Domestic top “secondary dimensional” IP: Three Kingdoms

"The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" has always been a famous book that the Chinese people talk about. Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Zhuge Liang, and Sima Yi, these historical figures from more than a thousand years ago are still household names today. This book is not only the pride of the Chinese people, but also the most popular Chinese classical novel in East Asia. What is the reason why "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" has such great charm and can remain in the circle of Chinese character civilization for a long time?

The Three Kingdoms of fiction, not the Three Kingdoms of history

Most of the Three Kingdoms allusions we are familiar with now come from the novel "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms", which has long been divorced from historical facts and is a pure novel. The characters in "Three Kingdoms" can be said to be quite different from those in "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". The Three Kingdoms that Chinese people love is not the Three Kingdoms in official history, but the story of the Three Kingdoms that has been interpreted and modified.

Before the Song Dynasty, people did not have the same aversion to powerful ministers as later, so Cao Cao's image in the official history "Three Kingdoms" is actually very tall. He was not only a military wizard but also an outstanding political leader. He was also a hero who ended the war in the north.

But in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, his image began to decline and gradually became cunning and cunning. By the Song Dynasty, especially the Southern Song Dynasty, it was almost the same as the image in "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". This process is also caused by the strengthening of centralization in China and the gradual change in people's views on powerful ministers.

At this time, the hero Cao Cao in the official history "Three Kingdoms" was naturally not liked by the public, and he gradually became dark in many unofficial histories. When "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" describes Cao Cao, it is not necessarily the author's personal prejudice against Cao Cao, but the result of absorbing a large number of previous unofficial historical records.

Cao Cao was demonized, while Zhuge Liang was sanctified. Originally in the Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms, he was a man who was good at internal affairs but bad at military affairs. However, because he "dedicated himself to the utmost", he was favored by later Confucian concepts, so he gradually became a man of scheming and scheming.

There are different opinions on the time and author of "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". It is generally believed that it was written by Luo Guanzhong, and its full name is "The Popular Romance of the Three Kingdoms". It was written in the early or mid-Ming Dynasty. "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" basically caters to the values ​​of the Ming Dynasty. The Ming and Qing dynasties coincided with the great success of Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism. The more than a thousand characters that appeared in the story of "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" were all embodiments of the good and bad guys in the Confucian mind.

In Japan, the story of the Three Kingdoms is packed with seats

However, the output of "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" was not smooth sailing. When Luo Guanzhong's "The Popular Romance of the Three Kingdoms" was first translated into Japanese, it was called "The Popular Romance of the Three Kingdoms". The translators were brothers Yi Tetsu and Yuetou, monks of Tenryuji Temple in Kyoto. Starting from 1689, they spent three years working together to translate the book, and then signed it "Hunan Wenshan" to engrave and publish it.

At this time, almost three hundred years have passed since the birth of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Moreover, it was still only circulated among monks long after it was translated. What is going on? In fact, this is directly related to the status of Confucianism in Japan.

According to the "Nihon Shoki", Japan's first official history, in the 15th year of Emperor Onshin's reign (AD 405), Dr. Wang Ren of Baekje arrived in Japan upon invitation and brought ten volumes of "The Analects of Confucius" and one volume of "The Thousand-Character Classic". This is the earliest record of the introduction of Chinese Confucianism to Japan. But until the Warring States Period, Confucianism did not have a true "official school" status in Japan.

But it all changed with one person. In 1600 AD, Tokugawa Ieyasu won the Battle of Sekigahara and seized national hegemony. Then in 1603, he forced the imperial family to make him the right minister and general of the conquest of barbarians. He opened the shogunate in Edo (today's Tokyo) and began the nearly three hundred years of Tokugawa shogunate rule.

Tokugawa Ieyasu was not only a shrewd political commander, but also a great scholar who was passionate about Chinese culture. He once invited Fujiwara Xingwo to teach "Zhenguan Zhengwo" and "Hanshu", published Chinese classics such as "The Book of Songs" and "The Book of Changes", and hired Lin Luoshan as a Confucian consultant to study and research Confucian political culture.

