When Chinese Folktales Meet Western Audience: Lon Po Po, Mulan, and Yeh-Shen, in an

English Interpretation
Yen-Chen Liu
Abstract
There are always a variety of revised English versions of folktales. Revised English versions
of folktales can be adapted fairy tales or films. And among those revised English folktales, those
from Chinese folktales especially attract my attention. In the Chinese folktales, I concern the
original contents and their revised parts, and how Western authors/publishers adapt those texts. I
cited three texts as my example, Lon Po Po, Yeh-Shen, and Mulan, to scrutinize how Western
people view Chinese folktales and how they would like to rewrite and abridge Chinese folktales
in the future. As these Chinese folktales have their new life in their English interpretation, some
of the Chinese elements are preserved, whereas the rest disappears. The essay is to discuss the
transformation of Chinese folktales from China to the English-speaking world.
Keywords: Fairy Tales, Chinese folktales, Lon Po Po, Yeh-Shen, Mulan

Introduction
In categorization of childrens literature, there are sundry genres. There are folktale, drama,
biography, alphabet book, legends, poetry, picture book, and etcetera. Among those childrens
books, folktale is the type that is widely spread. For folklorists, folktales preserve the traditional
ways of what people live, think, and fear. Some folktales in Western society have already had
prevalent versions and commercial adaptions, such as Cinderella and Little Red-Riding Hood.
And there exist Chinese folktales share similar plots as Western folktales/fairy tales.
When the Chinese folktales are introduced into Western world, the texts are vigor again. Some
characters, language usages, plots, and even the purposes are adjusted. Although the texts
preserve their primitive forms, they have new life through cross-cultural receptions. Here I take
three Chinese folktales as examples: Lon Po Po, Yeh-Shen, and Mulan, to scrutinize the original
oral traditions and the translated ones. My essay is to find out the interplaying between the two
versions of the same texts, and to discover how the Western world reinterprets Chinese folktales
in the future.
The Review of the Literature
There are three main references concerning English versions of Chinese folktales. The first
one is Hung-Shu Chens Translation of Cultural Images of Wolf and Tiger. In this article she
clarifies the wolf image in Ed Youngs Lon Po Po, because in fact, its character is tiger from
Chinese Tiger Grandma Story. She cites the functional equivalence from the translation theory
to explain the position of wolf in Western societies and that of tiger in Chinese culture. Her
perspective is insightful, paving my research of character changes from Chinese folktales to
English childrens stories.
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In Perry Nodelmans The Pleasures of Childrens Literature, he explains the essence of

folktales and how Westerners read those folktales from Far East. Folklorists have categorize
folktales in types, regardless of their regional diversity. Based on the types, there are Cinderella
folktales around the world, and there exist abundant revised versions of Cinderella stories. When
Westerners adapt those Cinderella stories from other cultures, some contradictions happen. It
might deny the premise that folktales around the world showing similarities encourages children
to tolerant other cultures.
Besides Disneys Mulan, Fa Mulan: The Story of a Woman Warrior is another picture
book on this Chinese heroine. The former adds many visual elements to become a Disney film,
while the latter describes the story based on Chinese versions: Song of Mulan and Poem of
Mulan. Both of them do not change the main plots and main characters.
Folktales from China: Lon Po Po and Yeh-Shen
Based on Perry Nodelmans explanation, folktales are not for children in the beginning, but
rather a collective memories for all human beings. It is a tradition that can be tracked back to
ancient period. People told those stories to entertain themselves, to recall the horrible memories
of their ancestors, and to retell those precious experiences to their descendants. The folktales thus
become a primitive behavior of all human beings, which attract folklorists attention. When we
study the more about folktales, we understand the life styles of our ancestors. In the eighteenth
century, folklorists as well as linguists the Brother Grimms collected those folktales to unite
German language and consolidate its nationalism. From the folktales of the Brother Grimms, it is
obvious that those stories are not appropriate for children, for they are full of sexual
implications and violence. And since the collection of the Brother Grimms, those oral stories
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have their written forms; the written forms unite the diverse oral stories, regardless of those
different details.
Ed Youngs Lon Po Po is based on a Chinese folktale Tiger Grandma Story, yet the
main character is changed for its Western audience. Like other folktales, there are several
versions of Tiger Grandma Story, and the common feature is that a tiger disguises itself as a
grandmother. Tiger Grandma Story narrates that a tiger in a grandmother image wants to eat little
children, but finally little children outwit tiger grandmother and save their life. No matter the
changes of details in Tiger Grandma Story, Chinese-Speaking people always remember the
moment of the scary tiger grandma appears.
According to Hung-Shu Chen research, tiger has ambivalent significances in Chinese
culture. For one thing, it represents a good omen: during traditional holidays, people use the
images of tigers to pray for good fortune. For the other, it is a predator or an enemy of human
beings. Chinese have complicated feelings toward tiger; they love its energetic and vivid gesture
in pictures yet keep away from its violence. When Westerners read this Tiger Grandma Story,
they might find it similar to the Little Red-Riding Hood story, but only the Tiger Grandma is
substituted by the Big Bad Wolf. When the author/publisher introduces this Chinese folktale to
Western audience, it is advertised into a Chinese Little Red-Riding Hood story to recall Western
audience reading experience. Therefore the predator, a tiger in the Chinese version, becomes a
wolf in English version, in order to accord to the story of Little Red-Riding Hood. This method
of changing from tiger to wolf is called functional equivalence in the studies of translation,
which means that the position of tiger in Chinese folktales has similar function of wolf in
western society; even though this method seems to violate the accuracy of translation, but it

