/lit/ - Literature

>>22612904
After reading Wuxia Novels, I thought about writing a Western Wuxia set during English Civil War and making all of the commanders martial arts experts, because that's literally what wuxia stories do. They pick a time period of Chinese History, read up/know about all of the figures at the time (usually rebellion leaders or major figures of the time), then invent an entirely fictional martial skill that makes them a superhuman fighter. It's a mix between 50% historical figures and 50% madeup.

Some of the tropes in Wuxia would be like me writing Baldwin the Leperr as a master of poisonous skills who can rot even metal to slush through his excellent martial arts skills.

>>22612316
You literally described Wuxia.

>>22569761
What if I haven't found anything in a decade?

I have a cousin who's the opposite, he has read 123098123901823 (Japanese) novels and then he got bored so he started reading 12039292 (Japanese) webnovels, but then he go bored and started reading Chinese novels and Wuxia, until he burned out and now he doesn't enjoy anything.

In my case I enjoy everything but always in this low energy way, doesn't matter the genre, fiction or nonfiction, written or musical or visual.
But I feel like the weight of knowing how much I haven't read yet can play a role in this constant fatigue.

>>22569849
When I took a week away in a farm, I took with me a book and read it, but still only for a couple hours a day.
Having no distractions helps, definitely, but I wouldn't be able to read for 16 hours in a row like I did as a kid sometimes.

>>22560766
Strange Beasts of China
There's other stuff out there but the biggest problem is that you have to write a very specific book (one criticial of the chinese government) to get an english translation which makes them feel pretty samey, like Han Song is their biggest scifi writer by far but because he doesn't do that he's gone untranslated outside of one short story.
For fantasy Jin Yong's got a load translated, he's like the foundational modern author of Wuxia.

>>22530926
At what point did you realise that it was greater than your typical wuxia novel? I'm a couple dozen pages in but I don't see it yet.

>>22508810
modern wuxia adheres to ccp filter much more strictly than xanxia, because wuxia authors hope that their story will make it into animation or live action (those are popular or at least puched by party in China) and anything that appears on chinese tv must have correct story and themes that align with ccp ideals.

>>22512046
>Chinese novels tend to spiral around themes like Jianghu, martial arts or wuxia, cultivation, internal alchemy, perfecting yourself, immortality, Chinese folklore,

They got the best crime novel imo.

You can have both but if you want to choose one, I suggest picking up Chinese first. It will make transition to the Japanese easier, because of the character readings. When learning Chinese, take time to learn both traditional and simplified characters and search for materials that contain both. This will help you with your Japanese as well because Japanese characters mostly have a traditional form only. As far as literature goes, Chinese novels tend to spiral around themes like Jianghu, martial arts or wuxia, cultivation, internal alchemy, perfecting yourself, immortality, Chinese folklore, some mild form of homoeroticism. Japanese light novels have a greater variety (many genres) so it may appear to be richer. In regards to historical and philosophical writings, Chinese literature may be the better choice.

>>22505775
Unfortunately wuxia is shit

>>22506010
I managed to sit 12 hours reading a Wuxia tier /qst/ out of nowhere, felt so good. Legit, if you like Warhammer and Imperial China, read 2nd Primarch Quest.

read wuxia instead. They're shorter reads and there's plenty of translated novels that you can download the epubs/pdfs of

>>22495509
I liked Ze Tian Ji a lot. I think it is a step up from other wuxia novels in terms of themes.
Dislike the novels from "I Eat Tomatos". Protagonists are basically villains.

A western style xianxia/wuxia story where the core theme is that the Chinese are an inhuman race of genocidal, amoral bugpeople who will do anything so long as it benefits the individual. The cultivation system will be a deliberate bastardization of the cultivation system used by many chinese novels, in fact, it will look unbearable to anyone who has actually read a chinese xianxia/wuxia novel. The names will be a complete hodgepodge of vaguely East-Asian sounding names; the tropes will be distortions of the already distorted tropes present in many western-style xianxia/wuxia novels, and if I'm competent enough as a writer, the entire story will look like an overt example of cultural imperialism against the Chinese.

Upon it being recognized (no matter how many chapters it may take) as such, I will respond to their comment in badly translated mandarin, making them think that I'm a white man pretending to be Chinese in order to escape any criticism. I'll continue writing the story from then on but become more blatant with the anti-Chinese propaganda, mimicking the jingoistic nationalism present in many Chinese webnovels, up until the backlash makes any attempts at writing impossible. Then I will respond to every critic's comment in fluent mandarin, refuse to elaborate, and delete my account.

I have no idea why I even thought up of this scheme other than to LARP as a false flagging glowie.

>>22433494
Correct. Western magic systems are superior to wuxia cultivation systems

>>22432013
I heard their early wuxia was serially published mainly in newspapers, so they'd probably not cover more than a page.

>>22426846
Are you referring to Martial World specifically or to general xanxia stereotypes?
What you described more often takes place in wuxia where magic system is loose and not really explained or even defined (think lotr). Xanxia often has defined cultivation stages with clearly defined limits.

>>22420045
He’s capable of writing ok stories but he has very little of anything interesting to write about so his stories are incredibly sterile in a way that I’ve only seen with shitty wuxia/ isekai novels. His worldbuilding is best described as interesting ideas that are written as blandly and shallowly as humanly possible and all character arcs can be boiled down to either the character doubling down on a single trait over and over again or x happens so character now randomly gains y trait. Character act completely out of character extremely often. People that praise his magic systems need to be taken out back and shot since they’re hard to the point of being boring. A person eats tin so they hear good. You’re in x group at y stage so you get a fancy sword and can fly. All his powers are that simple and he doesn’t have the skill to make them interesting

>>22412132
>xianxia
>sub 50 chapters
you're kinda missing the point of the genre
the whole deal of xianxia is that it's wuxia but with different 'realms' so that the story can drag out for 1000's of chapters

>>22408229
what’s with the precious gemstone and beautiful plant allusions that are specifically used with feet in xianxia and wuxia novels?

>>22407864
Never said I didn’t like Wuxia. In fact, Wuxia is one of my favorite genres specifically because of the cultural autism that went into their creation.

>>22407854
That is why you should read xanxia instead of wuxia.

>decide to read Wuxia
>expect kung fu movie stuff
>get references to archaic poems in Literary Chinese
>extreme levels of ultranationalism and belligerence that would only make sense to a warrior from a city-state back in antiquity
>over the top and ludicrously violent fights that mostly happen because of Chinese autism, only for the people involved, who were just trying to murder each other not even a minute ago, immediately decide to swear oaths of brotherhood over wine
>poor peasant characters going into an inn and ordering copious amounts of wine, meat, side dishes, and all sorts of stuff, something that occured in Water Margin except the characters in Water Margin were wealthy bandits
>Acts of chivalry combined with acts of extreme autism
Wuxia novels are a trip. Not something you’ll easily find in the West.

>>22364187
This reads like chinese wuxia novels

>Check litRPG/Wuxia stories
>200 chapters, still ongoing
>2500 people reading it
I can't even get through the first chapter without getting bored. How do these people do it?