Creator / Jin Yong

Pictured with portraits of characters from Condor Heroes

Jin Yong (金庸, 6 February 1924 – 30 October 2018) was the Pen Name of Louis Cha Leung-yung (查良鏞, "Jin Yong" being the constituent radicals which made up the 'yung' part of his name), one of the most influential modern Chinese-language novelists and one of the best-selling Chinese authors, well known for his historical Wuxia fiction — he pretty much single-handedly raised the Wuxia to a "legitimate" art form (Wuxia novels having gained an unfair reputation as "things teenagers and immature adults read". While most widely known as a novelist, Cha also co-founded the Hong Kong daily newspaper Ming Pao in 1959 and served as its first editor-in-chief.) and is the standard against which all other Wuxia novelists are compared — and a great many Live-Action Adaptation series have been made based on his books.

Besides his writing career, Jin Yong was also involved in drafting the Basic Law of Hong Kong just before Hong Kong was handed to over to China. Former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping was also a fan of his, and invited him over to mainland China to visit.

On 30th October 2018, he died at the age of 94.

---

His novels, in order of release:

• 1955 - The Book And The Sword (書劍恩仇錄/书剑恩仇录)
• 1956 - The Sword Stained With Royal Blood (碧血劍/碧血剑)
• 1957 - The Legend of the Condor Heroes (射雕英雄傳/射雕英雄传) — Part 1 of the Condor Trilogy
• 1959 - Flying Fox of the Snowy Mountain (雪山飛狐/雪山飞狐)
• 1959 - The Return of the Condor Heroes (神雕俠侶/神雕侠侣) — Part 2 of the Condor Trilogy
• 1960 - Other Tales of the Flying Fox (飛狐外傳/飞狐外传)
• 1961 - Swordswoman Riding West On White Horse (白馬嘯西風/白马啸西风)
• 1961 - Blade-dance of the Two Lovers (鴛鴦刀/鸳鸯刀)
• 1961 - Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre (倚天屠龍記/倚天屠龙记) — Part 3 of the Condor Trilogy
• 1963 - Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils (天龍八部/天龙八部)
• 1964 - A Deadly Secret (連城訣/连城诀)
• 1966 - Ode to Gallantry (俠客行/侠客行)
• 1967 - The Smiling, Proud Wanderer (笑傲江湖)
• 1969 - The Deer and the Cauldron (鹿鼎記/鹿鼎记)
• 1970 - Sword of the Yue Maiden (越女劍/越女剑)

---

Examples of tropes found in his work:

• Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder: A main source of angst for Di Yun in A Deadly Secret. His student sister married the guy who caused him to be imprisoned and tortured all those years.
• Absurdly Sharp Blade: To the point where certain blades can cut pieces of hair falling on them. Prominent examples are the Heavenly Sword and the Dragon Sabre which break upon clashing into each other.
• Abusive Parents:
  • Xiao Feng's dad. Look, admit it — he sucked. Although he didn't really abuse his son in any way and what trouble he caused for Xiao Feng was not collateral damage to his true purpose.
  • Also, Shi Potian's mother, who literally called him "son of a bitch." She wasn't his biological mother, she whisked him away from his parents when he was a baby because she was driven mad by jealousy, a Miss Haversham-sort.
• Action Girl: Almost all of the female leads in his series can, at the very least, kick a normal civilian's ass. And most of them are much stronger than that.
• Adaptational Attractiveness:
  • In The Legend of the Condor Heroes, Guo Jing is not normally being described as stout and muscular, and certainly not well known for being incredibly handsome or refined. However, the 2008 film casts teen heart throb Hu Ge, who is very Bishōnen. It can be rather wince-worthy when characters mention how "manly" and "plain" Guo Jing is (including several instances where people compare his relationship with Huang Rong as being "A beautiful flower planted in cow dung" — yes, he was even being likened to cow dung), when Guo Jing can◊ look◊ prettier◊ than some of the female cast. However, the 2008 modified the focus to be a contrast of minds; Guo Jing is now probably the slowest martial arts student ever (dung), while Huang Rong is a genius (flower).
  • In the novel, Dongfang Bubai is a man who castrated himself for power. After gorgeous Brigitte Lin played him in 1992, however, it became some sort of tradition that his role would be played by a woman.

