Chapter 1-5 Summary

Monkey by Wu Ch'eng-en and translated by Arthur Waley is a story about the Stone Monkey King and his journey, along with Hsuan Tsang and others, to get scrolls from Buddha's paradise in India and take them back to China. Along the way the group must fight demons, Immortals, save the innocent, and walk the path of Buddha without fail.

The story begins with a rock that is worked upon by heaven and earth and gives birth to the Stone Monkey. He lives with the other monkeys in the forest and one day the monkeys decide to go and find where the mountain from which the spring comes. They find a veil of water flowing over the side of a mountain and announce that any of them that are brave enough to go through the veil of water flowing down the...