Journey to the West is a mythological novel based on centuries old popular stories. The novel tells of the amazing adventures of Priest Xuanzang and his three disciples, the irreverent Monkey King, the greedy but lovable pig, and a hard working river goblin as they go on the journey in search Buddhist sutras which are the writings of Buddha.

      This is story is partly based on the history of a famous Chinese monk, Xuan Zang who lived from (602-664).

     After years of trials and tribulations, he traveled on foot to what is today India, the birthplace of Buddhism, to seek for the Sutra, which is the Buddhist holy book.  When he returned to China, or as it was call then “the Great Tang” he started to translate the sutras into Chinese, thus making a great contribution to the development of Buddhism in China.

     If you read the Novel the Journey to the West you will notice that the main character of the story is really the Monkey King. This character is very familiar to most Asian children and has now become more familiar to western children through the now popular cartoon “Dragon Ball Z” whose main character is the Monkey King in the Novel.