• Almighty Idiot: Zhou Botong is a ludicrously powerful martial artist with massive chi reserves, and, uniquely, can use two different techniques at the same time, one for each hand. He'd rather play pranks and take care of his bees than participate in the shenanigans of the jianghu.
• Almighty Janitor: The Sweeper Monk from Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils is the cleaning guy for the library in the Shaolin Temple, most of the higher-up monks in Shaolin didn't even know about him, and he ends up being the strongest character in the entire Jin Yong universe.
• Butt-Monkey: The Golden Wheel Monk. Ostensibly a fighter on par with the Greats, he ends up getting his ass kicked at every turn and humiliated constantly. He does have a change of heart at the end and sacrifices himself to right a wrong he had committed, however.

• Banned in China: Initially, his works were banned in Taiwan and Mainland China.

• Book Dumb: Wei Xiaobao, who is illiterate and constantly recites idioms incorrectly. Even Kangxi mentions numerous times that he should read more books. However, this trait can be attributed mainly to his extreme laziness, as he has proven more than enough times that he's certainly smart enough to learn.
• Born Lucky: Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils: Xu Zhu accidentally solves a Weiqi game and he is bestowed with 70 years worth of martial arts by Wuyazi as a reward. He runs into more luck after rescuing Tianshan Tonglao (a student sister of Wuyazi), who teaches him her techniques in return. As if his luck couldn't get any better, Tianshan Tonglao's nemesis and student sister Li Qiushui unintentionally transfers some of her power to Xu Zhu when the latter tries to stop the two from fighting each other. By the end of the novel, his prowess in martial arts is arguably only second to the Sweeper Monk.

• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Despite Zhou Botong's insane, childish personality, the members of the Quanzhen Sect have no choice but to accept his silly ways. Reason being that, not only is he insanely strong, he's also the member with the most seniority.

• Death Seeker: Dugu Qiubai, a Posthumous Character mentioned in three of the novels, was described as the most powerful martial artist of his era and who died alone in despair as he never found his match throughout his entire life. His name itself is revealing of his objectives^note it literally translates to "The Loner Who Seeks Defeat''.

• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Ren Wo Xing's Reign of Terror is suspiciously similar to purges that were happening in Red China at the time of the novel's writing.

• Driven to Suicide: Xiao Feng, who felt that life wasn't worth living anymore, considering that the girl that was waiting for him when it was all over was Ah Zi. Many people theorize that what drove him to suicide was a combination of heroics and the fact that he wanted to escape that manipulative, depressing relationship with her.

• Dying Alone: Yang Kang is poisoned and left to die a slow, painful death alone. No one dared to go near him, and he didn't even get a proper burial.

• Everybody Was Kung-Fu Fighting: What do you expect? It's Wuxia. Even the most harmless looking of old men will inevitably turn out to be a hidden kung fu master.

