- Judge Dee stories
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Judge Dee (also, Judge Di) is a semi-fictional character based on the historical figure Di Renjie , magistrate and statesman of the Tang court. The character first appeared in the 18th century Chinese detective novel Di Gong An. After Robert van Gulik came across it in a second-hand book store in Tokyo, he translated the novel into English and then used the style and characters to write his original Judge Dee stories.
The series is set in Tang Dynasty China and deals with various criminal cases solved by the upright Judge Dee (judges often play the investigator role in ancient Chinese crime stories).
Contents
Dee Goong An
Main article: Celebrated Cases of Judge DeeThe Judge Dee character is based on the historical figure Di Renjie (c. 630–c. 700), magistrate and statesman of the Tang court. During the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) in China, a "folk novel" was written set in former times, but filled with anachronisms. Van Gulik found in the 18th century Di Gong An (Chinese:狄公案 Pinyin: dí gōng àn , lit. "Cases of Judge Dee") an original tale dealing with three cases simultaneously, and, which was unusual among Chinese mystery tales, a plot that for the most part lacked an overbearing supernatural element which could alienate Western readers.[1] He translated it into English and had it published under the title Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee.
Van Gulik's stories
This gave van Gulik the idea of writing his own novels, set with the similar Ming anachronisms, but using the historical character. Van Gulik was careful in writing the main novels to deal with cases where Dee was newly appointed to a city, thereby isolating him from the existing lifestyle and enabling him to maintain an objective role in the books. Van Gulik's novels and stories made no direct reference to the original Chinese work and so Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee is not considered to be part of the Judge Dee series.
Initially Dee is assisted only by his faithful clerk, Sergeant Hoong, an old family retainer. However, in The Chinese Gold Murders, which describes Dee's initial appointment and first criminal cases, the judge encounters two highwaymen, euphemistically called "men of the greenwood," Ma Joong and Chiao Tai, who attempt to rob him but are so impressed with his character that they give up their criminal careers and join his retinue on the spot. A little later, in The Chinese Lake Murders, a third criminal, Tao Gan, an itinerant confidence trickster and swindler, similarly joins. Judge Dee ends his career being promoted to the position of senior Metropolitan Judge in the capital, and his assistants obtain official ranks in the Army and civil service.
Van Gulik also wrote series of newspaper comics about Judge Dee in 1964-1967, adding up to a total of 19 adventures. The first 4 were regular balloon strips, but the later 15 had the more typically Dutch textblock under the pictures.
Judge Dee, naturally, is responsible for deciding the sentence as well as assessing guilt or innocence, although van Gulik notes in the stories that all capital punishments must be referred to and decided by officials in the capital. One of the sentences he frequently has to deal with is slow slicing; if he is inclined to mercy, he orders the final, fatal, cut to be made first, thus rendering the ceremony anticlimactic.
Other authors
Several other authors have created stories based on Van Gulik's Judge Dee character.
- French author Frédéric Lenormand wrote nineteen new Judge Dee mysteries from year 2004 at Editions Fayard, Paris (not yet translated into English). Some of them have been translated into Spanish (Ediciones Paidos Iberica), Portuguese (Europress), Bulgarian (Paradox), Czech (Garamond) and Polish.[citation needed]
- Sven Roussel, another French author, has written La dernière enquète du Juge Ti. ISBN 978-2-9532206-0-5
- The Chinese/American author Zhu Xiao Di wrote a book about Judge Dee called Tales of Judge Dee (2006). Zhu Xiao Di has no relation to Robert van Gulik but tried to stay faithful to the fictionalized history of van Gulik's Judge Dee. Tales of Judge Dee is set when the Judge was the magistrate of Poo-yang (the same time period as The Chinese Bell Murders and several other novels).
- Judge Dee appears, along with a fictionalized Wu Zetian, in Eleanor Cooney & Daniel Alteri's mystery novel Deception: A Novel of Mystery and Madness in Ancient China.
Bibliography
By van Gulik
Following novels and short stories were published in English by van Gulik. The short story collection Judge Dee at Work (published in 1967) contains a "Judge Dee Chronology" detailing Dee's various posts in specific years and stories set in these times. Van Gulik's last two books, Poets and Murder and Necklace and Calabash, were not listed in the chronology, as they were written after Judge Dee at Work, but they are both set in the time when Judge Dee was the magistrate in Poo-yang.
