Heroic Quintuplets: A Look at Some Chinese Children's Literature

Once upon a time there were two fairy tales, one American, the other Chinese. Although worlds apart, the two tales recount ostensibly the same events: how five look-alike Chinese brothers, each of whom has a different superhuman power, circumvent a death sentence decreed for one of their number. My texts are the American Five Chinese Brothers (1938) by Claire Huchet Bishop, with illustrations by Kurt Weise, and the anonymous Chinese Five Little Liu Brothers (1960), with illustrations by Wang Yu-Chuan (in English translation from the Foreign Languages Press in Peking).¹

Both versions of the tale begin with one of the brothers getting into trouble and end with all of the brothers avoiding punishment; both sets of brothers (with one exception) have the same superhuman powers: one can swallow the sea, a second has a neck that can resist the executioner's axe, a third can stretch his legs to any length (and can therefore survive being thrown from great heights), and a fourth cannot be burned. In the American version, the fifth brother "could hold his breath indefinitely," while the Chinese fifth brother, called "The Know-All," can "speak the languages of all birds and animals."

The significant difference between the two tales lies not in the varying roles of the fifth brother but in the source of the brothers' difficulty and its resolution. In the American version, the brother who can swallow the sea tries to help a little boy who wants to go fishing. The brother sucks up the sea so that the little boy can roam the sea-bed at will. The little boy refuses to return at the pre-arranged signal and is drowned by the sea-waters as they rush out of an exhausted Chinese brother. This first brother is arrested and condemned by a judge for killing the boy, but before each attempt at execution, a different Chinese brother takes his place. Of course, the brothers survive all attempts at execution and the judge who condemned him (them) originally releases him (them), assuming that he (they) must be innocent, since execution is impossible.

This rather kindly looking and permissive judge is replaced in the Chinese version by a nasty, marauding "big official" from the city. The "big official" begins the Chinese version by leading a hunting band of his men into the countryside of the five Chinese brothers. Brother "Know-All" warns his sheep and all the other animals of the forest to hide. The "big official" suspects his bad luck in the field is due to Know-All and he orders this brother to be thrown into a cage with a tiger. Know-All quickly befriends the tiger; the enraged official orders a new execution. The brothers' drama of exchanging places begins, as in the American version, but with certain crucial differences.

In the Chinese version there is no judge and no trial; the brothers are not given permission by a judge to visit their mother to say farewell (and thereby exchange places easily), but each night the brother escapes from the autocratic official; and finally, the Chinese version has a happy ending only after the violent death of the "big official" and his retinue when they attempt to throw overboard the brother who can swallow the sea. This brother swallows the sea and spits it out on the stranded official and his men:

He sent the billows and rolling waves and drowned the big official and his men in the turbulent water. At dusk the water became very tranquil and peaceful. Only an official's hat floated on the calm surface of the blue, blue sea.

The Chinese version of the fairy tale reflects—like all the other English translations of Chinese children's books available to us—² situations and issues typical of a developing communist society.³ There is an overt, sometimes violent class struggle, which in the Five Little Liu Brothers is between the country folk and the city's ruling elite; there is, in addition, a special representative of the people who are struggling to survive at the...