Chinese Dragons in Popular Culture
As a part of traditional folklore, dragons appear in a variety of mythological fiction. In the classical story Journey to the West, the son of the Dragon King of the West was condemned to serve as a horse for the travellers because of his indiscretions at a party in the heavenly court. The Monkey King's cudgel Rú Yì Bàng was stolen from the Eastern (Donghai) Dragon King áo guǎng. In Fengshen Yanyi and other stories, Nezha, the boy hero, defeats the Dragon Kings and tames the seas. Chinese dragons also appear in innumerable Japanese anime movies and TV shows, manga, and in Western political cartoons as a personification of the People's Republic of China. The Chinese respect for dragons is emphasized in Naomi Novik's Temeraire novels, where they were the first people to tame dragons and are treated as equals, intellectuals or even royalty, rather than beasts solely bred for war in the West. King Ghidorah from the Godzilla franchise is a three headed arm/mustacheless Chinese dragon who acts as Godzilla's toughest foe. Manda is a large Chinese dragon that appears in the Godzilla storyline.
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Famous quotes containing the words dragons, popular and/or culture:
“Hermann and Humbert are alike only in the sense that two dragons painted by the same artist at different periods of his life resemble each other. Both are neurotic scoundrels, yet there is a green lane in Paradise where Humbert is permitted to wander at dusk once a year; but Hell shall never parole Hermann.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“One knows so well the popular idea of health. The English country gentleman galloping after a fox—the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“The anorexic prefigures this culture in rather a poetic fashion by trying to keep it at bay. He refuses lack. He says: I lack nothing, therefore I shall not eat. With the overweight person, it is the opposite: he refuses fullness, repletion. He says, I lack everything, so I will eat anything at all. The anorexic staves off lack by emptiness, the overweight person staves off fullness by excess. Both are homeopathic final solutions, solutions by extermination.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)