This article started as a nerdy dive into a 16th century Chinese novel which was the source and inspiration for the Japanese TV show Monkey, popular in the 1980s. However the article also became a bit of a nostalgia trip and now includes some thoughts on how the novel was adapted for TV as well as a few notes about its cast, characters and production.
In summary, the television drama was based on the 16th century Chinese novel Journey to the West by Wu Cheng’en. The English translator, Arthur Waley, managed to reduce it to around a third of its original length, condensing its hundred or so chapters into around thirty, and turning it into a picaresque adventure story that won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1942. A children’s version was published under the title Dear Monkey. An American children’s version was called The Adventures of Monkey.
The novel is a fictionalized account of a real pilgrimage nearly 1000 years earlier by a 7th century Chinese Buddhist monk who journeyed to India in 629 AD to seek out and collect Buddhist scriptures (aka sutras).
The real 7th century monk was called Hiuen Tsang, also known by his religious name of Xuanzang (born 602, died 664 AD). Xuanzang’s account of his journey and experiences appears in Great Tang Records on the Western Regions.
The Tang Dynasty ran from 618 to 907 AD. Xuanzang (sometimes rendered as Sanzang) was also known as Tripitaka. Taizong of Tang, the emperor at that time, had declared that he and Xuanzang were sworn brothers and gave him the name Tripitaka when Xuanzang was about to set off on his pilgrimage. Tripitaka is named after the three sets of sutras in the West called the Tripitaka canons which were the object of his quest. Tripitaka means something like “three baskets” or “triple basket” (sometimes “three collections”), a traditional term for certain ancient collections of Buddhist sacred scriptures. (I like to think that if we were to give him a street name today, Tripitaka would become something like ‘Jimmy Three Bags’.)
Fast forward nine centuries to 1592 when the Chinese novel Journey to the West was published, around the time that Shakespeare was writing his early history plays in England. The fictional monk in this 16th century novel is called Tang Sanzang, aka Tripitaka. The novel follows the broad outline of Xuanzang’s real 7th century account but adds fantasy elements from folk tales and the author’s own imagination, following the traditional Chinese style and genre of Shenmo Xiaoshuo (Tales of Gods of Demons). It doesn’t pretend to follow historical events accurately. In this version of the story, the Buddha tasks the monk Tripitaka with journeying to India and provides him with three protectors who agree to help him in order to atone for their sins. One of these disciples is Monkey, with the given name Sun Wukong. In the novel, Monkey is the main character and acts as protector and guardian to the rest of the gang.
That novel formed the basis for script development for the TV series Monkey. Nippon Television (NTV) commissioned the project in 1978 to celebrate the network’s 25th anniversary. It was produced in association with International Television Films and filmed mostly in Northwest China and Inner Mongolia with additional scenes shot in Japan for interior and studio work.
In Japan, the show was called Saiyuki, which means ‘Account of the Journey to the West’. It is titled ‘Monkey’ in the English version but is sometimes referred to as ‘Monkey Magic’ because of the lyrics of its title music Monki Majikku by Japanese rock band Godiego.
At the time of writing this article (January 2026), Masaaki Sakai, the actor who played Monkey, is the only cast member still alive. The full cast was:
Tripitaka (Tang Sanzang): Masako Natsume. Died aged 27 in 1985 from leukaemia. Voiced by Maria Warburg. Tripitaka is a young male priest. The director said he chose to have an actress play the character in order to better express his innocence. Another reason given for the male Tripitaka character being played by a woman in the series was that actress Masako Natsume matched descriptions of Tsang’s appearance more closely than male actors. Symbolically, Tripitaka had achieved the Buddhist goal of enlightenment and in the TV show he appears androgynous or beyond gender. The Buddha himself and various celestial beings – guides and messengers – appear with a reverse gender and are shown in female form.
Monkey (Sun Wukong): Masaaki Sakai. Born 6 August 1946. His voice was dubbed into English by David Collings. Collings had also voiced Legolas in the 1981 BBC radio serial adaptation of Lord of the Rings.
Pigsy (Zhu Bajie): The first Pigsy, Toshiyuki Nishida, was born 4 Nov 1947 and died 17 Oct 2024. The second Pigsy, Tonpei Hidari, was born 30 May 1937 and died 24 Feb 2018. Voiced by Peter Woodthorpe. Woodthorpe previously voiced Gollum in the 1981 BBC radio version of Lord of the Rings.
Sandy (Sha Wujing): Shiro Kishibe. Born 7 June 1949 and died 28 Aug 2020. Voiced by Gareth Armstrong,
Horse (Bai Long Ma): Shunji Fujimura. Born 8 Dec 1934 and died 25 Jan 2017. Voiced by Andrew Sachs. This character was a dragon prince who was banished and forced to serve as Tripitaka’s horse, appearing only occasionally in human form. ‘Bai Long Ma’ means ‘White Dragon Horse’.
Miriam Margolyes voiced many of the female characters.
Frank Duncan was the narrator for the earlier episodes then Burt Kwouk for later episodes.
And to finish, here is the opening of Arthur Waley’s translation of the 16th century novel:
“There was a rock that since the creation of the world had been worked upon by the pure essences of Heaven and the fine savours of Earth, the vigour of sunshine and the grace of moonlight, till at last it became magically pregnant and one day split open, giving birth to a stone egg, about as big as a playing ball. Fructified by the wind it developed into a stone monkey, complete with every organ and limb.”
In the TV show, it turned into this iconic introduction:
In the worlds before Monkey, primal chaos reigned.
Heaven sought order.
But the phoenix can fly only when its feathers are grown.
The four worlds formed again and yet again,
As endless aeons wheeled and passed.
Time and the pure essences of Heaven,
the moisture of the Earth,
the powers of the sun and the moon
All worked upon a certain rock, old as creation.
And it became magically fertile.
That first egg was named “Thought”.
Tathagata Buddha, the Father Buddha, said,
“With our thoughts, we make the world.”
Elemental forces caused the egg to hatch.
From it then came a stone monkey.
The nature of Monkey was irrepressible!
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Author’s note: No AI was used in writing this article. It is the product of traditional research methods using a variety of sources.
