Aggh!
It’s early March 2020 and everywhere I look I see something
about the coronavirus. And since the
virus started in China, incidents of racist actions and attacks against Asian
and Asian-American people seem to be on the rise.
You know what? At least
right here, right now, let’s turn things around. Let’s focus on something positive and
creative from China.
We’re going to talk about one of China’s “Four Great Folk
Tales”. For those who don’t know,
China’s Four Great Folk Tales are “The Butterfly Lovers”, “Lady Meng Jiang
Wailed Over the Great Wall”, “The Cowherd and the Weaving Girl” and “Madam
White Snake”. That last one is the one
we’re going to focus on.
The story of “Madam White Snake” is also often called “The
White Snake”. I’m using the former name
here because there’s also a Grimm story with the same title and I don’t want to
confuse the two. There are a couple of
different versions. Here’s a condensed
version that has many of the most common elements:
One day, Lu Dongbin of the Eight Immortals disguises himself
as a tangyuan vendor at a certain bridge.
There he meets a boy named Xu Xian who buys some tangyuan from him. Now, it turns out that the tangyuan are
actually immortality pills. After eating
them, Xu Xian discovers he doesn’t get hungry for the next three days. Wanting to know why, Xu Xian goes back to the
vendor. Lu Dongbin laughs, carries him
back to the bridge and holds him upside down and forces him to vomit the
immortality pills into the lake. Now, in
the lake is a white snake who has been practicing Taoist magical arts. Upon eating the spewed-up pills, she gains
500 years worth of magic power. One day,
the white snake sees a beggar who has caught a green snake and wants to kill it
and cut out its gall to sell (snake gall can be used as a sort of medicine in
Chinese medicine). The White Snake
transforms herself into a woman and buys the green snake, saving her life. The green snake is grateful and begins to
regard the white snake as a sort of elder sister. Years later, the white snake and green snake
take on the forms of two women named Bai Suzhen and Xiaoqing respectively. There, they meet Xu Xian again who has grown
into a man and become a physician to boot.
In time, Bai Suzhen and Xu Xian fall in love. They marry and open a medicine shop. Now, in this area there is a monk named Fahai
who has somehow realized that there is something supernatural about Bai
Suzhen. One day during the Duanwu
Festival, Fahai convinces Xu Xian that he should give Bai Suzhen some realgar
wine (a wine that humans can drink but does not agree with demons). Bai Suzhen drinks the wine and, feeling ill,
unconsciously turns back into the form of a large white snake. Seeing her true form, Xu Xian dies from
shock. Bai Suzhen and Xiaoqing then
travel to a distant mountain to retrieve a magical herb that can heal any wound
and even revive the dead. Thus revived,
Xu Xian realizes his wife’s devotion and love despite her supernatural nature
and embraces her, vowing to continue loving and cherishing his amazing wife.
This isn’t the end of the story, though. This story is practically a saga unto
itself. Fahai keeps coming back to try
and split up the two lovers. The tale
even carries over to another generation, Xu Xian and Bai Suzhen’s son Xu
Mengjiao. There are different versions
of the story too. Some say that Fahai
was just a monk who thought it was unholy for humans and spirits (spirits,
demons, etc. There are a lot of English
substitution words for what Bai Suzhen actually was) to comingle like they
did. Others say that Fahai was a
terrapin or tortoise that was practicing magic like the White Snake had and was
jealous that she had 500 years of magical power given to her by seeming chance.
When I pick these stories for Folk Tale Secret Stash, I
usually hedge my bets toward something that I feel will be easy for Western
audiences to get into. This one is
almost the opposite of that. With
mentions of certain obscure forms of food and wine, real locations and specific
references to Chinese medicine and Taoist magical practices, this story can
seem VERY Chinese. So, why did I pick
this specific story? Well, one thing is
exposure. But I’ll get back to that
later. The other is that there comes a
point where we can’t be afraid of those kinds of details anymore. If my aim is to expand the fairy tale canon
beyond the standard European tales, which it is, we’ll need to get to the point
where we can see the epic love story beyond all the details and cultural
references.
As for the exposure thing, well, it’s one of the most
popular folk tales in all of China. How
big is this tale? Really big. Big enough that the media stemming off of it
has spilled over into the U.S.
Seriously, stuff based on this tale is around. A loose animated prequel to the story was
brought over by GKIDS in a limited theatrical run and has just been released on
blu-ray. A serialized drama based on the
tale, The Legend of White Snake, is currently available on Netflix. A far looser adaptation, The Destiny of White Snake, is viewable on Amazon Prime Video.
There’s even a Jet Li movie titled The Sorcerer and the White Snake which I’m
pretty sure got an American release if only on home video. So, it’s been around in some form, but if you’re
not the type to peruse Asian media you might not have seen it.
So, that’s the story of “Madam White Snake”. Personally, I like it. I think it has a unique heroine and I like
the grand scale love story that plays out.
And it’s at least a nice break from the panic surrounding the recent
virus outbreak. Will it become part of
the new Cosmopolitan fairy tale canon I hope takes root in the Western
world? Maybe not. This one might still be playing too much on
hard mode for most Americans at least (I can’t speak for Europe). But I always have hope.
