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The Deer and the Cauldron
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The Deer and the Cauldron or The Duke of Mount Deer is the last of Jin Yong’s Wuxia novels.
The novel was initially published as a serial, the first installment being published on October 24, 1969 in Ming Pao and running for 2 years, 11 months, until September 23, 1972.
The choosing of the name of novel, which literally meant Tale of the Deer and the Cauldron, was alluded to in a scene of the first chapter showing a conversation between a scholar and his young son.
The scholar recounted that both the Deer and the Cauldron served as metaphors for the Central Plains and the Empire.
It was written in volume 92 of the historical text Book of Han "The deer lost by Qin was hunted by all under Heavens («??•????»:“????,??????” ), an illustration of the rise of numerous rivalling warlords contesting for supremacy to capture the prize, the empire lost by Qin.
During the Zhou Dynasty, there were the Nine Cauldrons, symbolic of the Divine Mandate of rulership.
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Encyclopedia
The Deer and the Cauldron or The Duke of Mount Deer is the last of Jin Yong’s Wuxia novels.
The novel was initially published as a serial, the first installment being published on October 24, 1969 in Ming Pao and running for 2 years, 11 months, until September 23, 1972.
The choosing of the name of novel, which literally meant Tale of the Deer and the Cauldron, was alluded to in a scene of the first chapter showing a conversation between a scholar and his young son.
The scholar recounted that both the Deer and the Cauldron served as metaphors for the Central Plains and the Empire.
It was written in volume 92 of the historical text Book of Han "The deer lost by Qin was hunted by all under Heavens («??•????»:“????,??????” ), an illustration of the rise of numerous rivalling warlords contesting for supremacy to capture the prize, the empire lost by Qin.
During the Zhou Dynasty, there were the Nine Cauldrons, symbolic of the Divine Mandate of rulership. Zuo Zhuan recorded an account where the ruler of the most powerful State of Chu enquired the weight of the cauldron from a Zhou minister. This sent a clear signal that he was coveting the rulership of the Empire technically possessed by the King of Zhou.
Put together, the title referred to novel's background where the ethnic-Han subjects of the defunct Ming struggled to restore their own rule on the empire against the nascent Manchu-ruled Qing Dynasty.
Towards the end of the novel, the protagonist Wei Xiaobao, an ethnic-Han with close ties to both the young Manchu emperor Kangxi and to the anti-Qing ethnic-Han rebels, and hitherto been delicately balancing his divided loyalties, came to personify the prize himself when he was pressured by both sides to make the crucial decision which would determine the fate of the empire.
Characters
See List of characters from The Deer and the Cauldron for a complete list of characters
Main Characters
Wei Xiaobao and his family
- Wei Xiaobao – the lazy, illiterate, witty and sly protagonist of the novel. He made a number of seemingly impossible achievements through sheer luck and wit.
- Mu Jianping – one of Wei Xiaobao’s seven wives. She was a princess of the Mu Prince Residence.
- Fang Yi – one of Wei Xiaobao’s seven wives. She served the Mu Prince Residence and was Liu Dahong’s disciple.
- Shuang Er – one of Wei Xiaobao’s seven wives. She was a maid from the Zhuang Family Residence in Huzhou and was given to Wei Xiaobao as a gift to thank him for killing Ao Bai. She is very loyal and very dependable as his bodyguard and servant.
- Su Quan – one of Wei Xiaobao’s seven wives. She was formerly the wife of Hong Antong. She bore Wei Tongchui.
- Princess Jian Ning – one of Wei Xiaobao’s seven wives. She was the spoiled younger sister of the Kangxi Emperor, very demanding and fierce. She bore Wei Shuangshuang.
- Zeng Rou – one of Wei Xiaobao’s seven wives. She tried to assassinate Wei Xiaobao but ended up falling in love with him.
- Wei Chunfang – the mother of Wei Xiaobao. She was a prostitute of the Li Chun Brothel in Yangzhou.
- Wei Tongchui – the second of Wei Xiaobao’s three children. His mother was Su Quan.
- Wei Shuangshuang – the youngest of Wei Xiaobao’s three children. Her mother was Princess Jian Ning.
Others
- Chen Jinnan – the highly respected leader of the anti-Qing Heaven and Earth Society. He was also a subject of the Kingdom of Tungning in Taiwan.
- Hong Antong – the leader of the Mystic Dragon Sect based on Snake Island.
- Ao Bai – the cruel and power-hungry aristocrat who had the intention of usurping the throne. He was removed from power cleverly by Wei Xiaobao and the young Kangxi Emperor and eventually died at Wei’s hands.