• Eye Scream: Blindness is a common effect of especially deadly poisons. After Ah Zi was blinded by her own poison, the opportunity came to heal her sight if only she had a donor...You Tanzhi cheerfully volunteers. When she decides to join Xiao Feng in death, she plucks out said eyes and throws them back to You Tanzhi.
• Face–Heel Turn: Hua Tiegan in A Deadly Secret. He was part of the "Luohua Liushui" group of orthodox martial artists who wanted to rescue Shui Sheng from Grandmaster Xuedao. However, his three companions are killed while pursuing Xuedao into an enclosed glacier, causing him to fear for his life and beg for mercy. After Xuedao's death at the hands of Di Yun, he realizes that his reputation will be ruined if his act of cowardice and disloyalty is spread by Di Yun and Shui Sheng and unsuccessfully attempt to kill them. After being rescued from the glacier, he accuses the duo of committing sexual acts while they were trapped in the glacier, causing Shui Sheng to fall out with her cousin/fiancé and Di Yun's reputation to sink even lower.
  • Li Mochou in Return of the Condor Heroes is implied to be this. Apparently she was not a bad person before her lover fell for another woman.
• The Fettered: Li Yan from Sword Stained with Royal Blood. He was critical in convincing martial artists to join Li Zicheng's anti-Ming peasant movement through constantly talking about his vision of creating a populist regime. Unfortunately for him, the newly established government under Li Zicheng was even more unpopular than its predecessor due to rampant corruption.
  • Guo Jing's display of this actually saved his life. Due to a misunderstanding about Yang Kang's death, Yang Guo wanted to "avenge" his dad by killing both Guo Jing and Huang Rong. However, after witnessing Guo Jing's loyal and indomitable personality, his murderous thoughts immediately vanish.
• The Film of the Book: There are several film adaptations from Shaw Brothers, including The Sword Stained With Royal Blood, Ode to Gallantry, The Emperor and His Brother (based on The Book and the Sword), Heaven Sword And Dragon Sabre, The Proud Youth (based on The Smiling, Proud Wanderer), A Deadly Secret, and a few others.
• First Girl Wins: Qing Qing from Sword Stained With Royal Blood.
• For the Evulz: Almost everything Ah Zi does. The only reason she tortures innocent bystanders is mostly because she's a sadistic little girl that takes pleasure in other people's pain.
• Forbidden Fruit: It's implied that Ah Zi fell for Xiao Feng when she saw him being in complete misery and mourning over Ah Zhu. She was impressed with how dedicated and in love a man could be towards a woman, and wished that she could have someone who would be like that towards her. So although she knew that Xiao Feng would never be able to love another woman, she kept persisting to try to get what she couldn't have.
  • Ironically, although this is her stated reason, she herself eventually gets a suitor that loves her very, very obsessively. But of course, You Tanzhi doesn't count, because he's ugly.
• Genki Girl: Huang Rong, Ding Dang (albeit a very violent one), Zhong Ling, and Ah Zi (who is a Spoiled Brat, Ax-Crazy version). Apparently, Hua Zheng also used to be one, before she started Wangsting about Guo Jing. This is lampshaded by her brother, who asks her what's gotten into her, since she always used to be high on life and always smiling.
• The Gift: Zhang Wuji and Shi Potian, who are shown to be very quick in learning martial arts. Zhou Botong has this aspect as well.
  • Ah Qing from Sword of the Yue Maiden, who manage to defeat 2000 palace guards with a bamboo stick. She learned all of her techniques from sparring with a white gibbon.
• Gotta Catch Them All: Wei Xiaobao collecting all eight volumes of the "Sutra of Forty-two Chapters."
• Green-Eyed Monster: Qing Qing from Sword Stained With Royal Blood is the queen of this. It's a rather unusual instance where the most jealous and narrow-minded woman in the series is the female lead.
• Grey-and-Gray Morality: The Smiling, Proud Wanderer. As a whole, both the orthodox and unorthodox sects are shown be morally ambiguous, to the point where many of the dislikable characters come from orthodox sects.
• Handicapped Badass: Yang Guo, who lost an arm about halfway through Return of the Condor Heroes, grows into a badass who eventually learned to become a true Bare-Fisted Monk by making his one remaining arm so strong and cultivating enough internal energy that swords simply can't stand up to his palm strikes. He eventually got badass enough that his power was considered equal to Guo Jing, protagonist of the prequel and considered the biggest badass of the period. He even got elected to join in the ranks of the Five Great Masters (North, East, South, Centre, he's the West Eccentric), inheriting his godfather Ouyang Feng's position (West Venom).
  • There's also usually at least one blind fighter in every novel.
  • Nun Jiunan in The Deer and The Cauldron, who was previously a princess of the Ming Dynasty. After losing an arm, her martial arts mastery was greatly elevated, giving her credentials to lead a Ming revivalist organization and develop numerous plots to destabilize the Qing government.
  • There's also the weaponsmith in Legend of the Condor Heroes who, despite having to use a crutch in place of a leg and having to sacrifice one hand to hold said crutch, managed to fight a major villain to a standstill.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: Very much subverted in Legend of the Condor Heroes, where it's pretty safe to say that Guo Jing had a lot less natural talent for kung fu than Yang Kang. However, due to Huang Rong's help, his own ridiculous amount of persistence, along with some of the most legendary kung fu masters pounding all their techniques into his slow head, he eventually manages to surpass Yang Kang and become very strong.
• Heartwarming Orphan: Yang Guo, Zhang Wuji, Yuan Chengzhi.
  • Implied in the cases of Linghu Chong and Di Yun, as nothing is ever mentioned about their parents.
• Heel–Face Turn: In the third version of Return of the Condor Heroes, Jinlun Fawang relents at the end and saves Guo Xiang from a burning wooden tower (that he had tied her to in the first place) at the cost of his life.
  • Hong Shenghai and He Tieshou from Sword Stained with Royal Blood, who repents their misdeeds and respectively become a loyal assistant and disciple to Yuan Chengzhi.
  • Tian Boguang in The Smiling, Proud Wanderer is the most surprising example of this. Introduced as a serial rapist with mastery in Qinggong, Linghu Chong manages to put a stop to his act and even befriend him. He is later forced by Monk Bujie to become a Buddhist monk and the faithful disciple of Bujie's daughter Yilin.
