Author : Jin Yong

In every chinese community around the globe, the novels of Jin Yong are read and cherished. Everyone, from street vendors to university professors, from teenagers to senior citizens, hungrily devours his rich sagas. He can claim hundreds of millions of readers- too many in fact to count. His works reflect the true essence of the Chinese spirit.

 His Novels

Jin Yong’s novels portray sweeping dramas of people who are ready to fight for a just cause, driven by the conviction that not to do so is cowardice. Justice to them is more important than life itself. They fight evil and injustice, placing their lives on the line for their principles.They are heros among the people.

The protagonists of Jin Yong’s novels are men of soild principles and women of strong resolve struggling together as comrades towards a common ideal. He describes his creations or characters ” I want to depict people who endure the most difficult circumstances with an invincible spirit and wage a valiant struggle to triumph over all obstacles.

A character in one of Jin Yong novel: Shu Jian En Chou Lu says ” the courageous are clear in their loyalties.” In other words, they are loyal to their benefactors and relentless in bringing justice anyone who would dare harm those whom they are indebted.This is a description of an impassioned person of action, a person whom the good will befriend and the corrupt will hesitate to meddle with.

 His Life

Jin Yong real name is Louis Cha , was born in China’s Zhejiang Province in 1924. Jin Yong has profound respect for his grandfather , Cha WenQing, who was a provincial governor towards the end of Qing Dynasty.Resentment against the incursions into China by the western powers and the suffering it was causing the Chinese people in the province ran high, and a group of protesters set fire to a Christian church in a place called Danyang in Jiangsu Province. To them, the church and clergy were nothing but agents of the foreign powers. The leader of the uprising was about to be executed, but Governor Cha helped the man to escape. Then he resigned from his post, taking full responsibility. He was prepared to give his very life to save the Chinese people. The inner strength of the Cha family shaped Jin Yong’s Life as well.

Though his grades were always top of the class, he was expelled twice from school.The first time is when he is seventeen whereby he wrote a satiric piece on an abusive head teacher in the school’s newspaper. The other students cheered, but he was expelled. The second he was expelled was when he was twenty. Wanting to become an diplomat, he entered the Central School of Government , where again he was at the head of his class. But he soon become angered at the violent wat in which students from Kuomintang harassed other students. He appealed to the university authorties for justice and instead of receiving it, he was expelled for stirring up trouble.

Later, he moved to Hong Kong, where he founded a newspaper, Ming Pao. There, too, he continued to find himself in the line of fire. In one of the conversations, he remarked: Because i have always stick with my beliefs, i have been subject to death threats and forced to bear the pressure of living in constant danger, But, ” what is right is right and what is evil is evil. I have been given in to pressure that goes against truth and justice. I always tell myself ,” Even if you are afraid, you must never beat a cowardly retreat when danger approaches, lest you be ridiculed by the heros of your own novels.”

Jin Yong says ” one determined person has the strength of a hundred.”

Advertisement