page_title: Moving Sands
section_title: Literature
hierarchical_section_title: Moving Sands / Mythological geographic context / Literature and poetry / Literature
context_page_description: The Moving Sands also known as the Flowing Sands is an important feature in the mythological geography of Chinese literature, including novels and poetry over a course of over two millennia from the Warring States to early Han dynasty era poetry of the Chuci onward to the present. In his poem "Li Sao", author Qu Yuan describes an aerial crossing of the Moving Sands on a shamanic spiritual Journey to Kunlun. "Moving Sands forms one of the obstacles the fictional version of the monk Xuanzang and companions must cross over on their mission to fetch the Buddhist scriptures from India and return them to Tang China. In this story, Xuanzang recruits the former sand demon and eater-of-humans Sha Wujing who is living in Moving Sands as his third disciple. Sometimes the Moving Sands seem to depict drifting dunes or desert, sometimes a sand or quicksand-like river, in which case, in Chinese, it would be
context_section_description: In the novel Journey to the West the Moving Sand river forms one of the barriers on the way, one of the many difficult areas which the Xuanzang the Monk, Sun Wukong the Monkey, and their companion must cross over. By the mercy and help of the Buddhist goddess Guanyin, who by forethought and prior preparation made it happen, Xuanzang met his third disciple at the Moving (or Flowing) Sands, who joins them after a brief misunderstanding.
caption: The heroic monk Sha Wujing, as pictured in the Journey to the West
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