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The Herbalist’s Wife
The Dragon King of the Eastern Sea. In the Monkey King’s story, Ao-Kuang is a fearsome god who is tasked with executing the Monkey King for trespassing upon Heaven. He’s self-assured, as well as derisive and prejudiced against the Monkey King and monkeys in general—he snidely says that he called the Monkey King to him because no one in Heaven wanted to get fleas by journeying to Flower-Fruit Mountain. He refuses to take the Monkey King seriously until after the Monkey King thwarts the execution attempt and then becomes a giant and squashes Ao-Kuang. Nervous and scared, Ao-Kuang gives the Monkey King a magical cudgel as a parting gift.
Ao-Kuang Quotes in American Born Chinese
The American Born Chinese quotes below are all either spoken by Ao-Kuang or refer to Ao-Kuang. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 4 Quotes
“This ‘Monkey King’ it speaks of no longer exists, for I have mastered twelve major disciplines of kung-fu and transcended my former title! I shall now be called—The Great Sage, Equal of Heaven!”
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“My apologies for not sending someone to arrest you in person, but frankly none of the gods wanted to go anywhere near your mountain. Nothing personal—we just aren’t particularly fond of fleas.”
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Get the entire American Born Chinese LitChart as a printable PDF.
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Ao-Kuang Character Timeline in American Born Chinese
The timeline below shows where the character Ao-Kuang appears in American Born Chinese. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 4
...reads that the Monkey King is convicted of trespassing upon Heaven and must go to Ao-Kuang, Dragon King of the Eastern Sea, to be executed. The Monkey King growls that this...
(full context)
Ao-Kuang insists that he’s been anxiously awaiting the Monkey King’s arrival, but he’s inwardly nervous at...
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The Monkey King performs the discipline of giant form and stomps on Ao-Kuang, which convinces the dragon king. Ao-Kuang gives the Monkey King a magic cudgel (staff) that...
(full context)