• Heroic Ambidexterity: Zhou Botong and Xiaolongnu can use two different sword techniques in each hand, which for Xiaolongnu makes her extremely powerful, because she can use the male Quanzhen Swordplay to complement her Jade Maiden Swordplay without requiring her lover Yang Guo.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: There's Wang Chongyang and Duan Zhixing. Apparently, they were such good friends that they decided to lock themselves up in a room for around one year to practice kung fu together. This had the unfortunate effect of causing Duan Zhixing's married life to become destroyed, to say the least.
• Hidden Villain: Murong Bo from Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils. He is basically directly and indirectly responsible for causing most of the conflict in the novel, including the battle that lead to the death of Xiao Feng's mother, increasing tension between the Song and Liao Dynasty, and Jiumozi's attempt to conquer the wulin. However, the connection between him and the events are not revealed until he makes his first and only appearance in the later part of the novel.
• Historical Domain Character: Many, many of them.
  • The Book and the Sword — Emperor Qianlong, Fuk'anggan
  • Sword Stained with Royal Blood — Emperor Chongzhen, Princess Changping, Li Zicheng, Hong Taiji, Dorgon
  • The Legend of the Condor Heroes — Genghis Khan, Tolui, Jebe, The Seven Disciples of Wang Chongyang
  • Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain — Li Zicheng
  • The Return of the Condor Heroes — Kublai Khan, The Seven Disciples of Wang Chongyang
  • Other Tales of the Flying Fox — Fuk'anggan
  • Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre — Zhu Yuanzhang, Xu Da, Chang Yuchun, Chen Youliang, Zhang Sanfeng
  • Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils — Emperor Daozong, Wanyan Aguda, Duan Zhengchun
  • The Deer and the Cauldron — Emperor Kangxi, Princess Changping, Oboi, Zheng Keshuang, Sophia Alekseyevna
  • Sword of the Yue Maiden — Fan Li, King Goujian, Wen Zhong, Xi Shi
• Honor Before Reason: A lot of the protagonists. The most extreme examples are Guo Jing, Zhang Wuji, and Xiao Feng. For Guo Jing's case, he actually became (in)famous even among his enemies for being an incredibly honorable goody-two-shoes.
• Humans Are Bastards: What A Deadly Secret revolves around. From disciples murdering their own master to cannibalism, even The Cynic would find the pessimistic mood to be disturbingly strong. A notable mention is Ling Tuisi, who prematurely buries his daughter as a part of his scheme to gain the secret leading to a hidden treasure.
  • Gongsun Zhi from Return of the Condor Heroes. He was taught various martial arts techniques by his wife Qiu Qianchi, and repays her goodwill by cheating on her, causing an infuriated Qiu to poison him and his lover. Qiu claims to have only one dose of antidote to the poison, leading Gongsun Zhi to quickly killing his lover so he can have the antidote. In revenge, he severs Qiu's tendons and imprisons her, hiding the secret from his own daughter.
• Humiliation Conga: Murong Fu succeeds in teaming up with Duan Yuan Qing, a bitter, psychotically murderous man who promises him that he'd be able to become emperor; in exchange, he fatally stabs Duan Yu's parents, but before he can murder Duan Yu himself his mother reveals that Duan Yu is Duan Yuan Qing's biological son, and Duan Yuan Qing relents of the order. By now the Big Damn Heroes have shown up at which point they completely waste Murong Fu. He spends the rest of his life a broken shell of a man who, in his insanity, believes himself to be emperor and appoints the neighborhood children and local wildlife the "officers" of his "court". You almost feel sorry for the guy...
• If I Can't Have You…: Guo Fu with Yang Guo, even going so far as to [[spoiler cut his arm off]] out of rage and spite. Also, Zhou Zhiruo becomes hellbent on destroying Zhang Wuji after he ditches her during their wedding.
  • That's one interpretation of Guo Fu. It's hard to say if she really did that because she couldn't have Yang Guo. She was also angry because Yang Guo convinced the Wu brothers to stop fighting for her affections and basically to give her the cold shoulder. And then she told him about that thing with his master/lover and etc.
• Insufferable Genius: Many characters that are badass geniuses are not modest. Quite a few times, it's something that makes them all the more endearing.
• Implausible Fencing Powers: It's Wuxia, so all swordplay and martial arts is going to fall under Rule of Cool.
  • The king of this in his novels is the Posthumous Character Dugu Qiubai, aptly named "Sword Devil", who by age 30 was such a good swordsman that he was literally the strongest person to have ever lived. He invented a series of stance which allow someone to counter literally any possible offense used on them (making the user effectively unbeatable), and being so good a swordsman that he no longer actually needed a sword to use swordplay: instead all the grass, stone, dirt, and trees in the world would become his sword should he need to defend himself.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Quite a few times, Huang Rong decides to leave to allow Guo Jing to go with his fiancee, Hua Zheng. Of course, when he makes it clear that the only one he loves is her, she decides to stay with him. Duan Yu did this for Wang Yuyan, as well. His sacrifice lead to the biggest turning point of their relationship.
• Karmic Death: Instead of having the protagonists outright kill the bad guys, this tends to be their ending. It also tends to be a lot more satisfying.
• Ki Manipulation
• Kissing Cousins: Hey, these stories are based in ancient China. It was okay. Examples include Zhu Er with Wuji and especially Wang Yuyan and Murong Fu.
• Last Girl Wins: Most prominently, Zhao Min from Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre, who was the very last girl Wuji met out of his harem of admirers. Wang Yuyan from Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils was the last girl that Duan Yu met, and is also the one that he ended up with. And then it's implied that Shui Sheng from A Deadly Secret ended up with Di Yun. Also, Huang Rong from Legend of the Condor Heroes met Guo Jing way after Hua Zheng.
• Like Brother and Sister: What Guo Jing feels towards Hua Zheng.
• Love at First Sight: Thankfully, Jin Yong tends not to use this trope as much, and normally fleshes out the characters' romance. However, there is Duan Yu towards Wang Yuyan, which culminated in him acting like a Stalker with a Crush towards her. The use of this trope is probably also part of the reason why their relationship is viewed by many as being Strangled by the Red String. There are also one-sided examples, which are mostly viewed negatively.

