Printing and Circulation of Journey to the West

Timeline

1. 1200–1582Jiangnan publishing region (Huai'an-Jinling) · NanzhiliThe Tang Monk's pilgrimage story accumulated over Song and Yuan vernacular storybooks, drama, and vernacular fragments in the Yongle Encyclopedia; figures like the Monkey Pilgrim were long established. From Jiajing to early Wanli, Jiangnan bookshops produced related editions now lost or fragmentary; the chronological relation between Zhu Dingchen's Tang Sanzang Xiyou Shie Zhuan abridgements and the 100-chapter version remains debated. The author of the 100-chapter text is not named on the 1592 edition.
2. 1592Shidetang of Jinling · JinlingThe Shidetang edition is titled New Engraved Illustrated Official Large-Character Journey to the West, in 20 juan with full-page illustrations. The text bears no author's name, only 'collated by the Master of Huayang Cave Heaven'; Chen Yuanzhi's preface lists various rumors of origin. Lacking the later-added chapter on the Tang Monk's origins, it already had the 100-chapter structure of Sun Wukong, Zhu Bajie, and Sha Wujing escorting the pilgrimage, becoming the ancestor of later common editions.
3. 1593–1600Jiangnan bookshop circle · JiangnanAfter the Shidetang edition appeared, bookshops in Fujian, Jiangsu, and elsewhere reprinted and annotated it; the 100-chapter Journey to the West became a model of Ming shenmo fiction, circulating alongside Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margin. In the twentieth century, Hu Shi and others, citing the Huai'an Prefecture Gazetteer, identified Wu Cheng'en as author; since the original bears no name, alternative theories point to a princely estate or Li Chunfang. Whatever the final attribution, the 1592 printing marks the book's entry into the age of print and wide circulation.