Laughing in the Wind 3rd Edition changes

Jin Yong revised Laughing in the Wind twice after its serialisation in Ming Pao. The Second Edition of 1980 made minor amendments. The Third Edition, the new revised edition published in early 2005 by Guangzhou Publishing House, is a lighter revision than those he made to the longer novels. His afterword says as much.

The list below follows a chapter-by-chapter collation of that 2005 text against the previous book edition.¹ In the collation the previous book text is the old edition and the 2005 text is the new revised edition. It does not record the separate changes made when the 1967–69 serial became the 1980 book. The plot is not rebuilt. Most entries correct a contradiction, a rank, an age, or a form of address, or add a sentence of explanation.

What the revision mainly does

It corrects the Huashan order of entry, ages, and seniority. Lao Denuo is the difficult case: a spy cannot have been in the school for long, and he is too old to sit at the bottom of the disciple list.
It makes the Six Immortals of the Peach Valley about twenty years younger.
It repairs small contradictions, among them the character 如 in a poem that does not contain it, and the generation character in Feng Qingyang’s name.
It makes Linghu Chong two years younger, and Lan Fenghuang about five years younger, so that she is younger than he is.
It says what the air Laughing in the Wind is about: the story of Nie Zheng.
It moves the Fujian Shaolin house from Putian to Quanzhou. The collation treats this as one of the larger changes, and asks whether The Book and the Sword was altered to match.
It says what became of the other four schools of the Five Mountains. They choose new leaders and begin to recover.
It tidies forms of address in the Northern Hengshan School, whose lines of transmission were muddled in the previous text.

Chapter 2, Eavesdropping

The teahouse waiter in Hengyang likes to begin a sentence with ha (哈). The Third Edition also explains nijia (你家) as a short form of “you, elder”, a respectful address, used around Hengyang and Mount Heng.
When Lu Dayou jokes that fear would have frozen him into a corpse, the Third Edition inserts “corpse” into “hero”, so that the joke is a hero-corpse.

Chapter 3, Rescue from peril

When Yue Buqun describes the Evil-Warding Swordplay, the Third Edition adds that it is ghostly and hard to guard against.
The wonton-seller’s bill changes from nine bowls, ninety cash, to eight bowls, eighty cash. The collation notes that Lu Dayou had asked for nine bowls, so the new figure disagrees with the earlier line.
While Linghu Chong is passing himself off as Lao Denuo, he adds that he has lived seventy or eighty years.

Chapter 4, Seated confrontation

The saying of the three poisons changes from “a nun, arsenic, and a gold-thread snake” to “a nun, arsenic, and a green-bamboo snake”.

Chapter 5, Treating wounds

Linghu Chong tells Yilin that if his own shifu ranked eighth, her shifu Dingyi could rank sixth, because Ning Zhongze had said the Hengshan shibo’s sword might surpass Yue Buqun’s. Yilin says she will tell her shifu.

Chapter 6, Washing hands

Fang Qianju is identified as Liu Zhengfeng’s brother-in-law.
The Songshan disciple Wan Daping (万大平) is renamed Wan Dengping (万登平), so that his name shares the generation character deng with his senior Shi Dengda.

Chapter 7, Passing on the scroll

Qu Yang adds that Guangling San (广陵散) tells of Nie Zheng’s attempt on the King of Han, that Laughing in the Wind takes its finest passage, and that Liu Zhengfeng’s bitter xiao is Nie Zheng’s sister recovering his body.
Linghu Chong reports Lin Zhennan’s dying words to Yue Buqun in a whisper.
When Yue Buqun catches Linghu Chong sticking his tongue out, the explanation is no longer a twitch of the muscle behind the ear. Linghu Chong turns towards Tao Jun and Ying Bailuo, who want to laugh and do not dare.
Lao Denuo, though he entered late, is made second disciple because he is too old to be called shidi by the others. The collation sets out why the old order could not stand. Lao Denuo says Linghu Chong entered twelve years before him, and Linghu Chong tells Yilin he has been in the school fifteen years, so Lao Denuo has been there about three. If Lao Denuo were second by order of entry, Yue Buqun would have taken no disciple for twelve years after Linghu Chong, and Lu Dayou later says he had been in the school five years before he learnt White Phoenix. A spy’s residence also cannot be very long.
Yue Lingshan is a year or two younger than Lin Pingzhi, not several years younger.
Mount Hua is described as the steepest of the Five Mountains. Lin Pingzhi and the others take most of a day to climb it.
In the retold cave scene, Tian Boguang addresses the disguised Linghu Chong as Brother Lao, not Brother Linghu. The collation calls the old form of address a well-known slip, because Linghu Chong is pretending to be Lao Denuo.

