Compassionate characters under-rated

[Dennis Chen]

The most compassionate characters always get the short end of the stick. Zhang Wuji is a prime example, more often than not coming in last to Guo Jing or Yang Guo. Yang Guo was certainly not a compassionate character, he was passionate and actually very selfish. Guo Jing had compassion, but he had greater sense of duty and justice. A clear example was when he was going to cut off Guo Fu's arm as punishment for her cutting off Yang Guo's arm. Also, there are the Greats. Everybody admires Hong Qi for his sense of justice. Most people love Huang Yaoshi for his coolness. There are even people who give Ouyang Feng his due for his tenacity. And people are often amused by Zhong Wan Tong. That leaves only Wang Chongyang and Duan Zhixing/Yi Deng. Not much is known about Wang Chongyang, however, he entered into the Hua Shan tournament to stop 9 Ying from falling into the wrong hands. He traded his art with Yi Deng to make sure that Ouyang Feng could be stopped after his death. That sounds like a compassionate man to me. Yet, most people don't seem to admire nor like him very much. Yi Deng had also become a compassionate man after he became a monk. He spent the latter part of his life with the man that killed the little boy of his concubine. He gladly gave up all his kung fu to heal Huang Rong's illness. Yet, many people do not seem to like him very much, nor hate him, most people seem neutral about him. And that brings us to Zhang Wuji. He had every reason to hate all the big schools and use his kung fu to make them all pay for the death of his parents. Instead, he used his skills to try to unite Jiang Hu and help everyone. Yet, everyone seems to think of him as a wish-washy pansy. He was merely compassionate. Nobody seems to like compassionate characters.

[yittz]

No one can really say they hate YD or WCY - they just don't have that much screentime or personality to hate or like. Also both YD and WCY had their list of failures.

ZWJ is uber imo. People who dislike either because he got to muck around with 4 chics, w/o commitment while getting loyalty in return (so the people who are jealous cause they are not as smooth, or feminists), or his lack of instinct in fighting (which can be attributed to his kindness, experience and growing up on an island, - XZ didnt win convincingly fighting someone 1/9 of his internal).

[duguxiaojing]

Actually I like all three...honestly the characters I did not like(or thought I did not like lol) was only due to my own ignorance. Once the translators started on the job I realized I only hated the characters only because because of what I read on the forum. Actually going through the novel I don't feel that I hate any of the main protagoinst(from the larger JY novels, not sure about the smaller ones).

Also, Ive said in the past that ZWJ's kind heart was one of his best qualities. The scene where he refuses to swear vengance on the people "responisible" for his parents death was actually quite touching, he actually had the prescence of mind as a child to realize that killing the people would lead to nothing. Compare that to YG who refused to swear to his dying mother to not seek out his father's killer and then spent a great deal of his latter teenage years trying to kill a man he respected out of vegence...and ZWJ definetly looks better out of the two.

[owbjhx]

The most compassionate characters always get the short end of the stick. Zhang Wuji is a prime example...That leaves only Wang Chongyang and Duan Zhixing/Yi Deng...

Interesting points.

I agree that Zhang Wuji certainly beats Guo Jing and Yang Guo in terms of sheer niceness, but for me personally, the issue is not his niceness but rather his blandness. GJ, Xuzhu and in some ways Xiao Feng are also fairly bland types, but the symbolism about them makes them slightly more interesting. Jinyong almost certainly had some sort of grand idea for ZWJ, too, but he didn't handle it very well, and so all that's left is a nice but fairly dull guy. If anything, JY seems to suggest that ZWJ's compassion is actually his problem. His romantic life parallels his political life in that he has difficulty making decisions that might hurt someone; his attitude towards Xie Xun is morally questionable in his reluctance to allow XX to face the punishment he probably deserves. The revised ending for Yi Tian 3rd edition even suggests how ZWJ's compassion, over time, has a tendency to make everything become blurred and colourless: in a word, bland.

So ZWJ is a good guy but bad literature.

I find Wang Chongyang, as glimpsed in Shen Diao, quite cool. It's just that the idea of him is not as striking as the idea of Dugu Qiubai.

As for Yideng: JY tries to harness the sublime power of Buddhist redemption in all of the Trilogy novels and in Tian Long, and each time, he fails. It's just Yideng's bad luck that he got to star in some of JY's worst writing. In that sense, he definitely got the short end of the stick.

[PJ]

Yet, most people don't seem to admire nor like him very much.

That's because your constant in-your-face worshipping of this man has impaired any admiration that we might have originally had for the man.

The situation illustrates one of the central ironies of wuxia: the more you want something (to happen), the less likely you will get it (to happen).

[Dennis Chen]

People's blind worship of Dugu Qiubai certainly hasn't effected your opinion of that non-character.

[smurf120]

I find Dugu Qiubai's swordmanship and legend status intriguing but other than that I find his life (what's known of it) to be quite boring. He practices sword, picks fights, changes weapon, picks fights, changes weapon, lives with condor in cave, picks fights with condor.

IMO WCY is very broad minded and left behind monuments to his achievements/defeats (the tomb, Chongyang Gong) and felt deeply about his country. His affair with LCY seems to have overshadowed all other aspects of him though.

[kidd]

ZWJ is my favourite hero of the Condor Trilogy because of his compassion and his willingness to let go of revenge for the greater good.

[AnhHung]

ZWJ is my favourite hero of the Condor Trilogy because of his compassion and his willingness to let go of revenge for the greater good.

I'll second that

[sixdays]

there's nothing wrong with ZWJ...professionally, i guess you could say. he does an incredible job with the Ming Cult; in fact, he does what i wish LHC would have done with Sun Moon Cult. However, to me, these are the main characteristics of each protagonist in the condor trilogy:

GJ - righteousness, i.e. the belief in what's right

YG - street smart

ZWJ - indecisiveness

now frankly, i want to say that ZWJ is known for his intelligence -- he surpasses the other two, that's for sure. easily the best doctor of his time, he also learns 9yang by himself, rocks QKDLY thanks to his 9yang base, has no problem learning tai chi, etc. but the problem here is that, even with all the advantages he's been given, ZWJ is not a warrior. that's what bothers me most about him. he just doesn't have a fighter's spirit, which JY illustrates admirably. ZWJ never wants to fight, only fights as long as he has to, and leaves Jiang Hu ASAP. i mean, it fits his personality, i just think it's lame in an age of warriors like LOCH and ROCH.