• Love Hurts: Boy, does it. It's capable of transforming originally Genki characters into wangsting drunks.
• Love Makes You Dumb: Happens more often than you think and as long as it's not the protagonist, it's generally fatal for the character.
• Love Martyr: There are lots. Yue Buqun's daughter, Yue Lingshan towards Ling Pingzhi, Qi Fang towards Wan Gui. A very messed up one is You Tanzhi towards Ah Zi, to the extent where he accepts her torturing him (including melting a scalding iron mask onto his face), and is willing to kill anyone for her.
• Love Triangle: A staple for every story of his. Every protagonist must be in one. Only certain protagonists, however, start getting more than two love interests.
• Luke, You Are My Father: All the time. The three biggest come in Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils, where the true lineage of three of the main protagonists all represent major turning points in their lives — Xiao Feng is revealed to be a foreign prince, causing him to spend the rest of his life torn between the duties to his biological family and his bonds with his former friends, whom he still feels obligated towards despite being forsaken by all but a few; Duan Yu turns out to be the result of a one night stand between Duan Yan Qing and Duan Yu's mother, who was pissed at her husband for being such a playboy, and Xu Zhu is revealed to be the product of an affair between the head monk of his temple and a woman who became a serial baby kidnapper/killer because of this event.
• MacGuffin: Most of the time, it comes in the form of a secret kung fu manual. In The Deer and the Cauldron, an interesting example would be the eight volumes of the "Sutra of Forty-two Chapters." In the books, despite being a huge driving force of the plot, the treasure map found in all eight books never ends up being used to find the treasure.
• Marry Them All: What Wei Xiaobao had in mind, pretty much ever since the beginning, with all eight of his love interests. In his defense, people in those days could do that, and there was absolutely nothing wrong with it.
  • Also, Duan Yu of Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils is told to marry his entire Unwanted Harem by his dying mother. (In at least one adaptation, she even takes the time to tell him that Da Li ethics are different from Han ethics, and he can marry them all as full wives instead of designating a head wife and make the rest of them his concubines.)
• Martial Pacifist: Quite a few of the martial artists don't care for fighting in any way.
• Meaningful Name: A load of characters, especially those in the Condor Trilogy.
  • Guo Jing and Yang Kang's given names combine to form Jingkang, which was used for reminding the duo of the era where the Northern Song Dynasty was toppled. ^note The "Jingkang Incident" or "Disaster of Jingkang" was the occupation of the imperial capital Kaifeng, whereby the Jurchen Jin abducted basically everyone of Emperor Qinzong's branch of the family. This included himself and his father Emperor Huizong.
  • Dongfang Bubai translates roughly to "Invincible/Undefeatable East", illustrating the character's supremacy in martial arts.
    • For fans of anime, this is where the name Tohou Fuhai comes from.
  • Dugu Qiubai's name means 'The Loner Begging for Defeat', someone who is so skilled and powerful, he is begging for someone, anyone to finally defeat him.
  • Murong Bo and Murong Fu's given name can mean "gamble" and "restore". This pretty much matches their intention of restoring a historical state through a series of dangerous gambles.
• Meaningless Villain Victory: Ling Tuisi and Qi Changfa achieves this in A Deadly Secret, as both of them sacrificed their daughter before arriving at their goal. They are hit with karma after touching the poison smeared on the treasure they were after all along, causing them to become insane.
• Minimalism: Sword of the Yue Maiden. Arguably, Blade-dance of the Two Lovers and Swordswoman Riding West on White Horse as well. Interestingly, they are generally regarded as Jin Yong's least popular works, and are the only novels where the female protagonist is featured more prominently than the male protagonist.
• Morality Pet: A rare example of an older, stronger man being a young girl's morality pet can be found in Demi Gods and Semi Devils. Xiao Feng is the only person who can bring out any sort of redeeming qualities in Ah Zi. Any good deed that Ah Zi ever attempts has been in the effort to seek his approval. Too bad Xiao Feng is an idiot when it comes to raising or encouraging kids.
• Murder the Hypotenuse: Zhou Zhiruo made a huge effort to secure her position in Wuji's heart — including attempting to murder any and every woman that got in the way. And then there's Ah Zhi with Xiao Feng... let's face it, anyone who looks to be a nuisance or gets in the way of her and her brother-in-law must die.
• No Challenge Equals No Satisfaction: Quite a few characters/masters experience this, but the biggest one has to be the near-mythical character of Dugu Qiubai, who was so ridiculously skilled and powerful that he had no equals or challengers, and all he was left with was profound loneliness and dissatisfaction. His name literally translates into 'The Loner Begging for Defeat'.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Experienced by most protagonists. Often this is a result of false rumours spread about them or the group they're associated with.
