Tripmaster Monkey by Maxine Hong Kingston (1990, Paperback, Reprint)

Top Marks and Highest Recommendations as American Literature

I read this book a few years back, after reading Kingston's Woman Warrior and China Men, both of which are superb examples of Chinese family story-telling-to-children-with​-a-moral, remembered tales from a Chinese childhood in America, surrounded by Chinese who had emigrated out of necessity. The use of "my grandfather who [did whatever event had been told to her]" in China Men; clearly the stories involved more than two grandfathers, some of whom are Chinese mythological figures; the use of the restrictive clause "who . . ." not preceded by comma was fascinating: tales true, mythological or legendary, and of other people woven into the figures that represent "The Chinese Man" when taken as a whole, just as she does in Woman Warrior. That book includes the story of the mother who had to abandon her baby by the side of a road and/or under a tree, wrapped in red silk accompanied by her jade and/or gold bracelets, a story in many family tales: fantasy, legend, and reality mixed together around the painful event of having left behind a child, perhaps with relatives or neighbors, which is a part of the lives of many Chinese women who left mainland China with the Republic fo China when it fell to Communists or who left parts of China after the fall of the Manchu Dynasty, even throughout history, similar to the western myth/legend of leaving a baby in a basket, like Moses, carefully swaddled, with a note or memento, on the church steps.

Tripmaster Monkey, His Fake Book, is a departure from the earlier two, a laugh-out-loud funny book around a theatre group in contemporary San Francisco's Chinatown. The book's male protagonist is playing the part of Monkey, one of the three figures in Journey to the West, a Chinese Classic tale of a journey to bring the Buddhist sutras from India (the characters also appear in many forms in Japanese Manga & Anime today, notably Saiyuki & Saiyuki Reload). It may not have been a Monk, a Monkey, & a Pig who made the journey, but Buddhism did indeed spread from India eastward. The Monkey character increasingly permeates the young man's, leading him farther and farther into trouble: monkey business.

Kingston does a remarkable job of seeing the world and relationships through a young man's eyes. It is an even further departure from her two previous books in that it is grounded in contemporary life with little emphasis on the past.

The characters are well-rounded and believable; especially memorable is the young man's father, who may well be based on one of Kingston's actual relatives sans myth.

These three books are all worth reading and re-reading as they are remarkable pieces of literature, which those with some background in Chinese or Asian culture will find especially rich in depth. I want to reread the book and see how much it actually parallels Journey to the West. The first time I read it, I read it for pure enjoyment -- and enjoy it I did. I plan to reread the book to see where it actually parallels Journey to the West.

Amy Tan's more pedestrian "personal narratives" may provide a surface introduction for those with no background in Asian culture; Kingston's earlier 2 books provide solid grounding in the feel of the Chinese, of Chinese life, society, outlook, attitude; "Monkey" provides an intense look at what it is to be a Chinese-American, with the emphasis on American, more Jack Kerouac or Henry Miller than Henry Pu-I.