The novel Romance of Gods was written in Qin Long during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty. The author generally thinks that Xu (talking about Lu Xixing) chose the historical event of Wu Wang's attack on Zhou as the narrative core, so it is also called The Complete Biography of Shang and Zhou Countries and The History of Wu Wang's Attack on Zhou. In the novel, the author adds many mythical elements, which puts a strange coat on this familiar history. Of course, this is also a major feature of the Romance of the Gods, which is different from other novels. Undoubtedly, it is a relatively successful fairy tale novel.

But when it comes to Romance of the Gods, many readers will inevitably compare it with The Journey to the West, another mythological masterpiece born in the Ming Dynasty. The Journey to the West is of great literary and artistic value. The narrative styles of many leading characters make readers fondle them, and a large number of fans have gathered since the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Of course, there are the aura of the protagonists in Journey to the West, the Monkey King and so on. Moreover, the logical events in the book are interlocking (this point is explained in detail in the book The Mystery of Journey to the West), which may be incomparable to the Romance of the Gods, which is dominated by group dramas.

But between them, it may not be completely without * * *. In The Journey to the West, the artistic images in The Romance of Gods actually appeared to varying degrees. For example, King Li Tian of Tota and his four sons, especially Nezha, also contributed a lot to heaven when the Monkey King made trouble in Huaguoshan. This may be the penetrating power of the characters in the novel. Of course, there are many such examples.

So can Romance of the Gods and The Journey to the West be read together? My point is, yes, not exactly.

Let's talk about the no part first. Although the two novels, Romance of the Gods and The Journey to the West, both originated in the Ming Dynasty and belong to fairy tales, the cultural background is roughly the same, but the authors are different after all, one is Xu (or Lu Xixing) and the other is Wu Cheng'en. The two authors have different knowledge, ideas, ideas and roles. Besides, their beliefs are not necessarily the same. If the two novels are integrated, it will inevitably be forced to "connect the bones and face", and the result is ridiculous.

For example, take Nezha as an example. "The Romance of the Gods" said that the lotus incarnation was made by Master Taiyi, but in The Journey to the West, it became the credit of the Tathagata Buddha. Nezha's artistic image in The Romance of the Gods was three heads and eight arms, but it became three heads and six arms in The Journey to the West. Because of this, the characters in the two novels cannot be simply connected in series, and there is a congenital gap in artistic shaping. However, it would be impolite to blindly draw a boundary between the two novels. As we mentioned earlier, there are many overlapping characters in the two novels.

Therefore, it is not impossible to connect the two novels in series, but incomplete. And this function is exactly what we want to elaborate.

As we all know, The Journey to the West is a work accumulated from generation to generation, and Wu Cheng'en is only its ultimate creator, not an independent creator. The story of Tang Priest's (Xuanzang's) pilgrimage to the West was widely circulated in the late Tang Dynasty and was regarded as a myth among the people. Before Wu The Journey to the West's book was written, there were records such as "Journey to the West by Sanzang" and "Pinghua", and early images of his disciples and his party can also be found in some murals before the Ming Dynasty.

Like The Journey to the West, The Romance of Gods is a work accumulated from generation to generation. The story of Jiang Ziya's beheading was circulated by storytellers long before the novel took shape. Especially in the Yuan Dynasty, most of the stories had already taken shape. Some of these stories have been improved by generations of people, and the framework is mostly fixed. For example, Biography of Guo, compiled by Yu during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, collected a large number of early folklore. All these provide the general framework and plot unit for the Romance of the Gods. It is on this basis that Xu (or Lu Xixing) completed the creation of the Romance of the Ghosts and Ghosts.

In a word, the text novels born in Ming Dynasty have the same cultural genes. Academically speaking, they all inherit a set of DNA and share the same bases, purines, pyrimidines and related literary polymerases, but there are some differences in the arrangement order when they are combined. Of course, this is mainly caused by the author's own differences. For example, The Journey to the West wrote a book before the Romance of Gods, and the hero Song Jiang left a lyric after committing a crime. "I am the jade emperor's son-in-law, and my husband taught me to bring hundreds of heavenly soldiers to kill you Jiangzhou people. King Yamaraja is a pioneer, and five generals are followers. Give me a golden seal, more than 800 kilograms, and kill a bird like you. " It can be seen that the legend of the Jade Emperor and the hundred thousand heavenly soldiers has a long history. The Journey to the West didn't create them independently, but they all continued a set of literary codes.

Let's take another popular example, taking Yan Xi Palace, a popular drama in the early Qing Dynasty, as a sample. Its historical background took place during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, and the story unfolded in the complex relationship between Emperor Qianlong, Empress Xiaoyi Chun (played by Wu as the imperial concubine) and the successor queen Huifa Nala (played by the imperial concubine). In The Story of Yan Xi Palace, the main plot naturally advances between Qianlong and Ling Fei, and the virtuous princess becomes the villain. Interestingly, in another TV series with the same theme "Love in Ruyi Palace", Xian Fei is the protagonist (that is, Yi Ru played by Zhou Xun), which has also become a positive image. If the audience shuttles back and forth between the two plays, it will inevitably be confused. God, who does this Qianlong emperor love? The root of this dislocation lies not in the confusion of historical framework, but in the conflict of the author's own will. Because of this, someone who has a skill even confuses the earlier princess with the joke Qianlong, which leads to a maddening question: Your concubine and virtuous princess, or Xia He, a civilian played by Daming Lake, who is Emperor Qianlong's favorite? In short, Qianlong is very busy on the road of personal feelings.

However, no matter how the author arranges it, their historical framework is fixed, that is, the chronicle of the harem in Qianlong period. Although fairy tales are different from history, they also have their own context. However, some mythical novels are based on this context, spreading branches and leaves for artistic creation. The Romance of the Gods and The Journey to the West are such works. So, you have to choose. What is subjectively added by the author, which causes differences in the text, can be appropriately eliminated, and what reflects the background of the mythical era can be retained and concatenated. By sorting out this train of thought, we can get a clue. The Journey to the West described the unsuccessful impact of grassroots forces represented by the Monkey King on the existing solidified class after the integration of Tang Tian Group. The story background of Romance of the Gods tells how the forces of all parties in heaven were integrated at first. The story background of the two novels presents a progressive relationship. Of course, what we interpret is the worship of the gods, and the main body of the story is definitely the romance of the gods. This is a sequence.