- Duo Long – the leader of the Imperial Guard. He had a close relationship with Wei Xiaobao, and was apparently killed by the latter unwillingly to save the entrapped anti-Qing rebels.
Wei Xiaobao’s treasured possessions
- Corpse-Eroding Powder – a powder which would turn corpses into dust when sprinkled on. Wei Xiaobao obtained this powder from Hai Dafu when he first entered the palace. This powder helped him in destroying evidence.
- Sharp Dagger – an extremely sharp dagger which could cut through metal as though it were soil and mud. Wei Xiaobao kept this dagger for himself when he went to confiscate Ao Bai’s possessions. The dagger proved useful for him in self-defence and times of danger.
- Lightweight Armour – a piece of light clothing which could prevent sharp weapons from piercing through. Wei Xiaobao obtained this clothing when he went to confiscate Ao Bai’s possessions. The armour proved useful for him in times of danger.
- Han Sha She Ying – a mechanical device capable of firing copper needles coated with poison. Wei Xiaobao obtained this device from He Tieshou and it came in useful for him in paralyzing and disarming enemies.
- Dice – a set of dice which contained mercury. They helped him cheat in gambling such that he would win every throw of the dice.
Plot
The story is centered around a witty, sly, illiterate and lazy protagonist, Wei Xiaobao who was born in a Yangzhou brothel. As a child, he listened to several stories of heroes and was awed by them. Once, he helped a pugilist named Mao Shiba escape from danger and pestered Mao until Mao had no choice but to bring him along all the way from the southern playground of Yangzhou to Beijing, the seat of Manchurian imperial power. There, he was kidnapped by two eunuchs and brought into the Imperial Palace (the Forbidden City). Through sheer wit and cunning, he managed to blind the old eunuch Hai Dafu and he killed the young eunuch Xiaoguizi and impersonated him.
One day, Wei Xiaobao came across a youth called Xiaoxuanzi, who was practising martial arts and had a contest with him, which gradually evolved into an unlikely friendship between the both of them. Xiaoxuanzi was later revealed to be actually the young Kangxi Emperor himself. At that time, the aristocrat Ao Bai wielded great power and had the intention of usurping the throne, but none dared to stand up against him for he was powerful in martial arts. Kangxi devised a scheme to remove Ao Bai from power and with the help of Wei Xiaobao, they managed to catch Ao Bai off guard and took him into captive. Kangxi’s position as ruler of the Qing Empire was thus secured with Wei’s assistance.
Later, Wei Xiaobao killed Ao Bai while he was in captive and earned himself the favour of the Emperor, as well as the respect of members of the anti-Qing organisation Heaven and Earth Society. At the age of 13, Wei Xiaobao became one of the Society’s Lodge Masters as well as the close disciple of Chen Jinnan, leader of the Society. Chen Jinnan found Wei Xiaobao to be of great use for his close relationship with the Emperor and made him the Society’s ‘undercover agent’ inside the palace. While in the palace, Wei Xiaobao encountered Mu Jianping and Fang Yi who also entered the palace by chance and he was attracted by their beauty. Wei helped the two beautiful maidens and their companions escape from the palace and won their hearts, so both of them would become his future wives.
Wei Xiaobao also managed to uncover the true identity of the Empress Dowager as being an imposter sent by the sinister Mystic Dragon Sect. He learnt from her that the Kangxi Emperor’s father the abdicated Shunzhi Emperor, who had been missing for several years was actually alive and had become a monk on Mount Wutai. To prevent the imposter Empress Dowager from harming Kangxi, he told Kangxi the truth that he was an imposter eunuch and that Shunzhi was still alive. When Kangxi heard that his presumed-to-be-long-dead father was still alive, he was both shocked and overjoyed and longed to be reunited with his father so he sent Wei Xiaobao on a mission to contact Shunzhi.
Wei Xiaobao passed by the Zhuang Family Manor and met Shuang Er, another one of his future wives and she proved herself to be both his ‘brain trust’ and loyal bodyguard. They made contact with Shunzhi but Shunzhi refused to return to the palace with them. On the way back, Wei Xiaobao was kidnapped by the Mystic Dragon Sect and brought to their home base Snake Island. Coincidentally, the Sect was experiencing some internal conflict and Wei Xiaobao seized the chance to win the favour and trust of the Sect’s leader Hong Antong with his bootlicking skills. He was appointed by Hong as the Sect’s White Dragon Marshal and allowed to return to the palace to replace the fake Empress Dowager as the Sect’s ‘mole’ in the palace.