Chapter 8, Facing the wall

Feng Qingyang is of the Qing generation, not the Feng generation. A generation character is the middle character of the name, not the surname. Yue Buqun is of the Bu generation.
When Yue Lingshan shivers on the cliff, Linghu Chong wants to put an arm around her, remembers her parents, and draws the arm back.
The man who cut the passage behind the cliff with an axe does not merely die of exhausted strength. He loses heart, and then dies of exhausted strength.

Chapter 9, Inviting guests

Speaking on the cliff to Linghu Chong, Shi Daizi, Lu Dayou, and Yue Lingshan, Yue Buqun dates the quarrel of the sword faction and the qi faction to fifty years before, not thirty.

Chapter 10, Transmitting the sword

One of the Six Immortals of the Peach Valley is forty or fifty, not sixty or seventy. The collation counts that as about twenty years younger.

Chapter 11, Gathering energy

When Lu Lianrong sneers at Linghu Chong in Hengshan city, Linghu Chong adds that the woman in question is Lu’s own.
Peach Root Immortal, speaking of Yilin, adds that the little nun is rather lovable, and that he would rather she call the six brothers dogs than hear her cry.
Fei Bin is said to be missing, not dead. The collation’s reason is that Mo Da’s killing of him is not widely known.

Chapter 12, Under siege

Yue Buqun does not recognise Tian Boguang until Tian Boguang introduces himself.
The Songshan ranks change. Ding Mian is the senior of the Thirteen Grandmasters, Lu Bai the second, and Tang Yinge the sixth. In the previous text Ding Mian was second, Lu Bai third, and Tang Yinge seventh. The collation reads the old numbering as including Zuo Lengchan himself, and the new numbering as excluding him, so that each shidi moves up one place. Ding Mian is Zuo’s second shidi, Lu Bai the third, and Fei Bin the fourth.
Cong Buqi is given an old desire for Ning Zhongze from their days as fellow disciples. After the fight he leaves with Feng Buping, rather than Feng Buping leaving alone.

Chapter 13, Learning the zither

Drunk, Linghu Chong tells Lao Denuo that if he has found no evidence he should invent some to please their shifu.
After Wang Yuanba’s feast, he calls his two sons and Yue Buqun and Ning Zhongze to discuss revenge for his daughter and son-in-law. Yue Buqun says the Five Mountains schools are at odds among themselves, that the Qingcheng School has the numbers, and that a hasty revenge may not prevail. The collation treats the scene as something the previous text unreasonably omitted.
Ren Yingying, still behind the screen, explains why an assassination story can be played lightly: the xia dies and the spirit remains, flowers fall and return, and every year some xia laughs at the jianghu, so the later music is thick with flowers.
When the Elder of the Green Bamboo sends Linghu Chong off, Wang Zhongqiang as well as his sons has both arms put out of joint.

Chapter 14, Discussing cups

Zu Qianqiu adds two Tang chief ministers of the Linghu surname, Linghu Chu (令狐楚) and Linghu Xuan (令狐绚).
On the cups for Shaoxing wine he adds that Five Dynasties porcelain would be better still, and that the Longquan Ge and Di wares of Wuyue are best and very rare. The talk of pear-blossom wine is also slightly expanded.

Chapter 15, Administering medicine

The leader of the Hundred Herbs School, previously only surnamed Zhu, is named Zhu Caoxian.
Peach Fruit Immortal coins xiatuo (吓拖) against Peach Branch Immortal’s xiezu (吓阻), because the two of them are behind Lao Touzi and so cannot be blocking him.
Lao Touzi no longer stuffs the mouths of Peach Branch Immortal and Peach Fruit Immortal. He tells them to be quiet and slaps them, and they comply. The collation notes that they have to speak again later, so a gag in the previous text was a known contradiction.
Lao Busi’s daughter is described as fair of face.

