Xianxia novel

There are many ancient Chinese texts that could sometimes be classified as xianxia, such as the Classic of Mountains and Seas from the Warring States period, or the Legend of the White Snake. Xianxia novels were popularized during the Republic of China period, but it was the 1932 novel Legend of the Sword Heroes from Zu Mountain that sparked the modern popularity of the genre. In the 21st century, the genre took on new life with the advent of online publishing, with sites such as Qidian.com, Zongheng.com, and 17k.com giving a platform for authors to reach wide audiences with high-volume, serialized content. It was popularized outside of China primarily by fan translations in the early 2000s. Novels such as Stellar Transformations, Coiling Dragon, Martial God Asura, and I Shall Seal the Heavens led to a boom in such fan translations. Later, official licensed translations began to be published by websites such as Wuxiaworld.com and Webnovel.com.[2] This genre is also a staple of Chinese television shows, movies, manhua, and games.

Protagonists are usually "cultivators" (修者 xiūzhě, 修士 xiūshì, or 修仙者 xiūxiānzhě) who seek to become Xian (often translated as Immortal), attaining eternal life, supernatural powers, and incredible levels of strength. The fictional cultivation practiced in xianxia is heavily based on the real-life meditation practice Qigong.

The stories usually include elements such as gods, immortals, demons, devils, ghosts, monsters, magical treasures, immortal items, medicinal pills, and the like.[1] They often take place in a "cultivation world" where cultivators engage in fierce and usually deadly struggles to acquire the resources they need to grow stronger. Oftentimes, the initial setting is reminiscent of Ancient China, but the stories usually become cosmic in nature, with the protagonists attaining godlike abilities, sometimes creating their own planets, galaxies or universes. While the primary focus is action and adventure, there are also romance-heavy stories.[3]

Perhaps one of the earliest successful xianxia movies was the 1983 Hong Kong film Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain, which was followed up by the 2001 film The Legend of Zu.[4] Other film adaptations of novels have been well received, such as the 2017 romantic xianxia film Once Upon a Time and the 2019 Jade Dynasty.

Overall, television shows are more numerous than films when it comes to xianxia adaptations.[5]

Some of the most popular and successful Chinese TV series in recent times are of the xianxia genre, such as Ashes of Love, Eternal Love and The Untamed.[6][7] It's worth noting all three dramas are adapted from popular novels published on Jinjiang Literature City. The already existing fandom of xianxia, and other fantasy novels has lead to most new television and film titles to be adaptions and their warm reception by fans, along with increased exposure and high rates of anticipation.

The characters forming xianxia are xian (仙) and xia (侠). Xian literally means immortal, not in the sense of immortality, but in the sense of the transcendent being from Chinese mythology. Xia is usually translated as hero, but specifically implies a person who is brave, chivalrous, and righteous.[8]

During the initial explosion of popularity of Chinese fantasy novels with English-speaking audiences, one of the most popular translation websites was Wuxiaworld. Because of the use of "wuxia" in the name of the site, many readers began to use that term to describe all of genres of Chinese fantasy novels. In reality, although xianxia shares many characteristics with wuxia, they are in fact separate genres. Later, as more readers came to understand the difference between wuxia and xianxia, they began to use xianxia to refer to all types of Chinese cultivation novels, when in fact there are some unique genres that are not xianxia, such as xuanhuan, qihuan, etc.[9]

• Xian (Taoism)
• Wuxia