  • Xiao Feng of Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils is the epitome of this simply because of his Khitan heritage.
  • Di Yun from A Deadly Secret bears this for almost the entirety of the novel. It wasn't until Shui Sheng began doing good deeds under his name that his reputation began to improve.
  • Linghu Chong from The Smiling, Proud Wanderer, due to his association with members of unorthodox sects.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Qiu Qianren in Legend of the Condor Heroes. Due his twin brother impersonating him as a con-artist in earlier parts of the novel, he is seen as nothing more than a petty crook by Huang Rong. Cut to Qiu almost killing Huang Rong with his "Iron Palm".
• One-Man Army: Most martial artist masters. There are battle strategies that basically throws them into the midst of the enemy and just let them rip.
• Opposites Attract: Numerous couples. Guo Jing (dumb, honorable, and an all-around Nice Guy) with Huang Rong (tricky and sly, spoiled, and morally ambiguous), Yang Guo (Genki, flirty, and fun-loving) and Xiao Long Nu (boring, Emotionless Girl that hates commotions and would rather live quietly in a coffin), Zhang Wuji (stupid, honorable, and very wishy washy when it comes to women) with Zhao Min (sneaky, one-man woman).
• Orwellian Retcon: Many of his works since 2002.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: Guo Polu from Return of the Condor Heroes. Despite being the only son of the Guo family (which meant a lot in traditional Chinese culture), he is constantly cast aside in favour of his infinitely more vibrant twin sister Guo Xiang. His only significant role was being the first person to wield the "Dragon Sabre", one of the coveted weapons in Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre.
• Parody: The Deer and The Cauldron to the rest of Jin Yong's works. Wei Xiaobao does everything that no one would ever expect a hero to do, most notably raping his future wives.
• Passing the Torch: Near the end of Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre, Zhang Wuji felt that his leadership of the Ming Cult was constantly being challenged, especially by Zhu Yuanzhang. He ultimately decides to transfer his position to Zhu and live a secluded life with Zhao Min.
• Plucky Comic Relief: The Six Immortals of the Peach Valley in The Smiling, Proud Wanderer.
  • The Four Heroes of Taiyue from Blade-dance of the Two Lovers are often regarded as some of the most memorable comic relief characters in his works, as they are actually crucial to plot development.
• Precocious Crush: Guo Xiang had a huge crush on Yang Guo... she never got over it, and remained single and celibate for the rest of her life. Considering that Yang Guo was a generation older than her, and had even held her in his arms when she was a baby... oh my.
  • Ah Zi had a big one on Xiao Feng, who was her dead twin sister's boyfriend. She also constantly manipulates him into staying by her side to protect her, using her sister as her trump card. Unfortunately for Ah Zi, Xiao Feng is not into Ax-Crazy Spoiled Brats. It's probably worth mentioning that Xiao Feng is also much older than her.
• The Promise: Xiao Feng promising Ah Zhu that he'll take care of Ah Zi for the rest of his life. God, he would regret that so much in the future. To the point where his only escape was in death.
• Reality Subtext:
  • The Qing dynasty (except for Kangxi) is depicted in poor light because Jin Yong's ancestors were the target of a censorious purge that almost caused his entire clan to be wiped out.
  • The false accusation that befell Di Yun is based on what happened to a family servant (he was similarly accused as a plot to Murder the Hypotenuse and Jin Yong's grandfather — a judge — realized the clues didn't add up and so had the man freed; in gratitude, the servant dedicated himself to the grandfather).
  • In the 1983 adaptation of Return of the Condor Heroes, numerous people applauded the performance of how love-struck and romantic Andy Lau (who played Yang Guo) was towards Idy Chan (who played the character's love, Xiao Long Nu). Apparently, Andy Lau has since admitted that he harbored a huge crush on Idy Chan. To quote him, "When I collaborated in Return of the Condor Heroes with her, I really felt that she's my girlfriend. When we go home after work, I would be worried about her and think of her. Then when we collaborated again in Casino Raiders where she played Alan Tam's girlfriend, I felt unhappy about it."
• Reconcile the Bitter Foes: During the reign of Ren Woxing and Dongfang Bubai in The Smiling, Prooud Wanderer, there was constant war between the Sun Moon Holy Cult and the orthodox sects. When Ren Woxing's daughter Ren Yingying came to power, a truce was successfully negotiated between the two sides.
  • Subverted in The Deer and The Cauldron, as Wei Xiaobao's attempts at reconciling the Han and Manchus are a constant failure.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Yang Guo and Xiaolongnü in The Return of the Condor Heroes.
• Running Gag: On average, the female protagonists are a lot smarter than the male protagonists, the most glaring examples being Huang Rong and Zhao Min.
• Samus Is a Girl: Many Action Girls in his series are this.
• Second Love: Heaven Sword Dragon Sabre has Wuji's first (and arguably strongest) love being Zhiruo. It takes her completely screwing it up for him to eventually decide to go with Zhao Min.
• Selective Obliviousness: Linghu Chong does not see his master's true nature, that would be just too unfilial.