Chapter 16, Blood transfusion

Lan Fenghuang is twenty-two or twenty-three, not twenty-seven or twenty-eight. Linghu Chong’s thought that she is older than he is becomes a thought that they are about the same age.
Yue Buqun is startled that a woman of a little over twenty should lead a large order.
Yue Buqun has led Huashan for ten-odd years, not twenty-odd.
A note at the end of the chapter says that, in modern medicine, blood of type O may be given to the other types. Lan Fenghuang does not know the types. Long experience has taught her that her own blood is of that kind, and she chooses donors of the same kind for Linghu Chong.

Chapter 17, Opening one’s heart

Linghu Chong claims he was four, not six, when he drank and gambled with Huang Boliu, and that twenty years have passed. The collation counts the previous text as making him twenty-six, and the Third Edition as making him twenty-four.
He calls for his fourth shidi, not his third. Liang Fa, the third, is already dead at the Medicine King Temple.
The men who blind themselves are sent to Coiling Dragon Island for seven or eight years, not for the rest of their lives.

Chapter 18, Joining hands

Linghu Chong has lain unconscious at Shaolin for two months and more, not three.
The Qingcheng name Hou Renxiong is corrected to Hou Renying, matching the earlier list of Hou Renying and Hong Renxiong. The young disciple whose palm Linghu Chong cuts off is seventeen or eighteen, not eighteen or nineteen, and Linghu Chong speaks to him with apology rather than a plain sigh.
Yue Hou is identified as Zuo Lengchan’s fifth shidi. With the ranks already given, the collation lists Zuo Lengchan, Ding Mian, Lu Bai, Fei Bin, Yue Hou, and Tang Yinge as seventh. The sixth is not named in this entry.

Chapter 19, Making a wager

Before the wager at Plum Manor, Xiang Wentian tells Linghu Chong that he is the Right Emissary of the order, that the errand will use Linghu Chong, and that Linghu Chong will suffer for it.
The false identity is no longer “the only heir of Feng Qingyang’s sword”, which would have put the heir in Yue Buqun’s generation. Xiang Wentian calls him a younger cousin of Feng Qingyang, and thus Yue Buqun’s shishu.
The wine is “strong grape wine”. A note at the end of the chapter discusses grape wine, and says the word “strong” is there to mark it off from true grape wine.
After tasting it, Linghu Chong adds that Danqingsheng’s three sword moves ought to be worth ten.
He also stops Danqingsheng from setting the ice above the cup. Cold falling from above is quick and is not the best method. Cold rising from below leaves fine layers of warmth and cold in the wine.
In Tubiweng’s copy of the Poem of General Pei, the praised character is 若, not 如. The poem has no 如. The collation calls this a very well-known error in the previous text.

Chapter 20

The chapter title changes from Entering the Prison (入狱) to Visiting the Prison (探狱).

Chapter 22, Breaking free

Qin Weibang, who resists and is fed the uncontrolled Corpse-Brain Pill, is given a short further scene in which the pill seems to take him and he fights like a cornered beast. Xiang Wentian kicks him to death. He is therefore dead before the later chapters, which is why he cannot reappear as a surrendered elder.
The account of the Greater Star-Absorbing Technique is expanded and altered to match the revised Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils. The previous text said the art came from the Northern Song Xiaoyao School in two lines, Beiming Power through the Duan family of Dali and the Transforming Power through the Xingxiu School, joined at last and owing more to the Transforming Power. The Third Edition still derives it from those two, but this Transforming Power is an orthodox line of Beiming Power and does not use poison. It is not the Northern Song practice that had gone wrong and depended on poison. Ren Woxing also argues at length that Linghu Chong need not think the art unjust.
A note at the end of the chapter says that Xianxia Ridge now has tunnels, so that travellers and cars need not climb it.

