Before I came back to the valley, I was in Hong Kong and bought the third edition of 笑傲江湖. For those of you unfamiliar with it, it's a Chinese martial arts novel. Ask any of your Chinese friends and they can fill you in.
A big fan and admirer of 金庸, I've read all his books many, many times over and over. Lost many hours of sleep in the wee hours of the night doing it. A relative purist when it comes to 金庸 - don't watch the TV and film renditions (aka. gross distortions) of his work.
This third edition of 笑傲江湖 is part of an iniative by the author to revise all his works. I might be slightly biased coming in since I've been so used to the second edition.
My favorite part about the new edition. When 令狐沖 is learning to play music from 任盈盈 (then not having revealed who she actually is), there're a couple new paragraphs of addition that analyzes 笑傲江湖之曲. I love this part. It's a little hard to describe in English, but read it and let me know what you think.
5 comments:
i haven't read the newest edition - is there a lot changed? haven't read it in years but i do recall a great scene where she's talking to him behind a screen and he thinks she is an old lady. although i love both characters, i don't think they're perfect for each other. ling totally romanticized his "siew see mui" and didn't appreciate ying ying enough. i'm skeptical about his change of heart. anyhooz, looking fwd to more updates on this blog chewcloud.
I agree with the TV dramas being crap. Sometimes, I can't help but imagine how some of the scenes could be played out on screen... like 張無忌's coming out party on 光明頂, or the Nameless monk tossing around those high hands in the 藏書閣.
I think 令's change of heart is totally plausible. 小師妹 basically broke his heart, he was on the rebound, and his free spirt allowed him to do so. Plus, traumatic events often breed attraction and allow relationships to bud at lightning speed.
Thanks for the comments!! =) Um, interesting discussion. I'm intrigued by our interpretations of how and when 令狐沖 reciprocates love towards 任盈盈. I'll write more on this later (gotta go to work now). Call this a cliffhanger.
First to arby82's suspicion of 令's change of heart. I think both arby82 and Laughing Man has a good point here, and you can argue both ways. 令 has idealized 小師妹, and sometimes it's tough to let go of somebody you idealized - this is the strong basis for arby82's suspicion. At the same time, men have pride, and after getting dumped and ditched, it's not unreasonable to assume 令 will go for the objectively better catch. That's why the author had 小師妹 killed so he didn't have to explain how to eventually have 令 and 盈盈 hook up! (And of course, after the tramautic events that 令 and 盈盈 go through together - fighting off "Auck But Kwun" and seeing 令's "See Leung" kill herself, being almost the edge of death together when they got tied up (twice!, once with rocks, and another inside a fishing net) plus all the fighting that goes on inside the cave at "Wah Saan Pie"... we can see how love can really be sped up.) Laughing Man, I love your rebound theory.
Ling Wu, where are you?
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