  • The same goes for Di Yun and just like Linghu Chong, he does absolutely nothing to punish his master after realizing his cruel and immoral personality.
• She Cleans Up Nicely: A notable example includes Sha Gu (from Legend of the Condor Heroes). Although she's crazy, it's revealed that after they cleaned her up, she was actually quite pretty. Yang Guo deliberately invokes this in his later years by always wearing an ugly mask to hide his face given how many girls' hearts he unwittingly broke over the years. Given what happened to Guo Xiang after she saw him...it may not be such a bad idea.
• Single-Target Sexuality: A lot of his characters are. Including villains.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Huang Rong towards Guo Jing — as a matter of fact, a huge reason why she decided to start following him and chasing him was because he was just such a nice guy to her, regardless of whether she was dressed as a beggar. And then there's Ah Shiu towards Shi Potian, who is attracted to his kind, naive personality (in contrast to his bad boy, rapist Evil Twin brother).
• Sissy Villain: Dongfang Bubai is a straight example after castrating himself to learn the Sunflower Manual skills in exchange for his personality and appearance becoming feminine as a result.
• Smug Snake:
  • Yue Buqun. In the end all of his plots came tumbling down.
  • Murong Fu (and he ultimately failed very, very badly).
• So Beautiful, It's a Curse: The most beautiful women in the Jin Yong universe tend to have the unfortunate fate of getting raped. The most obvious examples being Xiao Long Nu and Ah Ke. And then there's what happened to Princess Fragrance, whose beauty ended up catching the unfortunate attention of the Emperor, which later caused her to commit suicide.
• Spell My Name With An S: Inevitable given the multiple romanization systems and alternate translations for the novels.
• Spoiled Brat: Guo Fu is the epitome of this. Mostly, it's Huang Rong doing the spoiling, to an infuriating degree. She gets little more than a stern lecture and continues being spoiled after lopping a man's arm clean off. Also, Princess Jian Ning... although she also tends to like being mistreated, since she's a masochist. But still, a spoiled brat nonetheless. Ah Zi is one as well, constantly manipulating and torturing people into doing things she wants.
• Stalking is Love: In Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils, the series tries to make light of Duan Yu's stalking of Wang Yuyan, passing it off as him being dedicated to his love for her.
• Stalker with a Crush: No matter how you look at it, Duan Yu was a stalker towards Wang Yuyan. A more sinister example would be Yin Zhiping, who keeps the antidote bottle Xiao Long Nu gave him, constantly tries to stalk and watch her, and eventually out-and-out rapes her.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Numerous TV adaptations of Sword Stained with Royal Blood change Yuan Chengzhi and Ah Jiu's relationship into this. In the books, however, it was much more on Ah Jiu's side, considering that Yuan Chengzhi actually loved Qing Qing more.
  • And then there's Yang Guo and Xiao Long Nu's romance. Star-Crossed Lovers pretty much describes what most of that series consists of. It took more than a decade to finally resolve the situation.
  • In Legend of the Condor Heroes, there was Lu Guanying and Cheng Yaojia, whose little sidestory was the equivalent of a Chinese Romeo and Juliet (except with more kung fu). Only, with a happy ending.
  • What the romance between Ding Dian and Ling Shuanghua in A Deadly Secret was destined to be. Ding Dian possessed the "Secret of the Linked Cities", something that Ling Shuanghua's father Ling Tuisi was scheming for. Cut to Ding Dian being imprisoned and tortured for a decade by Ling Tuisi for refusing to reveal the secret.
• Street Smart: Wei Xiaobao.
• Sweet on Polly Oliver: Ironically, despite Jin Yong's works having so many Sweet Polly Olivers, this is almost always subverted. Normally, the main characters will be so insanely dense, they won't even have the "primordial sense" to subconsciously be attracted to them. And typically, it won't be until the girl reveals her true gender that the male protagonist will start showing a romantic attraction to her.
• Sweet Polly Oliver: An extremely common occurrence in his stories. Pretty much every single story has at least one girl who dresses up as a man for some important reason or another.
• Sympathetic Adulterer: Ying Gu's affair with Zhou Botong is shown from her point of view and is very much a product of love rather than lust. The only person who blames her is her ex-husband, who later blames himself for the death of the child born from the affair and seeks Ying Gu's forgiveness.
• Through His Stomach: Xie Yanke warmed up a lot more to Shi Potian after eating his delicious food. Unfortunately, not quite enough to give up his original plan of killing him, but... hey, it helped. Also, Huang Rong managed to get Hong Qigong to take both her and Guo Jing as his disciples by cooking cuisines fit for the Emperor for him.
• Title Drop: The original Chinese title for The Smiling, Proud Wanderer is dropped in the form of being the title of a piece of music.
• Too Kinky to Torture: The ultimate example might very well be Princess Jian Ning from The Deer and the Cauldron. Wei Xiaobao hits her, and she likes it. She's very explicit in her adoration of BDSM.
• Tsundere: Zhou Qi in The Book and The Sword. Especially around Xu Tianhong.

