Klasik Çin Edebiyatında “Batıya Yolculuk” Romanı ve Esin Kaynağı Üzerine Mitolojik Bir Okuma

Abstract

In the fifteenth century AD. during the period Ming Dynasty, which ise one of dynasties of Chinese history, written and compiled by Wu Cheng’en, the novel “Xi You Ji Journey To The West” is one of the classical chinese piece, narrates the pilgrim voyage of budist monk Xuanzang to the India. Along the way, they encounter various mythological animals, ghosts, monsters and mythical creatures. The novel "Journey to the West" is one of the four classic works of classical Chinese literature. These four classic books, including "Journey to the West", are "The Dream of Red Mansions 红楼梦", " Water Margin” or “Outlaws of the Marsh水浒传" and " Three Kingdoms三国演义." The novel describes the adventures of Xuanzang during his journey to India. In addition to this, in "Journey to the West", during Xuanzang's holy pilgrimage trip, to serve him and protect himself from all kinds of troubles, “Sun Wukong 孙悟空”, “Zhu Bajie 猪八戒”, “Sha Wujing沙悟净” and “White Dragon Horse 白龙马” accompanied him. There are many derivatives of the novel of Journey to the West in the countries neighboring the Chinese geography. Its Indian counterpart, the Ramayana, and one of the main characters, Hanuman, are an important example of this. It is also found in countries such as Korea, Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Sri Lanka. In this study, the definition of the novel Journey to the West is made, its content and subject are explained, its place and importance in classical Chinese and world literature are explained.