Chapter 23, The ambush

Among the three Songshan leaders who pretend to rescue Dingjing, Deng Bagong becomes Teng Bagong. With Zhong Zhen and Gao Kexin, all three are said to rank among the Thirteen Grandmasters.
Zhong Zhen calls himself “this junior” rather than “this humble one”, and a sentence notes that the form of address sounds as if the Five Mountains had already become one school and he a shidi of it.
When Dingjing comes to meet the rescued disciples, Qin Juan calls her Shifu, with tears, rather than Yilin calling her Shibo.
Dying, Dingjing adds “Thank you, young xia” after the two words “you”, takes Linghu Chong’s hand, and looks at him with gratitude. She has understood that the officer Wu Tiande is Linghu Chong.
Linghu Chong has a second reason for knowing the ambushers are not of the Sun Moon Holy Order. Besides refusing the name “demonic cult”, they would not mistake their own leader. The collation adds a further reading of its own: Linghu Chong has used the Star-Absorbing Technique only on Gao Kexin in this passage, and only Dingjing, Linghu Chong, and the Songshan men hear Gao Kexin cry out and hear Zhong Zhen guess that Linghu Chong is Ren Woxing. The false cult men who later take Linghu Chong for Ren Woxing are therefore the same party.

Chapter 24, Wrongly accused

When Yue Lingshan remembers the invisible-ink story, she is eight or nine and Linghu Chong is fifteen or sixteen. In the previous text he was seventeen or eighteen. The change matches the younger age set in chapter 17.

Chapter 25, Receiving news

When the man surnamed Zhao asks who has beaten him, Yihe answers that it is the young xia Linghu Chong, formerly of Huashan, now of no school, and a friend of Hengshan. He no longer claims to be the Quanzhou officer Wu Tiande.

Chapter 26, Temple siege

The wait until the fifteenth of the twelfth month is seventeen days, not sixteen.
The banner changes from “The heroes of the realm go together to Shaolin to welcome the Holy Maiden” to “The heroes of the jianghu go up to Shaolin, worship the Buddha, visit the monks, and welcome Maiden Ren”.
Outside the empty monastery, Linghu Chong kneels to the image of the Buddha.

Chapter 27, Three battles

Zuo Lengchan’s son is named: Zuo Ting (左挺), called Cold Pine beyond the Sky, said to be poor at martial arts and not very bright, and therefore easy to kill. Ren Woxing also names a famous dependent of Yue Buqun: the gentleman Yue has a daughter.
Before fighting Fangzheng, Ren Woxing adds that killing the short man Yu is only because he dislikes him, and that killing him today would not count as one of the matches.
When Xiang Wentian answers Zuo Lengchan’s protest at two against one, he says that a grandson and a bastard has only just said he would win by numbers. Zuo Lengchan has just proposed that the ten orthodox masters take Ren Woxing, Xiang Wentian, and Ren Yingying together.
The elders who appear at the end of the earlier fight, giving Ren Woxing a chance to leave, are Ding Mian and Yue Hou, not Ding Mian and Fei Bin.
Zuo Lengchan’s cold-ice true qi is likened to Heibaizi’s Mysterious Heaven Finger. Both are of the extreme yin and the extreme cold, and Zuo Lengchan’s neili is much deeper.
A short passage is added to the bout between Chongxu and Xiang Wentian. Nothing shows which man is the stronger, the bout matters, and everyone watches in dread.
When Yue Buqun hints that Yue Lingshan could be given to Linghu Chong, Linghu Chong adds that he has accommodated her in this way many times before and knows he can do it again.

Chapter 28, Accumulated snow

Ren Yingying adds that, in the spring of the year before, she and the Elder of the Green Bamboo left Blackwood Cliff to wander, and that she settled in Green Bamboo Lane because she liked it.
During her confinement she has, besides the monk who brings firewood and rice every ten days, a serving woman who washes her clothes and cooks each day.
She learns that Linghu Chong is bringing the heroes to Shaolin. The previous text had her learn it from Tian Boguang. His part in that meeting is removed.