Wei Xiaobao returned to Beijing and reported his success in completing the mission of contacting the Shunzhi Emperor, hoping that Kangxi would reward him. To his disappointment and surprise, Kangxi did praise him but then he ordered him to go to Shaolin Monastery and become a monk there. Kangxi made an imperial decree ordering that Wei Xiaobao become one of the senior monks in the Monastery, so the teenage scamp became on par with the elderly abbot in terms of seniority. Wei Xiaobao did not follow the Buddhist code of conduct and broke several regulations and rules, turning the Monastery upside-down but they could do nothing to him. During his stay in Shaolin, Wei Xiaobao encountered A Ke and fell in love with her on first sight, but she treated him coldly and saw him as a little sex pervert.
Kangxi received news that Wu Sangui was planning a rebellion in Yunnan so he decided to put Wu off guard by betrothing his sister Princess Jian Ning to Wu’s son Wu Yingxiong, while secretly making plans to counter Wu Sangui. Kangxi appointed Wei Xiaobao as the ‘Imperial Wedding Emissary’ in charge of escorting the Princess there and oversee that the wedding runs smoothly. However, the Princess and Wei Xiaobao had known each other for some time and both of them engaged in an illegitimate affair. While in Kunming, the hot-headed Princess refused to marry Wu Yingxiong and castrated him in a tantrum. Subsequently, relations between Wu Sangui and Wei Xiaobao started to become tense and almost came to armed confrontation. Wei Xiaobao managed to resolve the conflict through careful thinking and consideration, taking the Princess back to Beijing along with Wu Yingxiong as a hostage.
After that episode, Wei Xiaobao received another mission from Kangxi, ordering him to lead the army to destroy the evil Mystic Dragon Sect (one of Wu Sangui’s allies) in order to cripple Wu Sangui. The army reached Liaodong and attacked Snake Island but the commander Wei Xiaobao was unexpectedly captured by the Sect. Wei Xiaobao realised that he was in eminent danger and tried to bluff his way through once again by bootlicking Hong Antong, but Hong did not believe him again and had him imprisoned. Luckily for Wei Xiaobao, he was rescued by Shuang Er and they managed to escape from the clutches of the Mystic Dragon Sect but were pursued by them.
While attempting to flee from their pursuers, Wei Xiaobao and Shuang Er wandered aimlessly around and reached in the north east, where Wei Xiaobao uncovered the highly-sought treasure kept secret within the Sutra of Forty-two Chapters. Later both of them entered the Russian army camp mistakenly and hid there to avoid being detected by the Mystic Dragon Sect. Wei Xiaobao met Sophia Alekseyevna and tricked her with his glib tongue and followed her back to Moscow. Wei Xiaobao helped Sophia seize power and become Regent of Russia through a coup, following a ‘plan’ from those stories he heard in his childhood and won her trust. He was conferred the title of ‘Duke of the Far East’ by Sophia but he missed his homeland and returned home under the excuse of going on a diplomatic mission. Wei Xiaobao helped Russia and Qing China come to a border treaty and was rewarded by Kangxi, who conferred on him a title of nobility ‘Loyal and Courageous Duke of First Class Order’.
Shortly after, Wu Sangui initiated the long-expected rebellion and caused chaos in the empire. Kangxi wanted to pacify and calm his people so he sent Wei Xiaobao back to Yangzhou to build a memorial hall for Shi Kefa. Wei Xiaobao finally returned home after several years of adventures and he crept into the brothel to meet his mother secretly. However, the brothel was under siege by several pugilists, including the Mystic Dragon Sect, but Wei Xiaobao managed to knock them out using a special drug. Among these pugilists were seven maidens whom Wei Xiaobao met earlier and was attracted to, so he seized the opportunity when all of them were knocked out to have non-consensual sex with them, and they all became his future wives.
After that, Wei Xiaobao returned to Beijing and learnt that the pugilist Gui Xinshu and his family were planning to assassinate Kangxi while Kangxi’s attention was being diverted away by putting down Wu Sangui’s rebellion. Wei Xiaobao could not bear to see Kangxi killed so he devised a scheme to protect Kangxi and foil the assassination attempt. However, Wei Xiaobao had also unexpectedly revealed his true identity as being part of the Heaven and Earth Society. Kangxi threatened Wei Xiaobao and forced him to choose between remaining loyal to him or to the Society. Wei Xiaobao could not bear to see his fellow members of the Society, including his teacher Chen Jinnan, being killed by imperial forces, so he thought of a plan and helped them all escape. Wei Xiaobao also fled from Beijing as he knew Kangxi would not let him off for helping the rebels and he sought refuge on Tong Chi Island.