The success of Confucian political culture during the Tokugawa shogunate period was partly due to the actual needs of the rulers. Especially after more than a hundred years of war, the Tokugawa rulers urgently needed to consolidate their political power, restore social and political order, and rebuild their moral foundation. However, Buddhism, which once played an important role in these aspects, had declined and was no longer useful.

After that, "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" began a long process of localization. In 1836, with the publication of "The Popular Picture Book of the Three Kingdoms", the Three Kingdoms craze quickly spread in Japan. "Popular Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms" is based on Luo Guanzhong's "The Romance", with reference to Chen Shou's "The Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms", and combines 120 chapters into a popular Japanese version of the "Romance". It also adds a lot of additions to the unfinished parts, so it is closer to a compilation than a sentence-by-sentence translation that is faithful to the original text.

At the end of the 19th century, there were still many storytelling centers in Osaka's civilian areas that told stories of the Three Kingdoms all year round. The story is too long, and most listeners give up halfway. However, as long as a notice "Kong Ming appears today" is posted at the door of the bookstore, listeners will come again, so that the seats are packed. This shows how popular the story of the Three Kingdoms was in Japan at that time.

Corresponding to this, after two hundred years of localization, Confucianism has taken deep roots in Japan. So much so that on the eve of the Meiji Restoration, even the slogans of the rebel faction were based on the Confucian thinking of "respecting the king and rejecting the barbarians." It can be seen that the popularity of "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" in the Edo period was not a coincidence.

North Korea and Vietnam are also die-hard loyalists to the Three Kingdoms

Unlike Japan, the three countries entered the Korean Peninsula much earlier. It is currently known that at least before June 1569, the book had entered North Korea and was well known to the scholar-official class.

At the beginning of its introduction, most Korean scholar-officials were as critical of "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" as the scholar-officials before the mid-Ming Dynasty. They cited the writings of Confucius, Mencius or Cheng Zhuzhi, and adopted a rejection attitude towards popular Chinese novels such as "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms", criticizing the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" for its unorthodoxy, unethicality, non-historical nature and obscene nature.

However, as North Korea is the most authentic Confucian country, "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" naturally has unparalleled appeal to them. This also allowed some enlightened scholar-officials to put aside their prejudices. For example, Jin Wanzhong, a famous scholar of the Li Dynasty, fully affirmed the unique value of Chinese popular novels such as "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and cannot be replaced by official history. "This is the authoritative opinion of Luo's novels. Today, Chen Shou's biography and Wen Gong's "Tongjian" are used to gather people to talk about it. People may not burst into tears. This is why this popular novel is written."

Like Japan, it took a while for North Korea to fully embrace Romance of the Three Kingdoms. An opportunity brought the Korean people's obsession with the Three Kingdoms to its peak - the Imjin War. During the war, most of the Korean territory was occupied by the Japanese army, and a large number of people were plundered. Lee's Joseon, which recovered with the help of the Ming army, needed to strengthen Confucianism to stabilize its position. Under this trend of thought, the story of the Three Kingdoms is very popular in North Korea, and almost everyone knows Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Zhang Fei.

In addition to Japan and South Korea, Vietnam is the country most affected by China. Historically, Vietnam and China have had close relations since ancient times. From the Qin and Han Dynasties to the Tang Dynasty, Vietnam was ruled by the Chinese dynasty for a long time, which Vietnamese historians call the Northern period.

In the Later Le Dynasty, Vietnam's ruling class even respected Confucianism, which brought Confucianism into a heyday. Especially Le Thanh Tong, he penetrated Confucianism into all aspects of society's politics, economy, culture and education, and folk customs, making Confucianism the dominant ruling thought in the late feudal society of Vietnam.

