"Everything is a naked Judeo-Christian reference. There have been plenty of great stories told with Western tropes, but it doesn't take too long before everyone in the entire world feels they've heard the same story ad nauseum. It says something that few noticed how California just become the first to make Diwali an official state holiday -and of course the entire US economy revolves around a Christian holiday at the end of December."
"One of the benefits of growing up in California is being exposed to diversity on a regular basis, yet my first exposure to the Chinese Buddhist folktale of the Monkey King was probably through Gene Luen Yang's book American Born Chinese. It's an intriguing myth that finds its way into countless Chinese and Chinese-American stories (and one of arts editor Marke B.'s favorite '70s kid action-adven showsture)."
"The story of the eponymous king (Chinese tenor Kang Wang) is a tale of understandable hubris and inevitable come-uppance. After being born from a stone, he heads his fellow monkeys to safety from the world's many predators, leading them to make him "The Handsome Monkey King." ("I added the 'handsome' part myself.") Now both hero and monarch, he's as narcissistic as he is powerful, challenging enemies great and small."
Western cultural references dominate many contexts, creating repeated familiar tropes and leaving other mythologies underrepresented. California exhibits regular cultural diversity and recently recognized Diwali as an official state holiday, while US economic rhythms remain tied to a Christian December holiday. The Monkey King folktale gained American exposure through Gene Luen Yang's American Born Chinese. San Francisco Opera premiered The Monkey King at the War Memorial Opera House, with a libretto by David Henry Hwang and music by Huang Ruo. The narrative follows a stone-born monkey who becomes the Handsome Monkey King, whose narcissism and hubris provoke conflict until Buddha intervenes to teach him.
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