Wei Xiaobao remained in hiding on Tong Chi Island with his seven wives for several long years and intended to settle there permanently. However, his whereabouts were eventually discovered by Kangxi, but Kangxi pardoned him on account of their childhood friendship and even bestowed upon him titles of nobility and all kinds of rewards. In the meantime, Kangxi had emerged victorious in putting down Wu Sangui’s rebellion and the campaign against the Kingdom of Tungning of Taiwan. His victories spurred him on and further hardened his decision to retaliate the Russian invasion of the north east. Wei Xiaobao was invited back to Beijing to help Kangxi deal with the border conflict and was conferred the title of ‘Lord of Deer Cauldron Mountain’. Wei Xiaobao knew that Kangxi would not pester him on eradicating the Heaven and Earth Society for the time being so he accepted the mission to lead the army and succeeded in defeating the Russian invaders, forcing Russia to sign a peace treaty with Qing China.
For his numerous accomplishments and contributions to the Imperial Court, Wei Xiaobao was rewarded with immense wealth, ever-rising titles of nobility by Kangxi. However, Wei Xiaobao was drawn into a dilemma once again, when Kangxi asked him to destroy the remnants of the Heaven and Earth Society, while the Society’s members wanted him to succeed Chen Jinnan and continue opposing the Qing Empire. In the finale of the novel, Wei Xiaobao realized that he would never be able to reconcile between the two opposing forces and that his divided friendships were tearing him apart. Thus, he chose, instead, to walk out on it all, tricking Kangxi that he was fetching his mother, taking his immense wealth, mother, seven beautiful wives and three children for a peaceful life in seclusion, far away from the Qing Empire and the Society. Later, Kangxi saw that Wei Xiaobao had not returned after a long period of time and sent his subjects in search of Wei Xiaobao. It was also said that Kangxi started his six inspection tours of Jiangnan in person, which were recorded in history, in search of Wei Xiaobao but no one ever saw or heard of Wei Xiaobao ever again.
Trivia
The Sutra of Forty-two Chapters is a Buddhist sutra, consisting of eight volumes. When the Manchurians first invaded the Central Plains, they looted large amounts of treasure and transported them to a secret location in the northeast. The map to the location where the treasure was hidden was torn into several pieces and hidden into the eight books separately. Each of the eight books was given to each of the Manchu Eight Banners for safekeeping.
To protect the treasure against discovery, the heads of the Eight Banners were not told about the treasure vault, but were told that the books contained a secret which led to a location containing the root of the Manchurian royal bloodline, the Dragon's Vessel. They were told that if this root were excavated, all Manchurians would die. This was to ensure that none of the nobles would attempt to find this location, but instead would guard the books with their lives. Only the reigning Qing Emperor would know that this is false, as the novel reveals when the Shunzhi Emperor passes this knowledge to the Kangxi Emperor.
The books were highly sought after by many, including Hai Dafu; the fake empress dowager Mao Dongzhu; the Mystic Dragon Sect; the Heaven and Earth Society; Wei Xiaobao's second teacher, Jiu Nan, the former Princess Changping; Wu Sangui; and many others. Some of these characters know about the treasure; others wish to end the Qing Dynasty's rule and are pursuing the rumour of the Manchurian roots. Eventually, Wei Xiaobao managed to collect all the eight books and the pieces of the treasure map hidden in each of them. He unravelled the mystery of the treasure map and found the treasure to be hidden within the Deer Cauldron Mountain in the Heilongjiang region in the northeast. Although Wei Xiaobao was greedy by nature, he did not touch the treasure as he believed digging up the treasure would result in the death of Emperor Kangxi, his friend.
In the early years of the Kangxi Emperor’s reign, Ao Bai monopolised the power of the empire and introduced the practice of Literary Inquisition, in which many intellectuals and scholars were persecuted for their writings. The Zhuang family of Huzhou compiled a book entitled History of Ming which contained historical records of the Ming Dynasty. As the book used the Ming Dynasty’s emperor’s title of reign which was considered taboo, it was reported to the authorities by Wu Zhirong. The Zhuang family was massacred, with all of its male members killed, along with a horde of people involved in the book, including the original authors and editors, any book-store owner stocking the book, readers, and even people who had contact with the readers. Wu Zhirong eventually faced retribution when Wei Xiaobao had him framed for being in cahoots with Wu Sangui. He was bound and sent to the Zhuang family, where he was brutally killed in front of the widows of the Zhuang family.