Year Title Setting Notes 1949 Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee An "early phase of Judge Dee's career." Translated from Chinese (originally, Dee Goong An); not part of the later continuity. Three stories: "The Case of the Double Murder at Dawn," "The Case of the Strange Corpse", and "The Case of the Poisoned Bride". Dee is the newly appointed Magistrate of Chang-ping in the Province of Shantung. He has all four lieutenants on staff: Sgt. Hoong, Chiao Tai, Ma Joong, and Tao Gan.[2] 1957 The Chinese Maze Murders 670, Lan-fang Written in 1950, published in Japanese in 1951; Lan-fang is a fictional district at the western frontier of Tang China. 1958 The Chinese Bell Murders 668, Poo-yang Written between 1953 and 1956; Poo-yang is a fictional wealthy district on the shores of the Grand Canal of China (part of modern-day Jiangsu province). 1959 The Chinese Gold Murders 663, Penglai 1960 The Chinese Lake Murders 666, Han-yuan Han-yuan is a fictional district on a lakeshore near the capital of Chang-An. 1961 The Chinese Nail Murders 676, Pei-chow Pei-chow is a fictional district in the far north of Tang China. 1961 The Haunted Monastery 667, Han-yuan Judge Dee is traveling and forced to take shelter in a monastery. 1963 The Emperor's Pearl 668, Poo-yang 1964 The Lacquer Screen 664, Penglai 1964 The Red Pavilion 668, Poo-yang 1965 The Morning of the Monkey 667, Han-yuan A short story from The Monkey and the Tiger 1965 The Night of the Tiger 676, Pei-chow A short story from The Monkey and the Tiger 1965 The Willow Pattern 677, Chang-An Judge Dee is the Lord Chief Justice in the Imperial capital of Chang-An. 1966 Murder in Canton 681, Guangzhou Judge Dee is the Lord Chief Justice for all of China. 1966 The Phantom of the Temple 670, Lan-fang 1967 Five Auspicious Clouds 664, Penglai A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 The Red Tape Murders 663, Penglai A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 He came with the Rain 663, Penglai A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 The Murder on the Lotus Pond 666, Han-yuan A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 The Two Beggers 668, Poo-yang A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 The Wrong Sword 668, Poo-yang A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 The Coffins of the Emperor 672, Lan-fang A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 Murder on New Year's Eve 674, Lan-fang A short story from Judge Dee at Work 1967 Necklace and Calabash 668, Poo-yang 1968 Poets and Murder 669, Poo-yang By other authors
By the author Frédéric Lenormand (not yet translated into English)
- Le Château du lac Tchou-an (2004) The Zhou-an lake castle
- La Nuit des juges (2004) The Night of the judges
- Petits meurtres entre moines (2004) Little murders among monks
- Le Palais des courtisanes (2004) The courtesans' palace
- Madame Ti mène l'enquête (2005) Mrs. Dee investigates
- Mort d'un cuisinier chinois (2005) Death of a Chinese cook
- L'Art délicat du deuil (2006) The Delicate art of mourning
- Mort d'un maître de go (2006) Death of a Go master
- Dix petits démons chinois (2007) Ten little Chinese devils
- Médecine chinoise à l'usage des assassins (2007) Chinese Medicine for murderers
- Guide de survie d'un juge en Chine (2008) Survival guide for the Chinese judge
- Panique sur la Grande Muraille (2008) Panic on the Great Wall
- Le Mystère du jardin chinois (2009) The Chinese Garden Mystery
- Diplomatie en kimono (2009) Diplomacy in a Kimono
- Thé vert et arsenic (2010) Arsenic and green tea
- Un Chinois ne ment jamais (2010) A Chinese never lies
- Divorce à la chinoise (2011) Chinese-style Divorce
- Meurtres sur le fleuve Jaune (2011) The Yellow River Murders
By the author Zhu Xiao Di
- Tales of Judge Dee (2006), set in the time when Judge Dee is in Poo-yang (AD 669-670)
By the author Sven Roussel
- La Dernière Enquète du Juge Ti (2008) set at the end Judge Dee's term of service in Lan Fang (AD 675)
By authors Eleanor Cooney & Daniel Alteri
- Deception: A Novel of Mystery and Madness in Ancient China, ISBN 0380708728
By Lin Qianyu (林千羽)
- 狄仁杰 通天帝国 (2010), tie-in novel of Tsui Hark 2010 film: Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame, ISBN 9787538548594
Filmography
Judge Dee has been adapted for television twice.
- In 1969 Howard Baker produced six Judge Dee stories for Granada Television.[3] These episodes were in black and white and were not a ratings success.
- In 1974 the novel The Haunted Monastery was produced as a television show by Gerald Isenberg with the title Judge Dee and the Monastery Murders. It starred Khigh Dhiegh as Judge Dee and was filmed with an all Asian cast (including Mako, Soon-Tek Oh, Keye Luke and James Hong). Writing was credited to Nicholas Meyer and Robert van Gulik.[4] It was nominated for an Edgar Award, for Best Television Feature or Miniseries in 1975.
- Some of Robert van Gulik's Judge Dee stories have been adapted for Chinese TV.
In 2010, Tsui Hark released his take on Di Renjie in the form of Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame.
See Also
References
- ^ Wright, Daniel Franklin (2004). Chinoiserie in the novels of Robert Hans van Gulik (M.A. thesis) Wilfrid Laurier University
- ^ Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee (Dee Goong An): An Authentic Eighteenth-Century Chinese Detective Novel. Dover Publications, 1976. Copyright notes, "an unabridged, slightly corrected version of the work first published privately in Tokyo in 1949 under the title Dee Goong An: Three Murder Cases Solved by Judge Dee.
- ^ "Judge Dee". Internet Movie Database. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0164265/. Retrieved 2008-05-10.
- ^ "Judge Dee and the Monastery Murders". Internet Movie Database. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071703/. Retrieved 2008-05-10.
External links
- The Judge Dee website by Sven Roussel
- Judge Dee: Character chronology and information about the author (English)
- Judge-Dee.info, an (English) and (Dutch) fansite containing detailed publishing history in various languages
Categories:- Fictional detectives
- Fictional judges
- Judge Dee
- Novel series
- Fictional Chinese people in literature
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