The Journey to the West showed rich social content in the form of myth, reflected the realistic social contradictions in twists and turns, and showed the people's wishes and demands of punishing evil and promoting good. The Monkey King embodies the people's strong desire to resist autocratic oppression, defeat the dark forces and conquer nature.
The Monkey King's spirit of positive optimism and courage to struggle is an artistic summary of the long-term struggle life of the people of China, and it is the product of the combination of ideal and reality.
As the opposite of the Monkey King, the world of God buddha magic was unjust, and the fatuity and violence of the Jade Emperor was the epitome of the feudal ruling class at that time. The sinister lust of the demons on the way to the scriptures reflects the similarities and differences of the dark forces in society.
Appreciation of The Journey to the West:
The "Heavenly Palace" in the novel reflects the people's resistance in China feudal society through fairy tales. Of course, fantasy novel's reflection of reality has its own characteristics, which is different from ordinary literary works that directly reflect real life. The rebels in the "Tiangong" erected the banner of "the Monkey King" and put forward the slogan "The emperors take turns to do it and come to my house next year".
One hundred thousand heavenly soldiers will run away, and the rule of the Heavenly Palace is so shaky that the Jade Emperor has to ask for help. These fictional and fantasy plots are all based on the peasant uprising and peasant war in reality.
If there were not many large-scale peasant uprisings and peasant wars in history that violently impacted the feudal dynasty, the plot of "Make a scene in Heaven" could not be as bold as imagined, and the rebellious image of the Monkey King could not be so brilliant. "Making Heaven" ended in the Monkey King's failure, which was related to the author's influence on feudal orthodoxy to some extent.
At the same time, it must be pointed out that the Monkey King's subjugation at the foot of Wuxing Mountain and his subsequent conversion to Buddhism are also inevitable requirements for the development of the plot. Obviously, the Monkey King on Huaguoshan will never give up his life as a king for no reason to help Tang Priest learn from the West. Without this arrangement, he will not be able to transition to the following Buddhist story.
Moreover, the basic outline of The Journey to the West was formed long before Wu Cheng'en, so it is difficult for the author to make fundamental changes in this key place.