Therefore, Vietnam has a profound foundation of Confucianism. And unlike Japan and South Korea, Vietnam was directly ruled by the Central Plains dynasties several times, and the Ming Dynasty was one of them. Therefore, there are many Ming Dynasty survivors or soldiers living abroad. Compared with Japan and South Korea, this communication medium is undoubtedly more direct.

The Vietnamese historical novels in Chinese that we have seen so far basically adopt the chapter-turn structure form. This form is exactly what Vietnamese writers learned from "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". Among all historical novels in Vietnam, "The Unification of Huang Le" has the highest achievement and greatest influence. It is also known as an outstanding representative of Vietnamese medieval literature. Its influence by "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" has long been recognized by academic circles.

Influenced by "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms", "Huang Le Yi Tong Zhi" is a famous Chinese literary work in Vietnam / http://goodreads.com

It is worth mentioning that "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is also the first foreign novel to be translated into a new language after the Latinization of Vietnamese characters, and its influence is evident.

Japan brings the Three Kingdoms to the world

If China used words and illustrations to create novels to make the Three Kingdoms recognized by the Confucian world, then Japan used games and animations to let the world know about the Three Kingdoms. After all, with more than a hundred years of changes, the Confucian tradition of the three East Asian countries has been weakening, especially on the Korean Peninsula. Even the Chinese characters have been abandoned, and ordinary people cannot even read the original novels.

In 1971, Kouki Yokoyama's comic version of "Three Kingdoms" began to be serialized. Until 1986, there were a total of 60 single volumes and tens of millions of copies were distributed. The manga was later adapted into an animation, which is very popular in Japan and abroad.

However, in the Japanese Three Kingdoms works of the new era, it is difficult to see characters who embody Confucian thinking in the novels. Looking through the works of the Three Kingdoms from Japan after World War II, we see more heroes that conform to modern people's concepts. There are no almost perfect embodied "gods" or "devils" in the past.

The comic "Cangtian Passage" with Cao Cao as the protagonist is a typical example. There is no absolute good or evil in it, but only heroes who act for their own ideals. In "Steel Three Kingdoms", Zhuge Liang turns into a villain but his ultimate goal is to save the world.

The works of the Three Kingdoms at this time were more romantic than "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". Many of them just borrowed characters from the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but at their core they were completely based on the "save the world" routine of modern animation.

The game also promotes the culture of the Three Kingdoms and makes young people fascinated by it. In 1985, the game "Three Kingdoms", which influenced several generations of Chinese people, was released. As of 2016, 13 generations of products have been released, which is a good story in the history of simulation games. Since then, the Three Kingdoms game has been out of control. This enduring game is the childhood memory of countless Chinese young people.

Handheld games such as "The Legend of Kong Ming" have accompanied the childhood of many children around the world, including those born in the 80s and 90s in China. No matter how exciting the burning of the new fields in the original work is, compared to manually creating a "fire attack" on the palm of your hand, the depth of memory will be much weaker.

The fighting of the generals in "Dynasty Warriors" also expresses the characters of the Three Kingdoms more vividly. Moreover, the political distinction between good and evil and the clear distinction between good and evil has been eliminated, and it has become completely neutral.

Like "The Sky Route", this abandons the red-white-faced good and evil model of the traditional Three Kingdoms. Almost everyone's goal is to better the world. This is undoubtedly more in line with the values ​​of contemporary people than black and white. Many Europeans and Americans, after becoming fans of "Japanese Three Kingdoms", read the original work and got completely different feelings from East Asians.

Japan's status in the animation and comics industry also adds fuel to the Three Kingdoms culture. Japanese comics achieved sales of $4.84 billion in the United States in 2003 alone. In 2007, 70% of comics sold in Germany came from Japan. Wangdao comics like "Dragon Ball" have become childhood memories of many Europeans and Americans.

Through exquisite characters and modern interpretation, Japan has made the Three Kingdoms shine differently from the past. It is no exaggeration to say that although the Three Kingdoms culture was born in China, it was Japan that truly carried it forward.