• Values Dissonance:
  • The attitudes towards women, the borderline jingoistic nationalism, the whole Honor Before Reason thing... though some of it is probably invoked on purpose.
  • Fans have also noted a common trend to the fate of female characters in Jin Yong's novels. Most of the female characters that do fall in love with the protagonist but doesn't end up with him (or knows that there's no way he can reciprocate the love) either remains celibate or encounters a tragic end. The most prominent example of this is Gongsun Lü'e, who dies at the hands of her dad while attempting to save her romantic interest Yang Guo.
• Wall of Text: Jin Yong will sidetrack so often to pontificate about the Backstory of the most recently arrived character that it's very easy to lose track of the main plot.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: A lot of the male characters that side with the protagonists are like this. Unsurprisingly, this is generally their biggest character flaw.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Quite a few masters gain attain a great level of power at the cost of going completely insane and forgetting most of their skills. They are still very dangerous if the right buttons are pushed, either accidentally using their skills due to muscle memory, or having moments of lucidity that allows them to access their powers.
• World's Most Beautiful Woman: Jin Yong is quite fond of this trope. Most of his series has a designated "world's most beautiful woman" set during that period. Special mention goes to Xiao Long Nu, Princess Fragrance, Wang Yuyan, and Ah Ke along with her mother Chen Yuanyuan (who was Chinese history's equivalent of Helen of Troy). Expect many heated arguments among Jin Yong fans about who is most beautiful.
  • Xi Shi from Sword of the Yue Maiden is so beautiful that after Ah Qing witnesses her beauty, she can't bring herself to kill her.
• Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Most of his protagonists except for Wei Xiaobao.
• Woman Scorned: Zhou Zhiruo is the epitome of this. All hell breaks loose when Wuji leaves her during the wedding.
• Yandere: Ah Zi towards Xiao Feng fits this trope to a "T". She has the cute, innocent, Genki Girl looks... and the incredibly horrifying, sadistic personality. Guo Fu was also one towards Yang Guo. And then there's Zhou Zhiruo towards Zhang Wuji, among others.
• You're Insane!: Di Yun's implicit reaction to anyone who is after the "Secret of the Linked Cities", to the point of him losing faith in his master. Ironically, those who understood the secret and came into contact with the treasure that the secret lead toward became insane.
  • Yuan Chengzhi towards the Chongzhen Emperor when the latter tries to kill his own daughter, after having already chopped off one of her arms.

---