Could a legendary kung fu series be a Chinese Game of Thrones? Translator takes martial arts novels on a journey to the West
Independent publisher to release the first authorised translation of a Louis Cha novel in more than a decade
Kung fu novels pack a punch in China but translation difficulties and cultural differences mean they have never become a hit in the West.
An independent British publisher, MacLehose Press, is now trying to bridge the gap. It plans to publish an English translation of a trilogy by legendary Hong Kong kung fu novelist Louis Cha Leung-yung, who wrote under the pen-name Jin Yong, to test whether a novel first serialised in a Hong Kong newspaper in 1957 before becoming a household name in China can become a hit in the world of English literature.
Like JRR Tolkien, who created the Middle Earth of The Lord of the Rings, and George RR Martin, who imagined the Westeros of A Song of Ice and Fire (televised as Game of Thrones), Cha, now 93, created an imaginary world in his 15 novels – one featuring martial arts, poetry and plots with deep roots in Chinese history, culture and beliefs.
MacLehose plans to publish three novels by Cha: Legends of the Condor Heroes, Return of the Condor Heroes, and The Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre. Known as the Condor trilogy, each novel consists of four volumes, with the first volume of Legends of the Condor Heroes, A Hero Born, expected to be released in February. It will be the first authorised translation of a Cha novel for over a decade.
Three years ago, Cha’s literary agent on the mainland told the Shanghai Morning Post it was difficult to give a precise sales figure for his novels, but the general industry consensus was that more than 300 million copies had been sold worldwide.