preserves the meanings in the target culture as well as in the source culture. In Chens word,
Young were actually gluing the fragments, making the images of the predator more complete.1
Western people view Yeh-Shen as a Chinese Cinderella story. Yeh-Shen is originated
from The Miscellaneous Record of Yu Yang, a collection which can be tracked back to the Tang
Dynasty. It is regarded as the most ancient Cinderella story around the world. However, the
ending of the original Chinese Cinderella story is quite different. According to the original text,
the king marries Yeh-Shen for golden fish (gold slipper). The king keeps asking money and
treasure from the golden fish, and at the end the fish is tired of the greedy king, so the king buries
the disobedient fish. The ending and the purpose of this Chinese folktale does not meet the
standard of a Wish-Fulfillment Fantasy of Cinderella story. Following is based on Perry
Nodelmans definition of a Wish-Fulfillment Fantasy2:
Because the plots of the tales offer the satisfaction of an imaginary fulfillment of the
wish for power, they are wish-fulfillment fantasy for people who perceive or who enjoy
pretending to perceive themselves as underdogs.
The Chinese Cinderella story does not emphasize on the poor beautiful lady becoming a queen of
a rich king; on the contrary, it indicates that the good deed of the female protagonist finally has
good reward: the golden fish is like a godmother in the Cinderella story. It is obvious that the
original version of Yeh-Shen is not what we see today. When the Chinese text is rediscovered,
1 Chen, H. S. (2008). Translation of Cultural Images of Wolf and Tiger. Taipei, Taiwan. 12.
2 Nodelman, P. and Mavis Reimer. (2003). The Pleasures of Childrens Literature. 3rd Ed. New York, NY: Allyn
and Bacon. 316.

it appears in a Western formula, with a happily ever after ending. To conclude, the plots of
Chinese folktales might alter in English version.

Folktales from China: Mulan

Disneys Mulan originates from The Poetry of Mulan in China, and the exact time of the
first story happening can hardly date back to. Mulan is a legendary Chinese woman who
disguises herself as a man for her elderly father. She is recruited to military. Many versions such
as Fa Mulan: The Story of a Woman Warrior record her life in the military, and the process of her
leading other soldiers to victory. In Disneys revision, it adds supporting roles, matchmaking
plots, beautiful music, and a happy marriage.
Disneys Mulan might not be gender inequality. It demonstrates a heroine does heroic
behaviors, showing her true disposition and ingenuousness, a very positive image of an Asian
woman. Mulan frees herself from traditional Chinese customs and codes, chasing her happiness
as well as protecting her nation. Even though some audience still are not satisfied the Disney
film once again emphasizes China as a conservative country3, Mulan is still recognized as a
milestone in Disneys princesses films.

I.

Conclusion

3 Mulan Throgh Looking Glass. (Katherine Kim). Retrieved November 27, 2013, from Salon Websites,
http://www.salon.com/1998/07/07/feature_371/
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Lon Po Po, Yeh-Shen, and Mulan they all are revised Chinese folktales in front of Western
audience, but they have different fortunes in interpretation. The character of Lon Po Po and the
plots of Yeh-Shen are changed to link to Western audiences familiarity, whereas as the additions
in Mulan just makes the whole film more appealing. In my opinion, both Lon Po Po and YehShen have a Western prototypes; thus, it is easily to put them into the formulae of those Western
fairy tales. Though there are many Western stories on women disguising themselves as men,
Mulan is still the prototype for itself, so it is not advertised into a Chinese transvestite story to
appeal to the target culture. To infer, maybe in the future, when there exist some similar protofairy tales in Western society, then the stories of the Chinese folktales might be altered; in
contrast, when the plots of Chinese folktales are remote, the stories will be preserved. After all,
the relationships between cross-cultures, folktales, revised texts deserve further research.

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