Chapter 29, The zhangmen

Yihe proposes that, since her shifu’s generation uses the character ding, Linghu Chong might take the name Linghu Dingchong. The collation also notes corrected forms of address. Zheng E calls Dingxian and Dingyi “the two honoured teachers” rather than “the two shishu”. Yiwen’s “two shishu” becomes “Shifu and Shishu”. The collation found these while reading, and judges that the old forms of address in the school would not bear close study.
The disciples sent after Aunt Yu and Yiwen are Yiguang and Yikong, not Yiguang and Yishi.
The chain of joke names around Tian Boguang’s new name, 不可不戒, gains one more. Peach Root Immortal supplies “the utmost of it stands to reason that one must not fail to abstain” (理所当然不可不戒之至). In the previous text they could not think of a further name.
Never Abstain goes up the mountain and is recognised by his daughter. In the previous text the episode was told as Yilin confiding in him. The collation reads the new wording as the moment Yilin learns who her father is.
The Qingcheng School is added to the schools that send gifts, before the Beggars’ Guild. Kunlun, Diancang, Emei, Kongtong, and the Beggars’ Guild were already named.
The Songshan party that comes to stop the succession is led by Ding Mian, not Yue Hou. Linghu Chong refers to the forged cult masters at Longquan, and to the greater show of force compared with Liu Zhengfeng’s ceremony, because Songshan now has disciples of Taishan, Huashan, and Hengshan with it. His retort names Ding Mian and the rest of the treacherous men of Songshan, not Yue Hou alone.

Chapter 30, Secret deliberation

The Fujian Shaolin house where Abbot Hongye obtained the Sunflower Manual is in Quanzhou, not Putian.
Linghu Chong says again that Northern Hengshan no longer takes orders from Zuo Lengchan, and that he will not attend the merger on Songshan on the fifteenth of the next month.
The collation, in a note of its own rather than a change to the prose, lists the four of the Ten Elders who have not submitted: Jia Bu of the Azure Dragon Hall, killed just before; Shangguan Yun of the White Tiger Hall; Tong Baixiong of the Wind and Thunder Hall, who will die on Blackwood Cliff at Dongfang Bubai’s hands; and Qin Weibang, already killed at Plum Manor. Of the six who have submitted, only Bao Dachu, Wang Cheng, and Sang Sanniang have appeared.
The end of the chapter, from Yang Lianting walking in to “ask for instructions”, is moved to the opening of chapter 31.

Chapter 31, Embroidering flowers

Ren Woxing does not say aloud the lines on castration. He thinks them, and two further lines are added: refine the elixir and take the medicine, so that inside and outside are opened together. The remark that the manual would suit a eunuch is likewise only a thought. In this text only Ren Woxing knows that Dongfang Bubai has castrated himself, and later passages are altered to match. The collation’s guess is that Jin Yong did not want the lines spoken in Ren Yingying’s presence.
On the way down from Blackwood Cliff, Linghu Chong says he will always be Granny’s good grandson, and she says she will always be a little girl at the young xia’s side.

Chapter 32, Merging sects

Linghu Chong keeps a second plan. If Songshan tries to win by numbers, the heroes lodged at the Hengshan houses are to come at once.
The Junji Chan courtyard, once a great Buddhist temple, is said to have become a Daoist house.
Across this chapter and the next, a number of speeches are lightly rewritten. Peach Leaf Immortal’s line about who should lead gains the word “certainly” before “it stands to reason”. He has been unhappy with Peach Root Immortal’s longer joke-name, and decides that his own wording is the perfect one.

Chapter 34, Capturing the commander

Yue Buqun sets Ding Mian, Lu Bai, and Tang Yinge together to help the blinded Zuo Lengchan with the Songshan branch. Ding Mian has been the deputy all along. Tang Yinge is a man who has gained Zuo Lengchan’s trust during the past year. In the previous text the deputies were Lu Bai and Tang Yinge, and Tang Yinge had been the standing deputy.

Chapter 35, Taking revenge

The Evil-Warding Swordplay, besides beginning from neigong, now requires refining an inner elixir and taking heating medicines, in line with the added lines on the Sunflower Manual. The previous text said that without castration the desire would burn, the practice would go awry, and the man would die rigid. Where Lin Pingzhi says that Yue Buqun’s castration would make the jianghu laugh, the Third Edition prints 腾笑 rather than 贻笑. The collation thinks this may be a misprint.
When Yue Lingshan says that only her mother never suspected Linghu Chong of taking the manual, Ren Yingying adds, in thought, “and I”.
Ning Zhongze adds that if Zuo Lengchan killed all four schools to the last person, he would have no one left to merge with. Yue Buqun answers that Zuo Lengchan could hang a sign on each of the four mountains and staff it with underlings.

