Tang Sanzang

Tripitaka

Reincarnated monk who journeys west for the scriptures with his four disciples.

Tang Sanzang is the novel’s image of the historical monk Xuanzang, who journeyed to India for the scriptures in the seventh century. In Journey to the West he is the reincarnation of the Golden Cicada, gentle and stubborn by turns, whose faith holds the party together through every demon’s trap. His eighty-one trials end with the return of the canon to China.