Themes and story review
This Wuxia novel is unique in a sense that the protagonist was poor in martial arts and was by no means a person of integrity. Wei Xiaobao is a greedy, lazy, and womanizing anti-hero (In fact, at one point he has drugged and has non-consensual sex with his 'wives'). He is unlike any of Jin Yong's previous Wuxia protagonists, who viewed death lightly and fought for what they believed to be a noble cause. Wei's desire, however, is his own advancement. Even though he did not agree with their beliefs, he had genuine loyalty and generosity to his friends. In his epilogue to the novel, Jin Yong himself calls this book a "historical novel" rather than a "Wuxia novel".
The lack of absolute good and absolute evil in the real world is echoed in The Deer and the Cauldron. There is no nationalistic tone which was a prominent feature of all Jin Yong's previous novels. In the trilogy of The Legend of the Condor Heroes (set in the fall of the Song dynasty) and even The Book and the Sword (set in mid-Qing, during Emperor Qianlong's reign), the northern non-Han Chinese invaders were the obvious villains; war-mongering tribes who preyed on the fertile Central Plains whilst the Han Chinese-dominated Imperial Court was vulnerable. One exception was the Sword Stained with Royal Blood (an unofficial prequel to The Deer and the Cauldron), where the Qing ruler Huang Taiji was portrayed as wise, benevolent and fair, while Chinese leaders such as the Chongzhen Emperor and the rebel leader Li Zicheng were portrayed as being covetous, short-sighted, callous and subjective to manipulation.
A similar theme is present in The Deer and the Cauldron, where Jin Yong had greyed out the traditional black-and-white, Han Chinese versus Barbarians line. Although ruthless at times, the Manchurian Kangxi Emperor is portrayed as an intelligent, caring ruler doing his best for the people who did not always accept him. (Kangxi is historically remembered as one of the greatest monarchs in Chinese history). On the other hand, the patriotic anti-Qing-pro-Ming resistance had placed their hopes in the incompetent and spoiled Zheng Keshuang of the Kingdom of Tungning, fighting for a cause which did not echo with the wishes of the common people. This style was in direct opposition to the stance that Jin Yong had taken previously.
Towards the end of the book, Wei Xiaobao made a statement to the effect of "it doesn't matter whether a cat is black or white, a cat that catches mice is a good cat" (a quote from Paramount leader Deng Xiao Ping). Does it matter the race, colour or creed of the leader, as long as he or she has the best interests of the people at heart?
Admittedly, the Manchurians had indeed killed tens of thousands of Han people and ravaged the country, which accounted for the Heaven and Earth Society’s rebellion against them and attempt to restore ethnic-Han Chinese rule. However, they had forgotten that the common people longed to lead lives of peace and prosperity. Their zealousness reflects the world where people are divided violently along religious or ethnic lines.
In an essay on the Ming military commander Yuan Chonghuan, Jin Yong writes (in his own voice, not that of a narrator), "The Ming Dynasty deserved to fall. As a ruling power, the Qing Dynasty was far better for the people than the Ming...the combined score of the Ming Emperors' merit is a very negative one, while the score of the Qing Emperors combined is much more in the positive."
The novel's realism, historical references, and parodist approaches to the Wuxia genre contribute to its success, with some fans claiming that it is Jin Yong's best novel.
English language translation
The Deer and the Cauldron has been translated into English by John Minford, published in three volumes from 1997 to 2002. Minford is an Honorary Research Fellow at Lingnan University, Chair Professor of Chinese at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Chair Professor at the University of Auckland, Honorary Fellow of the Hong Kong Translation Society, and translator of numerous Chinese works, including the famous Chinese work of military strategy, Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" and the renowned classic "The Story of the Stone". Several minute details were paraphrased and omitted in the translation, presumably for the western audience unfamiliar with Wuxia novels.
Works based on the novel
There are also books to examine the office-politic skills displayed by the main characters and their modern day applications:
- ?????, ISBN 7-80207-108-9
- ?????, ISBN 7-80673-728-6
- ?????, ISBN 7-5048-4705-4
- ?????, ISBN 7-80661-929-1
- ?????????? ISBN 7-80100-576-7
Adaptations
There are several television and film adaptations of the novel; all of which have modified the original storyline.
TV series
Films
Video games
There are also several RPGs of the novel.
- ??? (DOS) (Traditional Chinese)
Other games based on the novel:
- J2ME game for phones:
- Online games:
- and etc.
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