Chapter 36, Mourning the departed

Only Ren Yingying, Lin Pingzhi, and Yue Lingshan wonder how Zuo Lengchan knows so much, and they see at once that the man in the carriage has heard them and is speaking for himself, not relaying a message. Linghu Chong does not share the thought. He has not overheard the couple, and Ren Yingying has not yet told him.
Ren Yingying adds a reason why two players improve faster than one: Nie Zheng and his sister were deeply attached, and the two hearts melt together.
Linghu Chong’s judgement that Elder Ge is without wit is deleted.

Chapter 37, Forced marriage

Ji Wushi adds that even if the Six Immortals could write the word “plot”, they would get the strokes wrong.
When White Bear curses eighteen generations of a mosquito’s ancestors, Black Bear answers that those ancestors are also mosquitoes, and asks how White Bear means to manage it.
Never Abstain, telling how he praised a woman who had praised the infant Yilin, calls it a return of courtesy.
If Yilin cannot beat Yue Buqun, the others will close a sword formation around him and leave the killing stroke to her.
Linghu Chong, fearing he might be left to starve, adds that with neither water nor rice there would be no “flavour” to speak of.

Chapter 38, Annihilation

Ren Yingying has Zhou Gutong take off his robe so that Linghu Chong can change out of the old woman’s clothes.
The two order elders Linghu Chong and Ren Yingying meet are Sang Sanniang and Wang Cheng, not Sang Sanniang and Qin Weibang. Qin Weibang never submitted, and was killed at Plum Manor.
Linghu Chong calls Lan Fenghuang “little sister”. In the previous text she was older, and he called her “big sister”.
After they have survived the cave, he kisses Ren Yingying on the lips. In the previous text he kissed her cheek.

Chapter 39, Refusing the alliance

While the search for the imprisoned Hengshan disciples goes on, he does not forget Lin Pingzhi. The collation places the addition at the end of chapter 38, and says he sends several Hengshan disciples to bring Lin Pingzhi out of the rear cave. In the Third Edition the line stands in this chapter: he asks several of the nuns to seize Lin Pingzhi at the mouth of the cave on the Cliff of Contemplation.
After Ren Woxing agrees to the marriage, Linghu Chong calls him father-in-law and himself son-in-law. In the previous text he still said “Order Leader” and “this junior”.

Chapter 40, The melodious resolution

When Linghu Chong cannot hold a sword, Qin Juan stands beside him with the sword and says she will pass it to him when he says the word. In the previous text she hung it on his belt. Later lines are adjusted to match.
The gift to Fangzheng is a string of bodhi beads mixed with agarwood, which Xiang Wentian says an elder of the order obtained on a famous mountain in India. It is no longer described only as a very old string of agarwood beads. The land given to Hengshan rises from three thousand mu to five thousand.
Besides Northern Hengshan, whose leadership Linghu Chong has passed to Yiqing, each of the other four schools has chosen a new leader and is slowly training people and recovering its strength. A further sentence says that for three years Linghu Chong has kept Mo Da in mind, that men sent to ask at Hengshan found a new leader installed, and that no news of Mo Da had come. The collation reads this as Mo Da having left his post after he came out of the cave.
A closing passage is added. Linghu Chong comes to see that freedom is not a matter of Ren Yingying binding him. In a world of action, so long as one has no improper desire, one suffers no improper bond, and that is to wander at ease.

Afterword

The Third Edition adds an afterword. It argues that Wei Xiaobao’s values should not be used to judge Xiao Feng, or Ning Zhongze’s suicide, and it speaks of castration and of same-sex attachment. It also says that Laughing in the Wind was revised less than the other novels.

External links

新修版《笑傲江湖》改动明细 by Captain0312 on Douban (Chinese)

Captain0312, 新修版《笑傲江湖》改动明细, Douban, 7 November 2019. ↩