Ancient China’s fantastic beasts and how to call them (p1)
So I’ve been re-reading my favourite Chinese novels (mainly MXTX and other danmei) using the English translations available online in order to talk about them to non-Chinese speaking friends. First of all, I have to give lots and lots thanks to the fan translators who took out a lot of time to translate and bring these novels to others who don’t speak Chinese, especially considering Chinese is not particularly an easy language to translate to English at all. However, in regards to how certain fantasy entities are often defined in Chinese, some of the English translations that I came across didn’t feel quite right to me. Therefore, here’s a (very limited) intro post I thought I’d make.
Disclaimer/disclosure: Chinese is actually my third language, but the language and culture share tons of similarity with my mother tongue (English is my 2nd, of course), so I was raised surrounded by Chinese culture and literary works. I am, however, a STEM kid through and through, so I honestly have no formal education of Chinese linguistics, and whatever I write here is based on my experience with the words/tropes as well as colloquial uses. I’ll refer to some Western mythology later in comparison as well, and I have even less experience with that outside of reading some Homer and fantasy books. Hence, I welcome any and all criticisms.
In this post, I’ll just identify some differences between 妖魔鬼怪 - yao, mo, gui, guai, respectively. While they are often used together as a phrase to denote supernatural presence (negatively) in general, each word actually denotes a different type of beings. Do note that authors are at full creative liberty to depict these beings however they want in their novels, similar to how things like vampires, witches, and werewolves can be different in different adaptations (sometimes wildly so - Draculas vs. Edward Cullen anyone?). Below are just some common understanding of the terms, that is, what I would picture in my mind when reading the words without the authors’ explanation.
Let’s start with the easiest type to explain - 妖, yao. Yao is used to describe things or living beings that can turn into human form. Similar to how humans can cultivate natural energy around us to increase our power/lifespan (see: Mo Dao Zu Shi), there is a belief that other living and non-living beings can cultivate energy to turn themselves into human forms. (As to why they would want to be human, well, we like to think ourselves as the superior existence, heh.) These human forms then often possess supernatural powers, most likely closely linked to their natural form. For example, a non-sentient tree or rock can cultivate enough to turn into a human if they are placed in a sacred place, or have ‘listened’ to lectures by some masters of cultivation over a long period of time. A tree that can turn human, for example is called 树妖, shu (tree) yao. Probably the most popular characters in folklore stories is the fox spirit, or kitsune (Japanese), or the 狐妖, hu yao, with 狐 (hu) is a fox. Aside from the suffix -yao, these types of creatures can be described with the suffix -jing, eg. 狐狸精, 树精. The word jing means to understand, to be aware, ergo fit to describe a yao. The closest translation would probably be the were creatures, werewolf, were-lion, etc. Yao is not infectious though, and it can come from non-living things, like rocks.
Another easy class of creatures to identify is 怪, guai. In everyday, non-fantasy meaning, guai means different, strange. Unsurprisingly, it’s used to described monsters, the most straightforward term I think of. Do note that guai often means monsters that are as different from the human form as possible, aka. think Godzilla, not vampires. They are often not of human origin as well. From the works I have read, guai often don’t possess very varied magical abilities, outside of their immense physical strength and at most 1-2 quirks.
Now, 魔鬼 is a bit of a hard one, because sometimes they are used interchangeably, sometimes even together as a 2-in-1 package. Just to confirm my instinctive thoughts, I double-checked on Baidu (aka Chinese Google) to be sure. Let’s do 鬼 - gui first. Most of the time, gui is used to describe ghosts - humans who have died but not moved on or went to (Buddhist) hell or can still return to Earth. While benign ghosts are gui as well, some authors may use 灵魂 (ling hun - souls) to distinguish them from gui, which has a negative connotation. Gui often are sorted into different categories - the hungry ghosts, the violent ghosts, etc. 厉鬼 (li gui) is often the most violent ghosts who died in a horrible manner and wanted revenge against the living. Gui can possess a wide of range of abilities which is not very different from Western horror movies’ depictions. An obvious difference is gui abides by the Chinese Buddhism/Taoist beliefs of reincarnation and karma, rather than the typical Judeo-Christian thing in Western movies (aka none of that cross and holy water stuff). For example, Hua Cheng in TGCF is a 鬼王 - Gui Wang, which is the ghost king. By using the term gui, the author didn’t have to spell out that he used to be a human that died.
魔 - mo is a tricky term. It can be used to describe dead evil people, emphasis on evil. Interestingly, Baidu says the Chinese language does not have the word mo - it is rather an adaptation from the word “Mara” in the Buddhist scriptures. Strictly speaking, mo describes all negative human emotions that prevent humans from practising Buddhism / their quest for Nirvana. It describes doubts, temptations, jealousy, etc. which are the roots to “evil”. This word later evolves to describe “evil” in general. When people are corrupted with thoughts like greed, envy, they are said to develop a 心魔 - xin (heart) mo - literally evil in their hearts. In MDZS, what Nie Mingjue undergoes is called 走火入魔 - zou hua ru mo, which was translated as “qi deviation”. The word mo appears in this phrase, and its linked verb ru mo (to enter/descend to evil). Creatures that are described as mo, then, are implied to be of evil origins. In some texts, they are born from the evil of the world/humanity. In other texts, humans can corrupt themselves to the point of evil, turning themselve into mo. Maybe, mo (creatures) can be translated as demons, or at least that’s how I understand the latter term in the Judeo-Christian sense. Luo Binghe from Scum Villain is definitely a mo, having been inheriting the ‘evil’ blood from his father. Since mo are quite commonly understood as evil, that’s why Binghe has to ask Shen Qing Qiu whether he discriminates against Binghe for his blood.
Then, here comes the confusion: since gui are often evil, and mo is definitively evil, some will use them interchangeably. Which is not wrong - there are no strict rules regulating this as far as I know. However, it’s sometimes a bit difficult to know which English word to use for it - demon and ghost are quite different. Some times I don’t even know LOL. For example, in Guardian (Zhen Hun), Shen Wei is called a 鬼王 (gui wang) as well, like Hua Cheng. However, in the story (spoiler?) Shen Wei was never human - he was born from the ‘evil energy’ of the Earth. Which would make him closer to a mo wang - demon king, but when Priest (the author) uses gui wang, in Chinese it still makes sense, at least to me (and probably readers). I don’t know if I’m making sense here, but mo gui can be a bit difficult like that.
So that’s it for this post. If I’m free, maybe I’ll add on with 神仙佛圣, the good supernatural guys later.
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