literature.  However, by the beginning of the T'ang Dynasty (618 to 907 AD), the early creativeness of the Han Dynasty degenerated into a highly stylized and excessively ornate type of literature.

It was during the T'ang Dynasty that the first real fiction appeared, with short stories that had riveting plots and highly developed charaters.  These stories dealt with virtue, social satire, religion, and love and influenced later drama and fiction. Superstitions documented in the earlier "historical" accounts were thus elevated into the realm of imaginative literature.  The stories were written in the elegant wen yen wen.

To be continued

Ho Yi, The Archer - Retold by Shelley Fu

                                             Contents

Introduction

Tales of Creation

     Pan Gu and the Creation

     Nu Wo, the Mother of Mankind

     Ho Yi, the Archer 

Morality Tales

     Journey to the west

     The Man in the Moon

Tales of Love

      The Story of the White Snake

      The Heavenly River

Making a needle out of an iron bar

  Making a needle out of an iron bar

Bai, JuYi who lived in the Tang dynasty, was recognized as a saint of poems in China. His work is studied by all the children in China today. As a bright and promising child, he was wild and playful. He didn¡¯t all that care about school work.

   One day he was playing on a bridge and noticed an old woman sitting on the side of the river polishing an iron bar. The woman has been working on her iron bar all day. Like all kids, curiosity drove him to approach her and asked her, ¡°What are you doing?¡±

   She looked at him and smiled like she was expecting the question. She replied, ¡°Young man, I¡¯m making a needle and I know I¡¯ll have one someday if I keep sharpening it with patience and perseverance.¡±

   What happened to Bai, JuYi after that encounter can be found in Chinese history.

MengZh¡¯s Mother cut the cloth which she had been working on for days

MengZh¡¯s Mother cut the cloth which she had been working on for days

2000 years ago, there was a highly accomplished scholar name MengZh. His mother was a very fine cloth maker and used it to earn a living. It took a few days of highly concentrated manual work to produce a good piece of cloth.

As a boy, MengZh was a very clever student, but he liked to skip school and have fun. One day, he went home after hanging out with friends all day and saw that his mother had finished the most beautiful piece of cloth that he every saw. Before he could admire the fine work, he was shocked to see that his mother pick up a pair of scissors and cut the cloth in half. ¡°Why have you just destroyed your beautiful cloth?¡± he asked.

His mother calmly replied, ¡°You were doing fine in school all alone. But, for one reason or another, you decided to skip school. All your efforts and accomplishments were wasted. It is just like my most beautiful cloth, it is worthless now.¡±

MengZh learned his lessons and became the most respected scholar in China for 2000 years only next to Confucius.

How did the universe start

Pan Gu and the Creation

     The Chinese believe that in the beginning, the universe was empty except for a big ball of energy shaped liked a chicken egg.  This ball of energy had existed since the beginning of time and was called Chaos.  Inside the egg, only mist swirled about until one day, the first living creature formed in Chaos.

     His name was Pan Gu, and he is the ancestor of us all. After he was formed, he slept for a long time while his body grew bigger and bigger   At first, his body was very small.  But after 18,000 years he grew so extremely big that Chaos could no longer hold him.  His strong and heavy head poked against one end if Chaos, and his sturdy feet strained against the other end.

      By this time, Pan Gu was enormous beyond measure.  In the small and narrow space of Chaos, Pan Gu was cramped and uncomfortable.  One day, he became so uncomfortable that he awoke.  He opened his eyes in amazement.  Beyond the haziness of Chaos, Pan Gu saw darkness so inky that nothing else was visible.

¡°I¡¯ll soon change this situation,¡± thought Pan Gu to himself.  He stretched out his hands and made an immense fist, which he struck against the wall of Chaos with all his might.  Ka-bam! The shell of the egg of Chaos cracked.

      Ts the stuff of Chaos leaked out into the darkness, the clear and light energy, called the Yang by the Chinese, curled upwards and formed the beautiful blue sky.  The heavier, murkier elements, called the Yin, sank to form the earth.  After Chaos was divided, the universe became a bright wide space.  But the distance between sky and earth was very small, and the elements of sky and earth would frequently mix.  Pan Gu couldn¡¯t stand up straight in this space and felt like dividing the two so that more distance separated them.

     Finally one day, Pan Gu was so bothered that he planted his huge feet on the ground and his hands against the sky.  Pan Gu grew an inch every day, and the sky was accordingly pushed one inch higher each day and the earth grew one inch thicker from the pressure of his heavy weight.  Time passed.  Day after day, Pan Gu stood between heaven and earth, not daring to let go of his hold on the sky, afraid that heaven and earth would mix and all would revert to Chaos.

     His salty sweat streamed down from his forehead, stinging his eyes, bur he couldn¡¯t mop it away.  It flowed down his body and fell as rain and dew onto the ground, where it collected into pools to form the seas and oceans.

     The work of supporting the sky was extremely hard, and Pan Gu could not suppress a deep sigh of suffering.  His breath turned into the floating clouds and the wind, and the soutnd of his sigh became the rumbling thunder.  Over many, many years, he saw the heavens slowly rise and the earth grow thicker and thicker, and he rejoiced.

     Finally, after another 18,000 years, the sky was very high and the earth very thick.  There was no longer any danger of sky and earth mixing.  At last, Pan Gu was satisfied and let go his hold.  But the strenuous work of holding earth and sky apart for so long had exhausted Pan Gu, and he fell to the ground immediately.

     His body became the massive mountains, his blood and body fluids the surging rivers.  His sinews and veins transformed into narrow and crooked roads, his skin and muscles the fertile fields.  The hairs on his skin turned into the beautiful and multitudinous grass, flowers, trees, and woods.  Even his bones and teeth turned into bright, hatd gold, brilliant jewels, and precious pearls.  His beautiful hair flew up and filled the whole sky with countless bright stars.

     Pan Gu was still not dead and observed the changes with great satisfaction.  He knew he was dying, but he wanted to gaze upon his work forever.  He winked and sent his left eye into the clear sky, where it tuned into the golden sun.  He winked again, and his right eye also sailed past the clouds and turned into the bright and silvery moon.  Thus to this day, Pan Gu looks lovingly down upon his greatest creation, the bountiful and beautiful earth.

¡°Heaven and earth were born at the same time I was, and the ten thousand thins are one with me.¡±