Fairies in China?!

Fairies and China?!

Earlier this year, I was invited as a speaker to a fantastic convention called Writing the Occult, which I greatly enjoyed. As a Chinese cultural writer, and translator, curator of an imminently published contemporary Chinese horror anthology, I would have gladly spoken about a range of topics related to the occult and China. However, the theme of that run of the con happened to be the Fae, entities with which Chinese cultures have only accidentally crossed paths. Nevertheless, the attendees seemed to enjoy my talk, so I have edited it into an article to share with more readers.

China has a rich mythological landscape, full of dragons, gods, demons, jiangshi, ghosts and giants. One thing it doesn’t have though, is fairies. I know that this may come as a surprise to many of you, but I hope to explain to you why you may think there are, what these actually are, and some of the problems with calling them “fairies”.

There have been trading routes with China ever since the days of Marco Polo, Europe at the time was mainly interested in the pretty silk patterns and pottery. When they did begin to consider the belief systems, it was rather one way, an attempt to civilise Cathay by sending missionaries, to instil Christianity into those heathen hearts. This was the first mistake, because religion and mythology in China are weird.

The spiritual landscape in China is an absolute amalgam of every religion which has ever crossed its path, from Jainism and Islam, to Buddhism, Daoism, Shamanism, ancestor worship, so forth. Between the Chinese ability to weave any belief into its own colourful tapestry, and the simplified tracts that Christian missionaries were producing, we ended up in 1850, with our very own Jesus. The scholar Hong Xiuquan was a man who amassed over 20,000 disciples, claiming he had been named as the Successor to Jesus Christ, destined to lead China away from demon worship, inequity, and the twin evils of Foreign Occupation and a Corrupt Imperial Court. This didn’t end so well for him. Killed in the insurrection, his cremated remains were fired out of a cannon to permanently disperse his body.

This major uprising led to two major changes. A more militant approach by European powers, which would lead to the Opium Wars, the Boxer Uprising, and the eventual occupation of China by Japan in 1937. Secondly, a more considered exploration of the beliefs of China. If they couldn’t replace the beliefs of a nation, they were going to belittle them.

The modern idea of the fairy, buzzing round the bottom of your garden on butterfly wings, dressed in couture petals, you know, that Victorian and Edwardian creation, aligned historically with this increased interest in The Orient. Gentlemen explorers and collectors would gather the folk stories and beliefs of China, both from visits to the Far East, and Chinese immigrants, who were beginning to find a place in the world. These collections were often heavily interpreted, or relayed to people who didn’t have the language skills or cultural knowledge to get every nuance. They were not published in the grandiose style of Greek and Roman legends, but made their way into children’s books, with quaint titles such as “The Marvellous Adventures of the Mandarin Fun Hoan”, “Chinese Fairy & Folk Tales, and “Fables & Parables of China”. Many of them were by scholars like the German American sociologist Wolfram Eberhard. Whist Eberhard may have had the best of intentions in his various publications, which contributed to setting the direction of 20th century Sinology, he is one the culprits in reducing the myriad of ethereal Chinese beings and creatures to “Fairies”.

What has been substituted as fairies are the 仙 Xian, the Chinese term for an immortal or enlightened being. This concept has been in Chinese literature since the 3rd century BCE and has evolved through the centuries from the spiritual to the more physical. The thinker and philosopher Zhuangzi was one of the first to write about these beings, he thought of them as spirits that lived on magic islands.

Here are the many facets of Xian.

  • The term most commonly refers to Daoist celestials, these are deities of the pantheon that reside in the celestial realm with assigned roles in taking care of the mortal realm.
  • The Xian are also the spirits of animals, plants and objects that live in many places.
  • In the mortal world, the term has been used to refer to mortals who strive to attain longevity through physical training. They can acquire superpowers sorcery and flying, you may have heard of them as, cultivators.
  • In folklore, the Xian are wise hermits that live in the mountains. In fact, the Chinese character for Xian literally marks “person in the mountains”.
  • Furthermore, Xian are of course, enlightened sages who transcended their earthly existence.
  • Lastly, Xian is also granted as an honorific to those who are extraordinarily accomplished in something.

The main groups you will have come across referred to as Fairies, are probably the Qi Xiannü Seven Celestial Maidens, and the Baxian, Eight immortals.

In the early times the Seven Celestial Maidens were the offspring of Supreme Goddess Xiwangmu. Nowadays, they are commonly believed to be the daughters of her and the Jade Emperor, the most powerful couple in Daoist heaven.  The fact there’s seven of them, and they were portrayed in the fantasy epic Journey to the West, flying about in dresses of seven colours, perhaps rendered them even more prone to be fairified.  Fairies aside, they are in fact, celestials of the Daoist pantheon, they each look after a part of mortal welfare, ensuring good weather, plentiful offspring, successful careers and fortunes, longevity, good health and fruitful relationships. It’s the youngest one of these, that looks after relationships who becomes most famous. It’s more probably more appropriate to call it “Legend of the Seventh Celestial Maiden”. This is most likely to have come from the pantheon’s interactions with folklore, via The Tale of Seventh Sister Zhang, from a village in Henan, central north China. The better-known version of the legend is of course, the Cowherd and the Weaver.

Another group you might see on old charms and medallions, referred to as Fairies, is the Baxian, the Eight Immortals. This group of deities was an effort to popularise Daoism, with the deification of once living mortals, which is a common process in Chinese beliefs (you can read more about them in my books). Even in the vast and eclectic Chinese pantheons, these are some of the most flaw, and earthy deities. In other words, hardly fairylike. The clue to what they really are, is in their Chinese name, the ba (“eight”) xian. The Eight Immortals are xian in two senses, that they are enlightened ones who transcended mortality, but many of them possess extraordinary skills in their field. If anything, they are closer to the idea of saints, but pan-orientalist interests of 20th century Western scholars meant they alternated between the term Geni, and the German word Fee, which of course, means Fairy.

In fact, the whole art of English-Chinese translation was very new at this time, still relying on the practically minded Wade Giles dictionary. When “oriental studies” developed into “area studies” from the 1950s, it was very much in light of the Cold War and this didn’t help improve terminologies or understandings. Now, we’re in a very different world, yet these inappropriate terminologies persist in academic books, and Chinese companies bringing their productions overseas, not being aware of this background, just pick a common English term that comes up in a search and stick it in their English titles.

Yet, we can see that in contemporary storytelling, Xian signifes all those meanings I discussed above. Let me give you a few well known examples where the “fairies” should be Xian.

苍兰诀 “Love between Fairy and Devil” (2022) – recently the biggest Chinese drama hit on Netflix, the fairy in question is a Xian in two senses, that she’s a celestial and an orchid spirit. (The “devil” isn’t a devil either but that’s for another piece)

将军家的小狐仙 “The Fox Fairy” (2021)

兔仙王妃 “The Princess is a Rabbit Fairy” （2023）

And one of my ongoing bugbears:

剑仙奇侠传 “Sword and Fairy” (games 1995 to date, TV adaptations 2005 to date), the most influential and longest running xianxia series in China and around the world, these “fairies” are people who are badass with swords, like Sword Immortals in Blood of Youth.

Though this may not have been the read you were expecting, but I hope you are feeling somewhat enlightened and will perhaps from now, look at Chinese spirits in a different light.

 

 


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