Adapted from Arthur Waley’s celebrated English translation of “Journey to the West” (1942), titled “Monkey.” Waley’s translation was the standard English text for half a century — but it was written entirely in Wade-Giles romanization. Here, it has been updated.
There was a rock that since the creation of the world had been worked upon by the pure essences of Heaven and the fine savours of Earth, the vigour of sunshine and the grace of moonlight, till at last it became magically pregnant and one day split open, giving birth to a stone egg, about as big as a playing ball. Fructified by the wind it developed into a stone monkey, complete with every organ and limb.
This monkey learned to walk and run, and at last wandered to the edge of a great waterfall. “Whoever dares to go through this waterfall and find out what lies behind it,” cried one of the old monkeys, “we will make him our king.”
The stone monkey leaped through. Behind the waterfall lay a great iron bridge, and beyond the bridge a cave — the Cave of the Water Curtain. And the monkey became King of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit.
But the Monkey King was not content. He journeyed across the seas, seeking the Way. In the land of Jambudvipa Southern Continent, he wandered through the world of men, learning their languages and their customs. At last, on the Mountain of the Heart and Mind, he found a great sage — the Patriarch Subodhi — who taught him the secrets of immortality, the seventy-two transformations, and the cloud-somersault that could carry him a hundred and eight thousand li miles in a single bound.
And so Sun Wukong — the Monkey King, the Great Sage Equal of Heaven — began his rebellion against the celestial order. He ate the Peaches of Immortality from the garden of the Taoist Daoist Queen Mother, drank the Jade Emperor’s wine, and stole the elixir pills of Laozi Laozi. The armies of Heaven could not subdue him. Only the Buddha himself could bring him to heel — and even then, only by a trick.
Note: Waley’s translation uses “Taoist” for Daoist, “Laozi” for Laozi, “li” for miles, and other Wade-Giles conventions throughout. “Journey to the West” is one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature. When English readers first encountered Sun Wukong, they met him through a romanization system that systematically misrepresented every Chinese name in the text. This passage replaces those conventions while preserving Waley’s narrative voice — one of the finest English prose styles of the 20th century.